Аватар. Сценарий фильма (eng)

Grace hands Josh a cup of coffee.

GRACE: Let's go amigo. Time to take flesh: and walk the earth.

JOSH/AVATAR blinks awake, looking up at the inside of the cathedral tree. Shafts of sunlight stream down into the high vault above him through gaps in the "braided" trunks. Flying stingbats twinkle silently high up in a shaft of light.

Grace comes by, snapping her fingers.

GRACE: Another beautiful day in hell.

Josh walks outside, looking for Zuleika. We see village life among the Tsumongwi... kids playing, people cooking, cleaning fish. Mo'at tells Josh where to find her daughter.

CUT TO Zuleika bowfishing from a rock in the pool below a large waterfall. Josh emerges from the trees nearby and freezes, watching her.

With deep concentration she stands still as a statue. Then the spear-like arrow shoots into the water, and Zuleika jumps in waistdeep to retrieve it. She holds up a good sized fish, and grins at Josh.

She comes up out of the water, a dripping primeval beauty. She pulls the arrow out of the fish and hands it and the bow to Josh. His turn.

CUT TO JOSH. Flailing about in the pool, trying to shoot a fish. It's a lot harder than it looks. Zuleika has to turn away, she's laughing so much. Finally Josh nails a fish about four inches long, and holds it up proudly.

JOSH: Anybody can hit the big ones.

TSU TE and another young hunter, TRI COOCHYESTEWA, come out of the forest leading TWO DOMESTICATED DIREHORSES. They control the huge animals with a leather nose-ring, but there is no sign of bridle, reins or saddle... only a woven grass surcingle around the animal's chest. The direhorses drink from the edge of the pool.

Tsu Te disdainfully watches Josh slogging out of the pool with his tiny prize.

ZULEIKA: This is Tsu Te.

JOSH: Gezundheit. Pleased to meet ya.

TSU: When are you going away?

JOSH: Direct. I like that. It's fresh.: Actually, I hoped to stay awhile.: Pick up a few hunting tips from: Zuleika.

Zuleika speaks to Tsu Te in their language. In subtitles we learn that the Matriarch has instructed her to teach the alien the ways of the forest, to see if it can be done. Tsu Te sneers at that, and says something which needs no translation.

Tsu Te flips his head and catches the end of his long queue in one hand. With the other hand he gently takes one moth-like antennae of his direhorse, and bends it down toward him. Next, he does an amazing thing... he touches the end of his hair to the end of the antenna, which looks like a feather. The "hair" comes alive, rapidly interweaving with the feather-like tendrils. They knit together, forming what Josh realizes is a neural interface, a direct plug-in to the horse's nervous system.

In one fluid move, Tsu Te hooks his bare foot into the bottom of the surcingle and vaults up onto the back of his direhorse. He grips the horse's flanks with his legs, and guides it with direct motor commands from the neural hookup. The animal has become an extension of his own body. And his hands are free to fire a bow.

The two hunters wheel around and ride into the woods along a game trail. Josh realizes how much he has to learn.

MONTAGE OF ZULEIKA TEACHING:

We see a sequence of vignettes over the next few days, of Josh and Zuleika together, in the village and the forest. She is teaching him their ways.

We see her pointing out different plants, and how they can be used. Which juices or saps or leaves can be used to attract, or repel certain animals. Which plant poisons are good for the arrows. What to avoid. How to walk. How to be invisible.

ZULEIKA stands behind him, correcting his position as he draws a longbow. Her hands move on his arm, his shoulders, correcting his stance. Aware of her touch, Josh finds it hard to concentrate.

NEAR A TRAIL we see them crouching behind concealing foliage as a herd of Hammerhead Titanotheres walk past. We see only the legs, huge as treetrunks. In the middle of the herd, a couple of babies walk, sheltered from predators among their parents legs.

ZULEIKA whirls a bolo round and round above her head. She hurls it and the two balls, connected by a leather thong, whistle through the air. They wrap around a sapling being used as a target. Josh tries it. The bolo winds up wrapped around his head, with one of the balls hitting him painfully in the nose. Zuleika has to lean against a tree she's laughing so hard.

NIGHT SHOT, from overhead... we see Josh and Zuleika bowfishing from a dugout canoe over the glowing anemones at the bottom of a pool. A large fish swims silhouetted against the glow. ZAP! Josh spears it.

SHOT OF ZULEIKA backlit by the sun. She is talking a mile a minute, gesturing rapidly, explaining something. We don't hear the words. Like Josh, we are just spellbound watching her.