Bus Ride
A screenplay for a film based on experience.
by
Matthew Traucht
Screen is black. The sound of heavy traffic is audible. Squealing airbrakes from a large vehicle become increasingly audible, drowning out the other traffic sounds. As squealing stops and airbrakes hiss, fast fade up from black to show red and blue doors of a bus opening. Visual is a low-resolution video, lighting is defused daylight, aesthetic is of handheld video. Camera “climbs” aboard.
Driver is anHispanic American male in uniform. He does not look at camera but instead stares beyond as if at the next passenger to board. Camera is at chest level, wide-angle, tight focus and demonstrates ascent up stairs, pivots left and pans from right to left. The bus is fairly crowded, especially towards the front. The passengers are diverse in race, age, and apparent socio-economic status. Some are reading newspapers, textbooks, paperbacks; some conversing with those around them or on cellular telephones; some are facing the front of the bus seemingly lost in thought. Some notice the presence of the camera and react with nervous smiles, others look away in annoyance and with rolled eyes or stare back blankly. The camera slowly maneuvers to the rear (but not the back) of the bus, turns slowly, lowers as if coming to rest. The bus shakes in obvious movement.
Audio is general ambient noise; amalgamation of conversation and bus motor and brake sounds continuously alternating. No one particular conversation carries through the din but individual voices and fragmented tales drift in and out. Sometimes Spanish is heard but predominantly it is English.
Video is wide angle so that both rows of passengers are visible. The technique remains handheld which slowly drifts emphasizing the motions of travel. Camera begins a slow zoom, brings 2-3 feet away in to fill the screen. As video moves in on face of Passenger A in profile, minor facial twitches occur as if in talking. Audio “hones in” on single male voice apparently belonging to the man in frame and the din lowers in level a few degrees. Passenger A is speaking to someone in front of him.
Passenger A: (unshaven, late-middle aged, dressed in rag-tag clothing) ... pulled me in. Said ‘Whata ya doing?’ I wasn’t doing anything. Nothing. They pulled on me, sat me down, opened me up. (Pause.) Yeah. Filled it. (pokes a finger at a tooth) They got openings everyday.
Camera pulls back from Passenger A as audio fills with hissing airbrakes which give way to ambient of the bus interior. Bus is traveling through city streets made apparent as camera looks out the side window though city-scape is non-descript and overexposed. Camera is not to full wide angle but instead keeps subjects at 5-6 feet. Camera movement is slow, moves from back of head to back of head, moves to profile of Passenger B near the front facing the aisle with her back against the windows. Camera zooms slowly on an elderly woman, well-dressed, reading a periodical. Camera continues to zoom in to a tight shot of her clouded, cataract eye which slowly blinks and moves as if in reading. Camera holds this shot until uncomfortable then widens to 5-6 feet.
Audio from the din lowers again for the emphasis of a male voice as the camera slowly traces through interior and exterior shots of the bus and the modern city. A Brooklyn accent is distinguishable.
Brooklyn Accent: (in short emphatic sentences) Said do you wanna buy a knife? Five bucks. Under nine inches. Buck-knife. Blue pearl handle and just sharpened. Here. Look.
Audio returns to the din of bus interior as the camera looks through a dirty window at humanoid statues in a plaza as the bus pauses at a stoplight. Camera hovers on statues; in background and slightly out of focus, two Caucasian adolescents on skateboards wave at the camera apparently trying to get the attention of the bus driver. They are racing across the plaza. Camera follows them keeping focus as they approach. Audio of bus accelerating as the skateboarders are left behind, camera tracks them as they change direction and try to keep up with the bus.
Female Voice: (Over the din, but meekly) Hey. There’s someone trying to catch the bus.
Male Voice: (Over the din, with authority) Should’ve gotten up earlier.
Camera loses track, swings back inside the bus to focus on the mirror that allows the driver to observe his passengers. Driver’s eyes are looking into the mirror as he adjusts it to look back at the camera. Driver’s eyes alternate between the road in front of him and the camera behind him as the camera closes the distance until the mirror fills the frame. His eyes are not accusatory but are aware of the presence of the camera. As the camera maintains focus, audio of bus stopping, doors opening.
Young Male Voice: (Over the din) Thanks man.
Second Male Voice: (Over the din) Yeah thanks. Can I have a transfer?
In the mirror, the driver’s eyes look away. Camera slowly pulls back to 5-6 feet and follows the movement of the two boys who just boarded. Skateboards in hand, the boys look into camera then look away as they walk past. Camera follows them from behind showing large backpacks with blankets, shoes, and jackets tied on. There is graffiti on the backpack of one of the boys. The boys turn and sit in the back of the bus facing forward, now oblivious of the camera. Camera remains fixed on the Boys, bus continues motion, din lowers as the clearing of a throat is audible.
Male Voice: (Clearing his throat) Chris. My name’s Chris.
Camera approaches wider angle quickly to show an African American male in his twenties wearing a stained trench coat and fingerless gloves. “Chris” extends his right hand as the camera comes to rest. Freeze-frame on the two skateboarders looking at Chris and his hand just entering from the left. Din lowers and the voices of Chris, Skateboarder Left and Skateboarder Right become plainly audible.
Chris: (Overly- friendly, in center channel) Where are you from?
Skateboarder Left: (Not necessarily friendly, in left channel) We’re from nowhere. We’re from everywhere.
Skateboarder Right: (Friendly, right channel) Come on. Seattle by way of Butte by way of thumb and board.
Chris: You guys going to Noonday? Today’s razor day at Noonday. Its a church.
Skateboarder Right: No. We need to get something to eat.
Chris: They serve from eleven to one-thirty. I need to get a shave.
Skateboarder Right: Let’s go get a razor.
Video returns to real-time. Focus is now on the fingerless-gloved hand clutching a red New Testament with strips of paper marking multiple pages. Audio returns to din. Camera pulls back to focus out of window. The bus is crawling through heavy construction. Audio picks up beeping backing signal from the heavy equipment outside the bus. Also, a jackhammer and an indiscriminant scraping of metal on concrete. Camera with long shot 12-14 feet slowly sweeps across large building construction in an already heavily built section of city. Cranes swing overhead contrasted orange against blue and white of the sky with low clouds. Deep caverns of darkness amongst girders and I-beams and dangling wires, atmosphere is both smoky and dusty as light beams streak through. Oily patches on dark soils. Forms of construction workers pass in and out of frame as the bus starts to accelerate and pulls away from the congestion.
Video returns to bus interior, floats across passengers; some are new and some are those from the first or second or third pan. Camera passes the mirror, the driver’s eyes still on the camera. Camera pans to young Asian girl near the front of the bus. She cradles a sleeping toddler in her arms. She wears no coat, the toddler is wrapped in it. She steadies with the other hand a baby-carriage loaded with plastic grocery bags. Audio of din lowers as two men off-screen are heard conversing. Camera floats idly centering on the toddler, his mother, the plastic bags, the wheels of the carriage, her face, the toddler, et cetera.
Passenger C: (Off camera) I got an interview this morning. Temp.
Passenger D: (Off camera) I’m not working today. Got some beers instead.
Passenger C: Yeah? I usually hit the industrial strength first thing then back off to that shit. That keeps me from getting heartburn.
Passenger D: Yep.
Pause in conversation. Camera follows the hand of the young mother who pulls the cable to signal a stop. She stands and the child does not stir. She shifts him to the other shoulder and struggles with the carriage down the steps of the bus after it has come to a stop. Someone outside the bus helps her with the carriage.
Passenger C: Sell me one of those for a buck?
Passenger D: Give me one of those cigarettes too.
Passenger C: Here.
Din returns to the fore of the audio. Camera rises as if to get off at the same stop as the young mother. Camera winds backward through the bus focusing briefly from a short distance on each face. Some passengers notice the camera, others do not. They react similarly to those from before. As the camera approaches the rear exit, it zooms in on the headphones and the Cleveland Indians ball cap of a teenage Native American male sitting near the door. The shutter speed of the camera is adjusted to “slow down” the action as the zoom closes in on the headphones. The din slowly recedes to the tinny sounding audio of a local radio program: Staccato electronic fiddle fills the soundtrack as the camera descends the stairs into the over-exposed street. Audio of music lowers as the sound of the bus pulling away becomes deafening and distorted. Then silence.
Fade to black.