Inglourious Basterds (3 page)

So, Monsieur LaPadite, let me propose a question. In this time of war, what is your number-one duty? Is it to fight the Germans
in the name of France to your last breath? Or is it to harass the occupying army to the best of your ability? Or is it to
protect the poor, unfortunate victims of warfare who can not protect themselves? Or is your number-one duty in this time of
bloodshed to protect those very beautiful women who constitute your family?

The Colonel lets the last statement stand.

That was a question, Monsieur LaPadite. In this time of war, what do you consider your number-one duty?

To protect my family.

Now, my job dictates that I must have my men enter your home and conduct a
thorough
search before I can officially cross your family’s name off my list.

(CON’T)

And if there are any irregularities to be found, rest assured, they will be.

That is, unless you have something to tell me that will make the conducting of a search unnecessary.

(pause)

I might add also that any information that makes the performing of my duty easier will not be met with punishment. Actually
quite the contrary, it will be met with reward.

And that reward will be your family will cease to be harassed in any way by the German military during the rest of our occupation
of your country.

The farmer, pipe in mouth, stares across the table at his German opponent.

You are sheltering enemies of the state, are you not?

Yes.

You’re sheltering them underneath your floorboards, aren’t you?

Yes.

Point out to me the areas where they’re hiding.

The farmer points out the areas on the floor where the Dreyfuses are underneath.

Since I haven’t heard any disturbance, I assume that while they’re listening, they don’t speak English?

Yes.

I’m going to switch back to French now, and I want you to follow my masquerade—is that clear?

Yes.

Col. Landa stands up from the table and, switching to FRENCH, says, SUBTITLED IN ENGLISH:

Monsieur LaPadite, I thank you for your milk and your hospitality. I do believe our business here is done.

The Nazi officer opens the front door and silently motions for his men to approach the house.

Madame LaPadite, I thank you for your time. We shan’t be bothering your family any longer.

The soldiers enter the doorway. Col. Landa silently points out the area of the floor the Jews are hiding under.

So, Monsieur and Madame LaPadite, I bid you adieu.

He motions to the soldiers with his index finger.

They TEAR UP the wooden floor with MACHINE-GUN FIRE.

The little farmhouse is filled with SMOKE, DUST, SPLINTERS, SCREAMS, BULLET CASINGS, and even a little BLOOD.

With a hand motion from the colonel, the soldiers cut off their gunfire. The colonel keeps his finger in the air to indicate
silence.

UNDERNEATH THE FLOORBOARDS

The entire Dreyfus family lies dead. Except for sixteen-year-old SHOSANNA, who miraculously escaped being struck by the Nazis’
bullets. With her dead family surrounding her, the young girl goes for freedom (represented by a wire-mesh vent).

COL. LANDA

hears a movement underneath the floor, looks down, and sees a SHAPE moving forward between the planks in the floor.

It’s the girl. Nobody move!

VENT

is KICKED open, the girl SPRINGS out.

COL. LANDA

as he crosses the floor, sees the young girl RUNNING toward the cover of the woods. He unlatches the window and opens it.
Shosanna is perfectly FRAMED in the windowsill.

SHOSANNA

RUNNING toward the woods. Farmhouse and Colonel in the window in B.G.

FILTHY BARE FEET

SLAPPING against wet grass.

CU SHOSANNA’S FACE

same as an animal being chased by a predator: FLIGHT—PANIC—FEAR.

SHOSANNA’S POV

the safety of trees, getting closer.

COL. LANDA

framed by the window, takes his WALTER, and straight-arm aims at the fleeing Jew, cocking back the hammer with his thumb.

COL. LANDA POV

of the fleeing Shosanna.

CU COL. LANDA

SLOW ZOOM into his eyes as he aims.

PROFILE CU SHOSANNA

mad dash for life.

COL. LANDA

changes his mind. He yells to the rat fleeing the trap, heading for the safety of the woodpile, in FRENCH SUBTITLED IN ENGLISH:

Au revoir, Shosanna!

SHOSANNA

makes it to the woods and is gone.

The S.S. colonel closes the window.

EXT—DAIRY FARM—DAY

The Nazi town car DRIVES away.

EXT—NAZI TOWN CAR (MOVING)—DAY

Col. Hans Landa sits in the backseat of the convertible that’s speeding away from the French farmhouse.

Landa speaks to his driver in GERMAN, SUBTITLE IN ENGLISH:

Herrman, I sense a question on your lips? Out with it?

Why did you allow an enemy of the state to escape?

Oh, I don’t think the state is in too much danger, do you?

I suppose not.

I’m glad you see it my way. Besides, not putting a bullet in the back of a fifteen-year-old girl and allowing her to escape
are not necessarily the same thing. She’s a young girl, no food, no shelter, no shoes, who’s just witnessed the massacre of
her entire family.

She may not survive the night. And after word spreads about what happened today, it’s highly unlikely she will find any willing
farmers to extend her aid.

If I had to guess her fate, I’d say she’ll probably be turned in by some neighbor. Or she’ll be spotted by some German soldier.
Or we’ll find her body in the woods, dead from starvation or exposure. Or, perhaps… she’ll survive. She will elude capture.
She will escape to America. She will move to New York City, where she will be elected President of the United States.

The S.S. colonel chuckles at his little funny.

FADE UP

CHAPTER TITLE APPEARS:

FADE UP

EXT—SOMEWHERE IN ENGLAND—DAY

A bunch of SOLDIERS are lined up at attention.

LIEUTENANT ALDO RAINE, a hillbilly from the mountains of Tennessee, walks down the line. He recruits the men the Germans will
later call “The Basterds.” Lt. Aldo has one defining physical characteristic, a ROPE BURN around his neck—as if, once upon
a time, he survived a LYNCHING. The scar will never once be mentioned.

My name is Lt. Aldo Raine, and I’m puttin’ together a special team. And I need me eight soldiers. Eight—Jewish—American—soldiers.
Now y’all might of heard rumors about the armada happening soon. Well, we’ll be leavin’ a little earlier. We’re gonna be dropped
into France, dressed as civilians. And once we’re in enemy territory, as a bushwackin’, guerrilla army, we’re gonna be doin’
one thing, and one thing only—
Killin’ Nazis.

The members of the National Socialist Party have conquered Europe through murder, torture, intimidation, and terror. And that’s
exactly what we’re gonna do to them. Now I don’t know ’bout y’all? But I sure as hell didn’t come down from the goddamn Smoky
Mountains, cross five thousand miles of water, fight my way through half Sicily, and then jump out of a fuckin’ air-o-plane
to teach the Nazis lessons in humanity. Nazi ain’t got no humanity. They’re the foot soldiers of a Jew-hatin’, mass-murderin’
maniac, and they need to be destroyed.

That’s why any and every son-of-a-bitch we find wearin’ a Nazi uniform, they’re gonna die.

(CON’T)

We will be cruel to the Germans, and through our cruelty, they will know who we are. They will find the evidence of our cruelty
in the disemboweled, dismembered, and disfigured bodies of their brothers we leave behind us. And the Germans will not be
able to help themselves from imagining the cruelty their brothers endured at our hands, and our bootheels, and the edge of
our knives.

And the Germans will be sickened by us. And the Germans will talk about us. And the Germans will fear us.

And when the Germans close their eyes at night and their subconscious tortures them for the evil they’ve done, it will be
thoughts of us that it tortures them with.

He stops pacing and looks at everybody.

Sound good?

They all say:

Yes, sir!

That’s what I like to hear. But I got a word of warning to all would-be warriors. When you join my command, you take on debit.
A debit you owe me, personally. Every man under my command owes me one hundred Nazi scalps. And I want my scalps.

And all y’all will git me one hundred Nazi scalps, taken from the heads of one hundred dead Nazis… or you will die trying.

CUT TO

EXT—MOUNTAIN TOP CHALET—DAY

A huge chalet on a misty mountaintop in Bavaria.

A SUBTITLE APPEARS:

INT—BERCHTESGADEN—DAY

In a huge room, ADOLF HITLER pounds on a big table with his fist as he rants at TWO GERMAN GENERALS.

They speak GERMAN SUBTITLED IN ENGLISH:

How much more of these Jew swine must I endure? They butcher my men like they were fish bait! This pack of filthy degenerates
are doing what the Russian army didn’t and Patton’s army couldn’t—turning soldiers of the Third Reich into superstitious old
women!

Just the cowards among them, mein Führer.

Hitler pounds furiously on the desk with his fist.

No, no, no, no, no, no! I have heard the rumors myself! Soldiers of the Third Reich, who have brought the world to their knees,
now pecking and clucking like chickens. Do you know the latest rumor they’ve conjured up, in their fear-induced delirium?
The one that beats my boys with a bat. The one they call “the Bear Jew”… is a golem.

An avenging Jew angel, conjured up by a vengeful rabbi, to smite the Aryans!

Mein Führer, this is just soldiers’ gossip. No one really believes the Bear Jew is a golem.

Why not? They seem to be able to elude capture like an apparition.

They seem to be able to appear and disappear at will.

(CON’T)

You want to prove they’re flesh and blood? Then BRING THEM TO ME! I will hang them naked, by their heels, from the Eiffel
Tower! And then throw their bodies in the sewers, for the rats of Paris to feast!

The Führer sits down at the table to compose himself and wipe his greasy black hair out of his face.

(disgusted)

The Bear Jew.

He hits the button on the intercom on his desk.

Kliest!

KLIEST’S VOICE comes out of the intercom:

Yes, mein Führer.

I have an order I want relayed to all German soldiers stationed in France. The Jew degenerate known as the Bear Jew henceforth
is never to be referred to as the Bear Jew again. We will cease to aid the Americans any longer in their attempt to undermine
the German soldier’s psyche. Did you get that, Kliest?

Yes, mein Führer. Do you still wish to see Private Butz?

Who and what is a private Butz?

He’s the soldier you wanted to see personally. His squad was ambushed by Lt. Raine’s Jews. He was its only survivor.

Indeed I do want to see him. Thank you for reminding me. Send him in.

CUT TO

EXT—FRENCH WOODS—DAY

CU FACE OF DEAD GERMAN SOLDIER

His head lies on the ground, horizontal. A HAND reaches into the FRAME, KNOCKS aside the dead German patriot’s helmet, and
grabs a handful of the cadaver’s blond hair. A LARGE KNIFE ENTERS THE FRAME and begins SLICING ALONG THE HAIRLINE.

This process is called
SCALPING
.

After SLICING is complete, the SCALP easily peels off, like a banana skin.

GERMAN PRISONERS PVT. BUTZ AND SGT. RACHTMAN

on their knees, hand behind their heads.

Pvt. Butz NARRATES the scene in GERMAN SUBTITLED IN ENGLISH:

Werner and I were the only ones left alive after the ambush. While one man guarded us, the rest removed the hair. All the
Basterds wore German scalps tied to their belts.

CU SCALPS

hanging from belts.

They not only took valuables…

WE SEE QUICK CUTS OF

rings, weapons, an iron cross, and somebody digging out a gold tooth with a knife, being removed from dead Germans.

… They also took their identification papers…

CU IDENTIFICATION PAPERS

taken from the inside pocket of a dead German’s uniform.

BASTERD PFC. UTIVICH

flips through the I.D. papers till he gets to the page that contains the German soldier’s name, statistics, and photo.

Sigfried Muller.

… They then removed their boots…

CU GERMAN COMBAT BOOTS

laces untied… boots pulled off…

SOCKS

removed, revealing dead bare feet…

BASTERDS

tossing the boots off a hill.

Throwing them away from the bodies…

DEAD GERMANS

scalps removed from their heads, pink bare feet…

The Basterds took their lives, their hair, their valuables, their identity, and finally their dignity in death.