The Engineer
by
Joe Murkijanian
Phone 323-253-6402
FADE IN:
BLACK SCREEN.
The sound of a river under ice. Steady. Indifferent. Then —
A low metallic groan. Stress on steel.
Then — closer, almost intimate — a man's breath. Shallow.
Held. Released.
We do not know whose breath it is yet.
OVER BLACK:
EASTERN BOSNIA — JANUARY 1994
FADE IN:
EXT. RIVER VALLEY — BRIDGE — NIGHT
Snow falling in heavy silence onto a stone-and-steel bridge
spanning a black river. Three arches. Mid-century
construction. Built to last.
There are no floodlights yet. Only the moon and the snow.
Four figures in white winter camouflage move along the
eastern pylon. They do not speak. Each man carries himself
like he has done this before.
The team leader — we do not see his face — checks his watch.
Holds up four fingers.
CLOSER on one of them: EMIR ZUKI?, 27. Beard frosted. Eyes
scanning the bank. His hands work a length of detcord with
the absent precision of a man who has stopped having to think
about it.
He looks up once at the bridge.
The way a builder looks at a building.
He looks away. Quickly. As if the look cost him something.
The team leader gestures. The team withdraws into the trees
on the eastern bank. Their tracks are already vanishing under
fresh snow.
A long beat. The river. The snow.
A flat crack — almost disappointing in its smallness — and a
section of the central span buckles. Holds. Then the steel
gives in a low structural groan, and a third of the bridge
collapses into the river in three pieces.
No fireball. No music. Just the river adjusting to its new
shape.
The sound of water finding the broken stone.
HOLD on the wound in the bridge. The black water.
Off-screen, very faint: a man weeping. One short, choked
exhalation. Cut off. Discipline returning.
A boot crunches in snow as he walks away.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Thriller","War"]
Ratings
Scene
2 -
Silent March of Fate
EXT. FOREST ROAD — DAY
Six days later. Grey light. A long column of men walks a
forest road, hands clasped behind their heads.
Two hundred of them. Bosniak men, ages sixteen to seventy.
Most without coats. They have been walking for nine hours.
VRS guards — Army of Republika Srpska — flank the column in
mismatched winter kit. Some carry AK-47s. One has a hunting
rifle.
The men do not speak. The only sound is boots on hard-packed
snow, and breath.
MARKO KOVA?, 49, walks third man, fourth row.
We see him in fragments first — the hands. Engineer's hands,
now cracked with cold. A wedding ring loose on a finger that
has lost weight around it.
Then his face. A face that has stopped expecting anything.
Stubble grey at the chin. A small bruise under the left eye,
days old, going yellow.
He does not look up.
A LADA NIVA crawls down the column at idle. A VRS JUNIOR
OFFICER, 30s, hangs out the passenger window with a
clipboard.
JUNIOR OFFICER
(reading)
Hadži?. Pilav. Mehmedovi?.
Three men step out of the column. A guard walks them into the
trees off the road. The column keeps walking.
Marko's breath catches. The smallest hitch in the rhythm.
He looks down at the snow at his boots.
A few seconds later — not even a full minute — three pistol
shots. Spaced. Unhurried.
The man walking beside Marko — older, sixty, wool cap, no
coat — makes a sound. Not a word. The sound that escapes a
man who has been holding it in for nine hours.
Marko's hand twitches. He does not turn his head.
The Lada crawls forward. The officer flips a page.
JUNIOR OFFICER (CONT'D)
Begovi?. Kova?.
Marko looks up for the first time.
His mouth opens fractionally. As if he meant to say
something. As if there was someone to say it to.
He closes it.
He steps out of the column. So does another man — BEGOVI?,
forty, beard, eyes already gone somewhere else. They are
walked to the side of the road.
Marko begins to walk toward the trees.
He is shaking. We see it now — the tremor in his left hand.
He clenches it. The tremor moves to the right.
JUNIOR OFFICER (CONT'D)
(without looking up)
Not you. The car.
Marko stops.
He looks at Begovi?, who is being walked into the trees.
Begovi? does not look back at him.
The junior officer holds open the back door of the Lada.
JUNIOR OFFICER (CONT'D)
(in Serbian)
Sjedi. Brzo.
(Sit. Quickly.)
Marko does not move.
JUNIOR OFFICER (CONT'D)
Sjedi!
Marko gets in. The door shuts.
Through the window, he watches the column begin to walk
again. The two hundred men. He watches them disappear around
a bend in the road.
A single pistol shot from the trees.
Marko closes his eyes. Very tight. For two seconds.
He opens them.
The Lada pulls away.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
3 -
Tension in Transit
INT. LADA NIVA — DAY
Marko in the back. The JUNIOR OFFICER driving. A GUARD in the
passenger seat, AK across his lap, half-turned to watch
Marko.
No one speaks.
Marko's hands are cuffed in front of him. He looks at them.
The tremor is still there.
He flexes the fingers, slowly. Tests for frostbite. Decides
he still has them.
He presses the hands hard between his thighs. To stop the
shake. To make it look like he is just warming them.
The guard sees this. The guard says nothing.
The Lada climbs. Switchbacks. Through the windshield: a
checkpoint. Hand-painted sign in Cyrillic. The guards wave
them through.
Marko's face registers nothing. But he stops looking out the
window.
THE GUARD
(in Serbian, casual)
Inženjer?
(Engineer?)
Marko does not answer.
THE GUARD (CONT'D)
Pitao sam te nešto.
(I asked you something.)
A long beat.
MARKO
(in Serbian, flat)
Yes.
THE GUARD
Sarajevo?
MARKO
Yes.
THE GUARD
(nodding, satisfied with
himself)
Knew it. Hands.
He turns back to face forward. The conversation is over.
The Lada descends into a valley. Fog. Through the fog, slowly
resolving — the bridge.
Floodlit now. Generators thrumming. Welding sparks falling
into the river. Men in dark coats swarming the broken span.
Marko sees it.
His face does not change. But something in his body does —
the smallest correction in his posture. A draftsman's
instinct: he is reading the wound.
His hands stop shaking.
He notices this. He notices that he has stopped shaking. His
eyes move down to his own hands.
For a moment he looks at them as if they belonged to someone
else.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
4 -
Negotiations at the Bridge
EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE — DAY
The Lada pulls up beside a row of prefab cabins. Smoke rises
from a stovepipe in one of them. Cyrillic stencil on the
door: KOMANDA.
Marko is pulled from the car. His cuffs are removed. He
flexes the wrists once.
The guard gestures him toward the cabin door.
He pauses on the threshold. Glances back at the bridge.
A man, midspan, is welding something to the broken edge. The
sparks fall in a slow arc into the river below.
Marko's lips part. He almost says — to no one, to himself —
something about the angle of the weld.
He catches it.
He looks away.
He goes inside.
CUT TO:
INT. OBRADOVI?'S OFFICE — CONTINUOUS
A coal stove. A drafting table. Maps pinned to the walls —
military maps, with red and blue tape arrows. Behind the
desk, a shelf with three books and a framed photograph.
The photograph faces the wall.
COLONEL DRAGAN OBRADOVI?, 52, VRS engineering corps, stands
at the stove pouring tea. He does not look up when Marko is
brought in.
OBRADOVI?
(in Serbian, to the guard)
Hvala. Možeš i?i.
(Thank you. You can go.)
The guard hesitates.
OBRADOVI?
Možeš i?i.
The guard leaves. Closes the door.
Obradovi? finishes pouring. Brings two cups to the desk. Sets
one in front of the chair opposite him. Sits. Gestures for
Marko to sit.
Marko sits.
Marko does not touch the tea.
A long beat.
Obradovi? opens a drawer. Removes a folder. Sets it on the
desk between them. Opens it.
Inside: a yellowing journal. Yugoslav Engineering Quarterly,
Vol. XXII, No. 3, 1987.
He turns it to a page. Slides it across to Marko, ninety
degrees so Marko can read it.
The article: Suspension Load Distribution in Variable-Span
Configurations. Author: Marko Kova?, Sarajevo Polytechnic.
Marko looks at it. Does not touch it.
For a moment — the smallest moment — his face changes. The
man he used to be is in the room.
He puts it away.
Obradovi? watches him do it. He has seen what crossed the
face. He gives no sign that he has.
OBRADOVI?
(in Serbian)
Footnote four. Page eighty-two.
Marko does not respond.
OBRADOVI?
You corrected an error in my dissertation. Without naming me.
Belgrade, 1986. I have wondered for seven years whether the
omission was kindness or contempt.
Marko looks up.
For the first time, the men's eyes meet.
Marko studies him. Does not recognize him.
MARKO
(in Serbian, quietly)
I don't remember.
OBRADOVI?
No. You wouldn't.
He closes the folder.
OBRADOVI?
Class 60 crossing. Ninety days from yesterday. The men
working the site live as long as the work continues.
A beat. Marko absorbs.
MARKO
How many men.
OBRADOVI?
Forty.
MARKO
What rations.
OBRADOVI?
Prisoner rations.
MARKO
No.
Obradovi?'s eyes flick up. The smallest reaction. He has been
surprised.
Not by the refusal.
By the negotiation.
OBRADOVI?
Go on.
MARKO
Infantry rations. I write the work
plan. I choose my foremen from the
prisoners. You give me the
calendar.
OBRADOVI?
The plan I review.
MARKO
The plan you review.
A long pause. Obradovi? studies him.
OBRADOVI?
And in exchange you build me a bridge that holds a T-72.
MARKO
In exchange I build you a bridge
that holds whatever you tell me it
has to hold.
Obradovi? looks at him for a beat. Almost — almost — smiles.
Does not.
OBRADOVI?
Class 60.
MARKO
Class 60.
Obradovi? closes the folder. Slides it into the drawer.
Slides the drawer shut.
OBRADOVI?
Lieutenant Vasi? will take you to the pen. You will select
your foremen now. The work plan is on my desk in seventy-two
hours.
Marko stands.
OBRADOVI?
Engineer.
Marko stops.
OBRADOVI?
Drink the tea. It will be a long winter.
Marko looks at the cup.
He picks it up.
His hand does not shake.
He drinks. Sets it down empty.
He walks out.
Obradovi? watches the door close. He sits in the silence for
a long moment.
Then he turns the framed photograph on the shelf.
He looks at it.
We do not see what is in it.
He turns it back to the wall.
He opens the drawer. Removes the journal. Re-reads the
footnote on page eighty-two.
He runs a thumb across the corner of the page.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
5 -
Selection and Silent Suffering
EXT. POW HOLDING PEN DAY
A fenced compound, twenty meters by thirty. Inside it, forty
men in various states of ruin. Some standing. Some sitting
against the wire. Most silent.
A guard opens the gate for Marko. Hands him a clipboard. A
list of names, prisoner numbers.
GUARD
(in Serbian)
Four. Foremen. Mark them.
The guard steps back outside the gate. The gate closes behind
Marko.
He is alone with the forty.
They watch him. They have noticed his coat is cleaner. His
boots are intact.
He does not move for a moment.
He looks at the clipboard. Then at the men. Then at the
clipboard again.
He is buying himself time. Five seconds. Eight.
He walks the line.
He stops at the first man. Mid-fifties. Hands like cured
leather. Marko looks at the hands.
MARKO
(in Bosnian, quiet)
Before the war.
THE MAN
(after a beat)
Truck driver.
Marko nods. Moves on.
A younger man, twenties, narrow shoulders.
MARKO
Before the war.
THE YOUNGER MAN
Student.
MARKO
Of?
THE YOUNGER MAN
Literature.
Marko looks at him a beat too long. Some part of him is doing
arithmetic what the body of a literature student is good for.
He moves on.
He stops at a man perhaps sixty. Heavy hands. Burn scars on
the forearms. Marko notices the scars.
MARKO
Before the war.
The man does not answer at first. He looks past Marko's
shoulder, toward the bridge visible through the fence.
THE MAN
Ironworker. Zenica steel.
A long beat. The man's eyes return to Marko.
THE MAN (CONT'D)
You're going to build it.
MARKO
Yes.
THE MAN
For them.
MARKO
For them.
THE MAN
You're a poturica.
The word is old. Pejorative. Convert. Turncoat. It is the
worst thing one Bosniak can call another.
Marko absorbs it.
Something flickers across his face. Anger. Quickly
suppressed. He swallows it.
His hand tightens on the clipboard. The knuckles go white.
He does not respond to the word.
MARKO
What's your name.
THE MAN
Hasan.
MARKO
Hasan what.
HASAN
Begovi?.
Marko writes the name on the clipboard. Hasan watches him do
it.
HASAN (CONT'D)
You're putting me on the crew.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
I won't work for them.
MARKO
You'll work for me.
A long beat. Hasan looks at him. Reassessing.
HASAN
What did you trade for the four
names.
MARKO
Infantry rations.
Hasan's eyes narrow. He nods, once. Slowly.
HASAN
Then we're both poturice.
He sits down against the wire.
Marko moves on. His hand on the clipboard is still white at
the knuckles. He notices. He loosens it. Deliberately.
He stops at a young man, nineteen, wide eyes, a flinch
already prepared.
MARKO
Before the war.
THE YOUNG MAN
(stammering slightly)
M-music. Conservatory.
MARKO
Instrument.
THE YOUNG MAN
Cello.
MARKO
Can you climb.
The young man hesitates. His eyes go up — toward the floodlit
bridge across the fence. Toward the height of it.
THE YOUNG MAN
I — yes.
He has lied. Marko sees that he has lied.
MARKO
Name.
THE YOUNG MAN
Vedad. Hrusti?.
Marko writes it. He hesitates with the pencil over the page
for a half-second longer than needed.
He could leave the name off.
He writes it.
He moves on. Stops at a man in his forties. Clean-shaven,
somehow, in a pen of bearded men. Eyes that find Marko's and
hold them.
MARKO
Before the war.
THE MAN
(in fluent technical
Serbian, not Bosnian)
Municipal clerk. Banja Luka.
Cadastral surveys. I read drawings.
Marko notes the language choice. Files it.
MARKO
Name.
THE MAN
Senad Tomi?.
MARKO
You speak Serbian at home.
SENAD
(smiling slightly)
I speak what is useful.
Marko writes the name. Holds Senad's eyes a beat longer than
necessary.
He moves on.
He stops at the last foreman he will choose. A man, thirty-
five, sitting apart from the others. The other prisoners have
given him a perimeter.
Marko crouches in front of him.
MARKO
(in Bosnian)
Before the war.
THE MAN
(in Bosnian — but with a
Belgrade accent)
Civil engineer. Doboj.
Marko stops.
The man — BRANKO — meets his eyes.
BRANKO
(quietly, in Bosnian)
I refused mobilization. I tried to
cross the line. They caught me.
MARKO
You're Serb.
BRANKO
Bosnian.
I'm one of you.
Marko looks at him for a long moment.
He writes the name.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
(softly)
The others won't like it.
MARKO
(standing)
The others don't decide.
He walks back to the gate. Hands the clipboard to the guard.
The guard reads the names. Looks up at Marko.
GUARD
(in Serbian)
You took the Serb.
MARKO
I took an engineer.
The guard shrugs. Walks away with the clipboard.
Marko stays inside the pen. He has nowhere else to be yet.
He sits down against the wire. Beside Hasan.
Hasan does not look at him.
They sit in silence as the light begins to fail over the
valley.
Marko's hand on his knee. The tremor has come back.
He does not try to hide it.
Hasan sees.
Hasan does not say anything about it.
But after a long beat — without looking at Marko — Hasan puts
his own hand on his own knee. Identical position. As if to
keep him company in it.
They sit.
The light fails.
CUT TO:
INT. POW BARRACKS — NIGHT
Concrete floor. A single coal stove unattended. Forty straw
mattresses arranged in two rows. The men sleep, or pretend
to.
Marko on a mattress near the door. Eyes open.
The ceiling has water damage. He studies it. He is, even now,
calculating something — the load tolerance of the roof. The
angle of failure. He cannot help it.
He turns his head.
In the next mattress: Hasan. Awake. Looking at the ceiling.
Neither man speaks.
Outside, distant artillery. Three thumps, spaced. Then
nothing.
Marko closes his eyes.
His face is wet.
He does not move. He does not wipe it. He does not let his
breath change.
He just lets it happen.
It stops on its own.
He does not sleep.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
6 -
Day One at the Bridge
EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE — DAWN
The site at first light. Mist on the river. Floodlights still
burning, useless now against the grey sky.
Marko walks the bridge for the first time as the engineer of
record.
Behind him: Obradovi?. Behind Obradovi?, at a respectful
distance: LIEUTENANT MILAN PAVKOVI?, 26, clean uniform, a
Sony Betacam balanced on his shoulder. He is filming.
Marko reaches the edge of the damaged span. He crouches. He
touches the steel where the demolition charges separated it.
Runs his fingers along the failure surface.
He stays there for thirty seconds. Silent.
Pavkovi? films him.
The crouch is too long. Pavkovi? senses it. Adjusts the
focus.
Marko stands.
MARKO
(to Obradovi?, quietly, in
Serbian)
Whoever did this knew what they
were doing.
OBRADOVI?
Yes.
PAVKOVI?
(stepping forward)
Sir — could you say that again, in Bosnian, for the —
Marko does not turn. Does not acknowledge him.
He walks to the next pylon. Obradovi? follows.
Pavkovi? stands where he was left. The camera still rolling.
His face neutral.
He pans the camera to follow Marko's back as Marko walks away
from him.
PAVKOVI?
(softly, into the camera mic)
Day one.
He smiles. A small, private smile. He has seen the crouch. He
knows what he has.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["War","Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
7 -
Rebuilding Tensions
EXT. THE BRIDGE — CONTINUOUS
Marko at the second pylon. Obradovi? catches up.
Marko points to a section of the upper arch.
MARKO
This was the secondary charge. They
placed it to drop the span
symmetrically. They wanted you to
rebuild it true.
OBRADOVI?
Why does that matter.
MARKO
Because they thought you would.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
And will I.
MARKO
(looking at him)
You will if I'm building it.
Obradovi? studies him.
OBRADOVI?
Walk me through what you need.
Marko begins to list. Steel. Concrete. Welders. Cranes.
As he speaks, his voice changes — fractionally. He is no
longer a prisoner. He is an engineer giving requirements to a
client.
He hears himself.
He stops mid-sentence.
He has caught himself in the voice. The old voice. The voice
he had in Sarajevo when the war was something happening to
other people.
A small, ugly tightening around his mouth.
He keeps going. The voice continues. He cannot stop it. The
voice is the work. The work is the voice.
Obradovi? hears all of this. He nods at each item as if he
had heard nothing.
In the distance, behind them, Pavkovi? is filming. Marko's
back. Obradovi?'s back. The bridge. The river.
He has not lowered the camera since Marko refused him.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
8 -
Tensions in the Tent
INT. CLINIC TENT — DAY
A canvas tent at the edge of the site. Two cots. A small wood
stove. A locked metal cabinet. Surgical lamps powered by a
generator.
DR. AMRA ?URI?, 38, in VRS military medical fatigues,
examines the hand of a Bosniak prisoner — the truck driver
from the pen. His thumb is purple, the nail black.
She works without speaking. Cleans. Lances the nail. Drains.
Marko enters. She does not look up.
AMRA
(in Serbian, to the
prisoner)
This was crushed before you came
here?
THE PRISONER
(in Bosnian)
Yes.
AMRA
(in Bosnian, switching)
Then it should have been treated
then.
THE PRISONER
There was no one to —
AMRA
I know.
She finishes wrapping the hand. Looks at the prisoner.
AMRA (CONT'D)
Keep this clean. If it gets warm,
if it smells, you come back. Do you
understand.
The prisoner nods. He is dismissed. He leaves the tent.
Amra washes her hands at a basin. She does not look at Marko.
AMRA (CONT'D)
He works tomorrow?
MARKO
Yes.
AMRA
He shouldn't.
MARKO
He works tomorrow.
A beat. She dries her hands.
She turns. Looks at him for the first time. She reads him in
three seconds.
Her eyes go to his hands. They have started shaking again. He
has not noticed yet.
AMRA
Engineer.
MARKO
Yes.
AMRA
If you kill them, I cannot bring
them back.
MARKO
I am trying to keep them alive.
AMRA
I know.
That's why I'm telling you.
She turns back to her instruments. Begins to sterilize them.
Marko looks down. Sees his hands. Stops them.
Amra has her back to him. She knows he has just seen them.
AMRA (CONT'D)
(without turning)
When did you last sleep.
MARKO
I don't remember.
AMRA
That's an answer.
She does not turn.
He stays a moment. There is something he wants to ask. He
does not ask it.
He leaves the tent.
Amra continues working. She does not watch him go.
After a beat, she stops. She is holding a clamp. Her hand is
steady.
She sets the clamp down.
She presses both palms flat against the metal counter. Hard.
She stands like that for ten seconds.
Then she picks the clamp back up.
She continues working.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
9 -
Silent Obsession
INT. MARKO'S DRAFTING ROOM — NIGHT
A small room adjacent to Obradovi?'s office. Cot in the
corner. Drafting table under a hooded lamp. Stove. A window
facing the bridge — floodlit, beautiful, broken.
Marko at the table. He has been there for hours.
Sheets of paper. Schedules. A scaled drawing emerging in
pencil and rule.
He works the way an engineer works — not artistically, but
with the inevitability of physical law. He is solving the
bridge in his head and his hands are recording the solution.
The door opens behind him.
He does not turn.
Obradovi? enters. Stands behind him. Reads over his shoulder
for thirty seconds.
Marko does not stop drawing.
Obradovi? leaves. Does not speak.
The door closes.
Marko keeps drawing.
He works for twenty more minutes.
Then he stops.
He sets the pencil down. Very carefully. The way you set down
something delicate.
He looks at the work on the table.
It is good work.
He knows it is good work.
His face does not change.
He pushes back from the table. Stands. Crosses to the small
basin in the corner. Pours water from a tin pitcher into the
bowl.
He washes his hands. Slowly. Methodically.
He scrubs them.
He keeps scrubbing.
The water goes grey with pencil graphite.
He keeps scrubbing.
The skin on the backs of his hands goes pink. Then red.
He keeps scrubbing.
He stops only when he hears himself making a sound. A small
one. He does not know how long he has been making it.
He stops.
He stands at the basin. Hands in the water. Eyes closed.
He stays that way.
He does not cry. Not the way a man cries. But his breath is
going in and out in a way that costs him. The way breath does
when the chest has been holding for a long time.
He stays at the basin for a long minute.
He raises his head.
He looks at his face in the small shaving mirror nailed above
the basin.
He does not recognize the man.
For one second — only one — he raises his wet hand and
touches his own cheek. The way you would touch a stranger to
see if they are real.
He drops the hand.
He dries it on his trousers.
He goes back to the table.
He picks up the pencil.
He keeps drawing.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
10 -
Uncertain Futures
INT. OBRADOVI?'S OFFICE — MORNING
Saturday. Three days later.
The work plan is on Obradovi?'s desk. Twelve pages. Phased.
Detailed.
Obradovi? has annotated it in red. He has not redrawn
anything. He has only checked.
He hands it back to Marko, who stands across the desk.
OBRADOVI?
Begin Monday.
MARKO
Today is Saturday.
OBRADOVI?
Yes.
A beat. Marko looks at him.
MARKO
Why Monday.
OBRADOVI?
The men need a day. Yours, and mine.
Marko absorbs. Takes the work plan.
He walks to the door. Hand on the latch.
He stops.
He does not turn.
MARKO
Colonel.
OBRADOVI?
Yes.
MARKO
When the bridge is finished. What
happens to my men.
A long beat. Obradovi? is at his desk. He sets down his pen,
carefully. He looks at Marko's back.
He could lie. He chooses not to.
OBRADOVI?
We will see.
Marko stands in the doorway for another beat.
MARKO
Colonel.
OBRADOVI?
Yes.
MARKO
That is not an answer.
A long beat.
OBRADOVI?
No.
It isn't.
Marko opens the door. He leaves.
The door closes.
Obradovi? sits looking at the closed door for a long moment.
He picks up his pen. He goes back to work.
OUTSIDE, through the window behind him: the bridge. Floodlit
in the morning fog. Half-built. Half-dead.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
11 -
Temptation at the Bridge
EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE — DAY
Wide shot. The bridge from a distance. The site coming alive
— workers, equipment, the day shift beginning.
Marko walks alone toward the bridge, the work plan rolled
under his arm.
A guard at the eastern approach nods to him. Lets him pass.
He walks onto the bridge.
He stops at the edge of the broken span.
The river runs below. The sun is just beginning to break
through the mist.
He stands there.
Looking down.
For one second — only one — there is something on his face
that an actor cannot fake. The pull. The way the height
itself talks to a man who is tired enough to listen.
He closes his eyes.
He steps back from the edge.
He turns and walks off the bridge.
HOLD on the bridge.
FADE TO BLACK.
END ACT ONE.
ACT TWO
FADE IN:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
12 -
Dawn at the Construction Site
EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE — DAWN — MONDAY
A whistle. Sharp. Twice.
The pen gate opens. Forty men file out in a line, breath
visible in the cold. Guards with rifles flanking.
Marko stands at the head of the column with a clipboard. He
has been there since before dawn.
He watches each man pass. He nods at Hasan. Hasan does not
return it.
Vedad — nineteen, the cellist — pauses in front of Marko.
Almost says something. Doesn't. Moves on.
Senad passes. Smiles slightly. The kind of smile that wants
to be received. Marko does not receive it.
Branko passes last.
BRANKO
(quietly)
The men are watching how you handle
the first day.
MARKO
I know.
BRANKO
What's your plan.
MARKO
Build the bridge.
He starts walking toward the site. Branko falls in beside
him.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
13 -
The Work Plan
EXT. THE BRIDGE — EASTERN APPROACH — MORNING
The forty assembled at the eastern foot of the bridge.
Cranes, welders, stockpiles of steel rebar. A bone-cold wind
off the river.
Marko stands on a stack of pallets. The men look up at him.
A guard nearby — bored, smoking. Pavkovi?, at the rear,
camera up.
Marko unrolls a section of the work plan. Tacks it to a
plywood board.
MARKO
(in Bosnian, plain)
Three phases. Two months for the
substructure. Three weeks for the
deck. One week for surfacing.
A pause. The men wait. The speech they expect — about
courage, or solidarity, or shame — does not come.
MARKO (CONT'D)
The deck pour requires forty
degrees Fahrenheit minimum ambient.
That is the only deadline that is
mine. The rest are theirs.
He looks at them.
MARKO (CONT'D)
I am not asking you to work harder
than you would have worked at home.
I am asking you to work as well. We
will not lie about what this is. We
will not pretend otherwise. But the
work itself is the same work.
A beat.
MARKO (CONT'D)
Foremen step forward.
Hasan. Vedad. Senad. Branko. They step forward.
MARKO (CONT'D)
Hasan. Iron. Vedad. Lift and
rigging. Senad. Materials and
inventory. Branko. Concrete and
forms.
Hasan looks at the assignment.
HASAN
(in Bosnian, quietly)
Iron.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
You knew.
MARKO
Yes.
A beat. Hasan does not refuse.
HASAN
(to his men)
Iron crew. With me.
He walks. Eight men peel off and follow him.
The other foremen call their crews. The site begins to move.
Marko climbs down from the pallets. Obradovi? is watching
from the office porch, fifty meters away. They make eye
contact across the distance.
Obradovi? does not nod. Neither does Marko.
Pavkovi? films the moment.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
14 -
Building Bridges: A Day's Labor
EXT. THE BRIDGE — DAY — MONTAGE
A working rhythm establishes.
Hasan's iron crew on the scaffolding. The clean, sour ring of
hammer on rebar. Sparks falling.
Branko at a concrete form, gloves white with dust, sighting a
level by eye.
Vedad twenty meters up, harness clipped, hauling a steel
cable hand over hand. He is not strong. He is careful. The
work suits him.
But close on his face: when he reaches the platform, he sits
down hard against the rail. Not from fatigue. He is sweating
in the cold. He is breathing through his nose, mouth closed,
eyes fixed on the horizon line. The way you breathe to stop
yourself from being sick.
He does not look down.
He stays there a moment. He gets up. He goes back to work.
Senad on the ground beside a stack of timber, clipboard,
counting in Serbian to a VRS supply sergeant.
Marko everywhere. Not lifting. Looking. Touching steel.
Reading a plumb line. Correcting an angle with two fingers.
CUT TO:
EXT. THE BRIDGE EVENING
End of day one. The light failing. The men limp toward the
mess. Vedad has a bruise across his cheek a swung cable end.
He does not complain.
Marko watches them go. He is the last to leave the bridge.
He stands at the eastern approach a moment. Watching the
river.
He puts a hand on the stone of the abutment.
He takes it away. Looks at his palm.
There is a fine grey dust on it. From the stone.
He looks at it.
He wipes it on his trousers.
He walks back to the cabins.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
15 -
Silent Strain
INT. POW BARRACKS — NIGHT
The men sleeping or pretending to. Hasan awake. Marko awake.
Marko's eyes on the ceiling.
In the silence:
HASAN
(quietly, off-screen)
You said the work was the same.
Marko does not turn his head.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
It is not the same.
A long beat.
MARKO
I know.
HASAN
Then why did you say it.
MARKO
Because if it isn't the same, none
of us survive what we're doing.
Silence. Hasan does not respond at first.
Then:
HASAN
(very quietly)
That's a thing a man says who's
making it the same. For himself.
Marko does not respond.
A beat.
HASAN (CONT'D)
You worked all night three nights
ago. I heard the chair scraping. I
heard the pencil.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
You're enjoying it.
A long silence.
MARKO
(eventually, quietly)
No.
HASAN
(softer, almost gentle,
which is worse)
Yes you are.
Marko does not respond.
Hasan turns onto his side. Faces away.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(into the wall)
Try to sleep, Engineer.
Marko closes his eyes.
He does not sleep.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
16 -
Perilous Heights
EXT. THE BRIDGE — DAY — DAY EIGHT
The scaffold on the central pier. Three men working a steel
cross-brace at height — fifteen meters above the water.
One of them is Vedad.
He is not supposed to be at that height. The platform is for
the iron crew. But the lift line has tangled, and he has
climbed up to free it.
He is on the outside rail. Reaching.
His hand on the rail is white.
Hasan, on the platform above, sees him.
HASAN
(in Bosnian, sharp)
Vedad. Sit down. Sit down on the
platform.
VEDAD
The line —
HASAN
Sit down.
Vedad shakes his head. He is concentrating. He cannot stop
concentrating. He is afraid that if he stops he will fall.
He reaches further.
His foot slips.
Not a fall. A skid. He catches the rail with both hands. He
is hanging by the elbows, legs swinging over the water
fifteen meters below.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(roaring)
Vedad!
The platform under Vedad's footing — already poorly braced —
shifts.
A bolt sings out of its housing.
The plank under his right hand twists.
And then it goes.
The corner of the scaffold drops three meters in a single
rending crack of timber. Vedad goes with it.
He does not fall into the river.
He falls onto the secondary brace below — a steel cross-
piece, two meters down — and stops there with a sound that is
not a scream. It is too short to be a scream. It is the sound
of all the air leaving a body.
The plank he was holding lands in the river a half-second
later. Distant splash.
Vedad does not move.
Hasan is already climbing down.
HASAN (CONT'D)
?ovjek! ?ovjek dolje!
(Man down!)
Marko is at the eastern abutment.
He saw it.
He runs.
We have not seen him run before.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
17 -
Tension on the Scaffold
EXT. CENTRAL PIER SCAFFOLD — CONTINUOUS
Marko on the scaffold. Hasan on the brace below him. Hasan
has Vedad in his arms, the boy doubled across the steel,
awake, conscious, but trying to breathe and not managing it.
The wind moves the broken corner of the scaffold.
A guard on the deck is shouting at them — get him down, get
him down — but no one is moving fast enough.
MARKO
(in Bosnian, to Hasan)
Don't lift him yet. The ribs.
Hasan freezes. Looks up.
HASAN
He can't
MARKO
The ribs. We brace him first.
Marko unbuckles his coat. Lays it under Vedad. He is calm. He
is shockingly calm. Working with his hands.
The men on the deck have lowered a stretcher.
MARKO (CONT'D)
On three. Lift on the coat.
Together.
HASAN
Together.
MARKO
One. Two. Three.
They lift. Vedad makes a sound, small and animal.
They get him onto the stretcher.
The stretcher goes up.
Hasan and Marko stand alone on the brace.
For a moment neither moves.
HASAN
(quietly, in Bosnian)
The plank.
MARKO
What about it.
HASAN
You wrote the specifications for
the bracing on this scaffold. After
the first man.
A long beat.
HASAN (CONT'D)
The drawing said two bolts per
crossing. Senad's crew put one in.
To save time.
Marko's face does not change.
HASAN (CONT'D)
Did you know.
MARKO
No.
HASAN
Will you do something about it.
Marko looks at Hasan.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
What.
A long beat.
MARKO
I'll rebuild the scaffold.
HASAN
That's not what I asked.
A beat.
MARKO
I know.
Hasan studies him. The smallest, ugliest twitch at the corner
of Hasan's mouth.
HASAN
(quietly)
You won't touch Senad.
MARKO
I'll move him off the bridge.
HASAN
You won't punish him.
MARKO
No.
HASAN
Because the Colonel likes him.
Marko does not answer.
HASAN (CONT'D)
Because Senad informs.
Marko does not answer.
A very long beat.
Hasan steps toward Marko. Closes the gap on the brace until
they are face to face. He is older but he is bigger. The
brace is narrow.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(in Bosnian, very low)
That boy is nineteen.
MARKO
I know.
HASAN
You wrote him into iron.
MARKO
I wrote him into lifting. He was
not supposed to be on iron.
HASAN
He was on iron because your foreman
of materials sent him there with
the lift cable. Because materials
is short. Because the schedule is
short. Because the schedule is
yours.
Marko's jaw moves once. He says nothing.
HASAN (CONT'D)
Say something, Engineer.
MARKO
There is nothing to say.
HASAN
(louder, the first time he
has raised his voice)
Then I will say it. He is nineteen
and you have already started
killing him. Slowly. By inches. By
bolts not put in. By minutes not
lost. By a calendar that is your
calendar.
Marko's mouth opens.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(continuing)
Don't —
MARKO
(quietly)
Hasan.
HASAN
— say my name, Engineer.
Hasan's hand comes up.
It does not become a fist. But it comes up. Open. Trembling.
Six inches from Marko's chest.
Hasan holds it there.
Marko does not flinch. Does not look down at the hand. Does
not move.
He looks Hasan in the eyes.
MARKO
(very quietly)
Do it.
A long beat.
Hasan does not.
He lowers the hand.
He looks down at the brace under their feet.
HASAN
(quieter, almost broken)
I cannot afford to do it.
A long silence.
He turns. He climbs up off the brace.
Marko stays.
He puts a hand on the steel where Vedad fell.
He stays there a long moment.
He climbs up.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
18 -
Reassurance in the Dark
INT. CLINIC TENT — NIGHT — DAY EIGHT
Vedad on a cot. Amra at his side. His chest is bound. He is
awake but his eyes are unfocused. Shock.
Marko in the doorway. He has not come in.
Amra looks up.
AMRA
(in Bosnian)
Three ribs. One displaced. The lung
is not punctured.
A beat.
AMRA (CONT'D)
He will live.
Marko nods. The relief on his face is small but visible. Then
it is gone.
AMRA (CONT'D)
He will not climb again.
A beat.
MARKO
That's fine.
AMRA
Tell him.
She gestures to the cot.
Marko hesitates.
He crosses to the cot. Crouches beside it.
Vedad's eyes find him.
VEDAD
(barely)
Engineer.
MARKO
Vedad.
VEDAD
I'm sorry.
MARKO
For what.
VEDAD
The cable.
A beat.
MARKO
You did not drop the cable.
VEDAD
I —
MARKO
You did not drop the cable, Vedad.
Listen to me. The platform dropped.
That is not the same as you
dropping the cable. Do you
understand.
Vedad looks at him.
VEDAD
(very quietly)
Yes.
MARKO
You are off iron. You will work on
the ground. With Branko.
A beat.
VEDAD
Yes, Engineer.
Marko stands.
He turns to leave.
Vedad's hand catches his sleeve. Weakly.
VEDAD (CONT'D)
Engineer.
Marko stops.
VEDAD (CONT'D)
Will you come back.
Marko looks at the boy.
For a long moment, his face does something. Something the
audience has not seen yet. Some kind of cost.
MARKO
Yes.
VEDAD
Tomorrow.
MARKO
Tomorrow.
He gently removes the hand from his sleeve. Places it back on
the cot.
He walks out.
Amra watches him go. She does not call after him.
She turns back to Vedad. She begins to change a dressing.
Her hands are steady. Her face is not.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
19 -
Fractured Focus
INT. MARKO'S DRAFTING ROOM — NIGHT — DAY EIGHT
Marko at the table. The scaffold drawing in front of him. He
is redesigning.
Secondary anchors. Tertiary footings. A doubling of the clamp
specification.
The pencil moves quickly.
He is angry.
The anger is in his shoulders. In the line he is drawing —
pressing too hard, the pencil tip snapping with a small
crack.
He picks up another.
He keeps drawing.
He stops.
He stares at the drawing.
He picks up the broken pencil. He holds it. He turns it in
his fingers.
Without warning he hurls it at the wall. It hits with a small
wooden snap.
He sits in the silence.
He does not move for a long time.
He picks up a fresh pencil.
He keeps drawing.
He does not stop until the new drawing is finished. He sets
the pencil down.
He stares at the drawing.
He picks the pencil back up and refines a detail he has
already finished.
He does not stop.
The lamp burns down. The light begins to fail in the room.
He does not stop.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
20 -
Tension at the Bridge
EXT. THE BRIDGE — DAY ELEVEN
The new scaffold installed. The men working under it.
A wind gust. Sharp. The scaffold holds — visibly stiffer than
before.
A GUARD — not the friendly one; a different man, mid-30s,
narrow eyes, NIKOLA — at the foot of a different scaffold
section. He is searching one of the prisoners. The man is
stripped of his coat. The guard's hands move through the
pockets. Through the lining.
The prisoner stands with his arms out. Shaking. Cold.
Nikola finishes. Hands the coat back. Walks to the next man.
He has been doing this for an hour.
Marko crosses the yard with a clipboard. Stops by Branko, who
is at the form for the western abutment.
MARKO
(quietly, in Bosnian)
This is new.
BRANKO
Yes.
MARKO
Did someone order it.
BRANKO
Not that I have heard.
MARKO
Then why.
BRANKO
(very quietly)
Because someone reported that
someone is reporting.
A beat.
MARKO
Tomi?.
BRANKO
Probably.
MARKO
Probably.
Branko shrugs. He has gone back to looking at the form.
BRANKO
Or someone reporting on Tomi?.
Marko looks at him.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
There is more than one informer in
any camp, Engineer.
Marko absorbs this.
He walks on.
He crosses to where Vedad is now stationed — at a low table
beside Branko's concrete forms, marking rebar with chalk. The
boy's chest is still bound. He moves stiffly.
Vedad sees Marko coming. He straightens. Tries to look
useful.
MARKO
Sit down.
VEDAD
I —
MARKO
Sit.
Vedad sits on a crate.
Marko crouches beside him. Examines the chalk marks Vedad has
been making on the rebar.
MARKO (CONT'D)
These are good.
VEDAD
Branko showed me.
MARKO
Branko's a good teacher.
A beat.
VEDAD
Engineer.
MARKO
Yes.
VEDAD
The guard. The new one. He keeps
looking at me.
Marko looks across the yard.
Nikola is watching them.
Marko's face does not change.
MARKO
Don't look at him.
VEDAD
He —
MARKO
Don't look at him. Look at the
rebar.
Vedad looks at the rebar.
MARKO (CONT'D)
(quieter)
You did nothing wrong, Vedad. He is
looking at you because he is bored.
Tomorrow he will look at someone
else.
A beat.
VEDAD
(very small)
Yes, Engineer.
Marko straightens.
He walks back across the yard.
He does not look at Nikola as he passes.
But Nikola looks at him.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
21 -
Tension in the Shadows
INT. OBRADOVI?'S OFFICE — NIGHT — DAY ELEVEN
A single lamp. Obradovi? at his desk with a sheet of paper. A
pencil. A calculation he has been working at for an hour.
He has done it three times. He gets a different answer each
time.
He sets the pencil down. Looks at the door.
He picks up the paper. Walks out.
CUT TO:
INT. MARKO'S DRAFTING ROOM — CONTINUOUS
Marko at his table. He has been sleeping less. It shows. The
eyes hollow.
Obradovi? enters without knocking. Sets the sheet of paper on
the table beside Marko's drawings.
OBRADOVI?
(in Serbian)
Tell me what is wrong with this.
Marko looks at the sheet. It is a load distribution for the
central span under specified axle weights — 41 tons per axle,
two-axle spacing.
He reads it without picking it up.
MARKO
Your shear coefficient.
OBRADOVI?
What about it.
MARKO
It is from the 1962 manual. You're
calculating for a Class 30 bridge.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
I know.
Marko looks up.
The men hold each other's eyes.
MARKO
Class 60.
OBRADOVI?
Yes.
MARKO
T-72s.
OBRADOVI?
Yes.
A long beat. Marko looks at the paper. He picks up a pencil.
He does not hesitate.
He works the calculation for forty-five seconds. Crosses out
the shear coefficient. Substitutes. Carries through the new
values.
He sets the pencil down.
He slides the paper back across the table.
Obradovi? picks it up. Reads.
OBRADOVI?
Thank you.
MARKO
Don't thank me.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
No.
He walks to the door. Stops.
OBRADOVI?
The boy. Day eight.
Marko looks up.
OBRADOVI?
He will live.
MARKO
Yes.
OBRADOVI?
The new scaffold drawings were good. They should have been
the original.
MARKO
Yes.
OBRADOVI?
You did not have to redesign on your own time.
MARKO
Yes I did.
A beat.
Obradovi? nods.
He moves to leave.
He stops at the door. Does not turn.
OBRADOVI?
The guard who has been searching the men.
MARKO
Yes.
OBRADOVI?
Tell him to stop.
Marko looks up.
MARKO
He works for you.
OBRADOVI?
He works for someone.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
Tell him to stop.
He opens the door.
OBRADOVI?
Or I will.
He leaves.
The door closes.
Marko sits looking at the door for a long time.
He turns out the lamp.
He sits in the dark.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
22 -
A Moment of Distress
EXT. THE BRIDGE — DAY EIGHTEEN
The scaffold. Hasan twenty feet up, fitting a beam.
He stops. He sets the wrench down on the platform. Carefully.
As if he is afraid he will throw it.
He sits down on the platform.
His crew works around him. One of them, a young man, looks
down at him with concern.
THE YOUNG MAN
(in Bosnian)
Hasan.
Hasan does not respond.
His shoulders are moving. Not large movements. Small ones.
The shoulders of a man who is breathing in a specific way.
He puts his head in his hands.
Below, on the deck, Senad sees this. He starts toward a
guard.
Marko sees Senad moving. He cuts him off.
MARKO
(in Bosnian, low)
I have it.
SENAD
He's stopped working —
MARKO
I have it.
Senad backs off. There is something in his face —
calculation. He is filing it.
Marko climbs the scaffold.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
23 -
Bridging Silence
EXT. THE SCAFFOLD — CONTINUOUS
Marko reaches the platform.
Hasan does not look up.
Marko sits beside him. He keeps a meter between them.
A long silence. Below: the river. Twenty feet down.
HASAN
(without looking up)
Don't sit with me.
MARKO
The men are watching.
HASAN
Then go.
A beat.
MARKO
If I go, a guard comes.
HASAN
Then a guard comes.
A long silence.
Hasan raises his head. He does not look at Marko. He looks at
the river.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(quietly, in Bosnian)
My son worked steel in Zenica.
A beat.
MARKO
(quietly)
I know.
HASAN
How.
MARKO
I asked about you.
A beat.
HASAN
Why.
MARKO
Because I wrote your name down
without asking.
A long beat.
HASAN
He died in May. Mortar. I have not
worked steel since.
Marko does not answer.
HASAN (CONT'D)
This morning I picked up the wrench
and my hand did not work. For four
minutes. I could not close the
fingers. I sat down because if I
stood up the men would see.
A beat.
HASAN (CONT'D)
That is the second time. The first
was this winter. Before they took
me.
Marko does not answer.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(still looking at the
river)
When this bridge is done. The tanks
cross it. The tanks go where.
MARKO
I don't know.
HASAN
Yes you do.
A long beat.
MARKO
Goražde.
HASAN
My brother is in Goražde.
Marko closes his eyes for a moment. Opens them.
A long silence. Hasan's shoulders are still moving. Small.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(very quietly)
I want to ask you something. And I
want you to give me the answer that
is true. Not the one that is
useful.
MARKO
Ask.
HASAN
Are you sleeping.
A beat.
MARKO
No.
HASAN
Are you eating.
MARKO
I am eating less.
HASAN
But are you working better.
A very long beat.
Marko does not answer.
Hasan turns his head. Looks at him for the first time.
HASAN (CONT'D)
That is your answer.
A beat. Marko looks at the river.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
You are working better.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
Than you have in.
A beat.
MARKO
Two years.
HASAN
Two years.
MARKO
Yes.
A long silence.
HASAN
(very quietly)
I cannot decide if I want to push
you off this platform or take care
of you.
MARKO
I know.
HASAN
I have been deciding for a week.
MARKO
I know.
A beat.
HASAN
The hand. This morning. I thought —
what if it does not come back.
(MORE)
HASAN (CONT'D)
What if I sit here on the platform
until a guard sees and then a guard
shoots me. And I thought — that is
the cleanest exit available to me.
He looks at Marko.
HASAN (CONT'D)
You know what stopped me.
Marko waits.
HASAN (CONT'D)
I do not want to leave Vedad on the
bridge without me.
A long beat.
HASAN (CONT'D)
Without us.
A very long silence.
Marko stares at the river.
His jaw moves. He looks for a long moment as if he might
speak.
He does not.
He reaches across the meter. He puts his hand — flat, brief —
on Hasan's knee.
Hasan does not look at the hand. He does not move.
Marko takes the hand away.
He stands up.
MARKO
(quietly)
The wrench. Try the hand again.
Hasan looks at the wrench.
He flexes the right hand.
He picks the wrench up.
The hand closes.
He nods.
Marko climbs down.
Hasan goes back to fitting the beam.
Below, Senad has been watching. He is on the deck with a
clipboard. He does not write anything down.
But he files it.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
24 -
The Tension of Visibility
EXT. MESS TENT — DAY — DAY TWENTY
Pavkovi? at a table outside the mess. Camera on a small
tripod, recording B-roll of the bridge. He sees Marko
crossing the yard.
Pavkovi? crosses to him. Camera off.
PAVKOVI?
(in Serbian)
Engineer. A moment.
Marko does not stop.
PAVKOVI?
Two minutes. For history.
MARKO
No.
PAVKOVI?
The Colonel has approved —
Marko stops. Turns.
Pavkovi? takes a half step back without realizing.
MARKO
(in Serbian, low and very
level)
Film me working. Do not point that
at my face. If you point it at my
face, I will walk into the river
and you will lose your bridge.
A long beat.
Pavkovi? smiles, small.
PAVKOVI?
That is the line that will play on Pale TV.
MARKO
Then don't use it.
PAVKOVI?
(after a beat)
I have seven hours of you. Did you know that.
Marko goes still.
PAVKOVI?
At the drafting table. On the scaffold. On the deck. Walking.
Crouching. Pointing. Touching the steel. I have you touching
the steel from four angles. Front. Side. From above. From
below the water line — there is a camera position in the form
scaffold that no one notices.
A beat.
PAVKOVI?
The face is what I do not have.
Marko stares at him.
PAVKOVI?
(quieter)
I am very patient, Engineer.
He smiles again.
PAVKOVI?
A film is not made by the man who is in it.
A long beat.
Marko's face does not change. But his hand — at his side —
has closed into a fist. He does not realize.
He turns. Walks away.
Pavkovi? watches him go.
He raises the camera. He films Marko's back.
He films Marko's hand.
The fist.
He holds the shot.
PAVKOVI?
(softly, to himself)
Eto te.
(There you are.)
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
25 -
Healing Wounds
INT. CLINIC TENT — DAY — DAY TWENTY-FOUR
A cut on Marko's palm. Deep. Steel edge. Amra cleans it
without speaking.
She is precise. Her fingers are warm and dry.
She begins to stitch.
AMRA
(in Bosnian)
You're working with the men.
MARKO
Yes.
AMRA
The Colonel doesn't like that.
MARKO
He hasn't told me to stop.
AMRA
He won't tell you. He'll watch and
decide later.
She ties off. Bites the suture short with her teeth.
A beat. Marko looks at her.
MARKO
How long have you been here.
AMRA
Two years.
MARKO
Why.
She does not answer at first. She wraps the hand in gauze.
Tapes it.
She does not look at him when she speaks.
AMRA
My husband was Bosniak. They killed
him in the first month of the war.
Fo?a. He was a math teacher.
She finishes the wrap.
AMRA (CONT'D)
I had two choices.
A beat.
AMRA (CONT'D)
I made this one.
She finally looks at him.
AMRA (CONT'D)
Don't ask me again.
He does not.
She turns to her instruments.
He stays a moment.
He looks at the bandaged hand.
MARKO
(quietly)
You are working with them too.
She stops what she is doing. She does not turn.
AMRA
Yes.
MARKO
Does it.
He stops. Tries again.
MARKO (CONT'D)
Does it.
He cannot find the sentence.
She turns.
AMRA
Does it what, Engineer.
A long beat.
MARKO
Does it get easier.
A very long beat.
She looks at him for a long moment.
AMRA
(quietly)
That is what frightens me.
A beat.
She turns back to the instruments.
He stays a moment longer.
He leaves the tent.
She continues working.
Her hand is steady.
Her hand is too steady.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
26 -
Tension in the Briefing
INT. OBRADOVI?'S OFFICE — DAY — DAY TWENTY-EIGHT
Marko delivering the weekly progress briefing. Standing. A
drawing on the desk.
Behind Obradovi?, on the wall, a calendar. APRIL 15 circled
in red. Below it, in smaller writing, in Cyrillic:
Operacija Prolje?e.
Marko sees it. He does not react.
MARKO
(continuing)
… the abutment forms are stripped
tomorrow. We pour the central pier
cap on the eighth.
OBRADOVI?
Steel.
MARKO
Behind by four days. Senad has it.
OBRADOVI?
Behind.
MARKO
Four days. We will recover it by
the seventeenth.
A beat. Obradovi? does not write anything.
He is looking past Marko. At nothing. At the wall.
A long beat.
MARKO (CONT'D)
Colonel.
OBRADOVI?
Continue.
But he says it without moving. His eyes are still on the
wall.
Marko looks at him.
A radio behind Obradovi? crackles, very low. A voice in
Serbian: military operations chatter. The word "Goražde"
passes once.
Obradovi? does not turn to the radio. His face does not
change.
But on the desk, his right hand is flat against the wood. The
fingers are pressed down hard enough that the nail beds have
gone white.
Marko sees this.
MARKO
(quietly)
Colonel.
OBRADOVI?
(without looking at him)
I said continue.
A long beat.
Marko does not continue.
He stands in silence.
Slowly, Obradovi?'s hand relaxes.
He looks at Marko for the first time.
His eyes are tired in a way Marko has not seen them.
OBRADOVI?
Continue, Engineer. Please.
Marko continues. He does not look at the calendar again.
He does not need to.
Obradovi? listens. He hears nothing.
When Marko is finished, he leaves.
Obradovi? sits at the desk a long moment.
He gets up. Walks to the shelf. Picks up the framed
photograph that faces the wall.
He looks at it.
A YOUNG MAN, twenty-two, in a graduation photograph. Civilian
clothes. A small smile.
Obradovi? holds the photograph for a long time.
He puts it back on the shelf.
Facing the wall.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
27 -
Silent Vulnerability
EXT. THE BRIDGE — DAY — DAY THIRTY-SIX
A wide shot. The bridge taking shape. The central span
beginning to close. The deck-formwork rising on the eastern
side.
The work is going well. The audience can see this.
Marko on the western approach with a level and a chalkline.
Branko beside him.
The river running below them. A clean day. Cold sun.
Marko stands up from the level. Looks at the bridge.
For one second, his face is open.
Not just open. Lit. Some thing in him that has been buried
for years is awake and looking at the bridge.
He sees Branko seeing this.
He closes his face.
He goes back to the level.
He works for thirty seconds in silence.
Then, without looking up:
MARKO
(quietly, in Bosnian)
Branko.
BRANKO
Yes.
MARKO
Don't tell anyone what you just
saw.
A beat.
BRANKO
What did I just see.
A very long beat.
MARKO
You know what you saw.
Branko does not answer.
He goes back to the form. He does not look at Marko again
that day.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
28 -
Concrete Decisions
EXT. EASTERN PYLON BASE — DAY — DAY FORTY-TWO
Marko, Branko, Senad, and a VRS sapper — KAPETAN VOLKOV, 40s,
Russian-trained, beard, hard eyes — at the base of the
eastern pylon. Water has infiltrated the form. The concrete
is curing wet.
Volkov in heavily-accented Serbian. Senad translating to
Marko, though Marko understands fine.
VOLKOV
(in Serbian)
We pump it out. We add accelerator
to the next pour. We let the wet
section cure. Three days.
Marko listens.
Senad starts to translate. Marko cuts him off.
MARKO
(in Serbian)
That doesn't work.
Volkov turns to him.
VOLKOV
(in Serbian)
Engineer. With respect. I built
bridges in Afghanistan.
MARKO
The wet section is below the load
axis. If you accelerate the next
pour, the differential cure rate
will set up a shear plane two feet
under the pylon footing. When the
bridge takes its first axle weight,
that plane fails.
A long beat. Volkov looks at the pylon. Looks back at Marko.
VOLKOV
Then what.
Marko could let him do it wrong. He could.
He doesn't.
MARKO
You strip the eastern form. You let
the wet section drain twenty-four
hours. You re-form. You re-pour
with a slow-set additive at four
percent. You lose two days. You
don't lose the bridge.
VOLKOV
The schedule —
MARKO
The schedule is mine.
A beat.
In the distance, on the porch of his office, Obradovi? is
watching. He has been watching for some time. He has heard
nothing. He does not need to.
He sees Volkov nod. He sees the prisoners begin to move
toward the form. He sees Marko issue orders.
Obradovi? stands on the porch a moment longer.
He turns and goes inside.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
29 -
Silent Gratitude
INT. POW BARRACKS — NIGHT — DAY FORTY-TWO
The men sleeping. The stove low.
Marko on his mattress. Eyes open.
A figure crosses the room. Vedad. He kneels beside Marko's
mattress. He has a tin cup. Steam from it.
VEDAD
(whispering)
Tea. The cook gave me an extra
ration.
Marko looks at him.
MARKO
Why.
VEDAD
The men were saying — what you did
today. The eastern pylon.
Marko looks at the cup.
MARKO
What did they say.
VEDAD
That you saved it.
A beat.
VEDAD (CONT'D)
That without you it would have come
down. Maybe under a tank. Maybe
before.
Marko does not take the cup. He looks at Vedad.
MARKO
Vedad.
VEDAD
Yes.
MARKO
Go to sleep.
VEDAD
But I —
MARKO
(quieter, harder)
Go.
Vedad flinches.
He sets the cup on the floor.
VEDAD
(very quietly)
Yes, Engineer.
He walks back to his mattress.
Marko looks at the cup.
He looks at it for a long time.
He sits up.
He reaches for the cup. Lifts it.
The tea is still warm.
He drinks it.
He sets the empty cup on the floor.
He puts his head in his hands.
He stays that way.
When he raises his head, his face is wet.
He lies back down.
He turns his face to the wall.
He does not sleep.
CUT TO:
INT. MARKO'S DRAFTING ROOM — NIGHT — LATE — DAY FORTY-TWO
Marko at the table. The lamp off.
He sits in the dark.
He is looking at his own hands.
He is looking at them as if trying to remember how they got
to be his.
HOLD.
The midpoint has passed. He felt it pass.
He did not stop it.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
30 -
The Weight of Propaganda
EXT. MESS TENT — DAY — DAY FORTY-NINE
A canvas mess tent. A projector on a wooden crate. A bedsheet
stretched as a screen. Forty prisoners on benches. Guards
along the back.
Pavkovi? at the projector. He has not changed out of his
clean uniform.
PAVKOVI?
(in Bosnian, friendly)
A courtesy. Fifteen minutes. The Colonel has approved.
He starts the projector.
ON THE SHEET:
A title card in Cyrillic: MOST. RAD I OBNOVA.
(THE BRIDGE. WORK AND REBUILDING.)
Sweeping orchestral music — Yugoslav military band, recycled.
The opening shot is the river valley from above. A drone shot
— somehow Pavkovi? got a drone. The bridge from the air. Snow
on the spans. Workers like ants.
Voiceover in Serbian. Male, deep, paternal.
V.O.
The crossing at the Drina has stood for thirty years as a
monument to the patient labor of a people who build —
The film cuts to footage of the bridge work. We recognize it.
The angles are too clean, too composed. The prisoners on
screen do not look like prisoners. The light has been chosen.
The camera has been chosen.
V.O.
— and to the patience of those who restore what others have
broken.
A cut to Marko.
MARKO ON SCREEN: at his drafting table, sleeves rolled up,
three days' growth of beard. He is gesturing at a blueprint
with a pencil.
The cut holds on him for a long beat. Almost forty seconds.
He looks — there is no other word for it — alive.
The voiceover continues over him.
V.O.
Engineer Marko Kova?. A son of Sarajevo, trained at the
Polytechnic. He brings to this work the precision of his
profession, undiminished by circumstance. In him, we are
reminded that the work of construction is older than any
conflict, and will outlast it.
In the mess tent:
Hasan is sitting next to Marko. He does not look at Marko.
Marko does not look at Hasan.
But Hasan's hands, in his lap, have closed into fists.
Vedad, two rows ahead, has turned his head so he is not
looking at the screen.
Senad is watching with a fixed half-smile. The smile he wore
on the first day.
Branko is staring at the floor.
The film continues. Now: shots of Obradovi?. Of Volkov. Of
the steel rising. Music swelling.
ON SCREEN: a new shot. Marko crouched at the failure surface,
day one. The forty-second crouch. Pavkovi? has slowed it. We
can see the moment Marko reads the demolition. We can see the
engineer in him.
V.O.
A bridge does not choose its travelers. It chooses to stand.
Now Marko on screen at the eastern pylon. The day of Volkov's
correction. Pavkovi? has been there, with the camera. We did
not know.
We watch Marko explain the shear plane. He looks competent.
He looks confident. He looks like a man who is good at what
he does.
He looks like a Serb engineer.
V.O.
The work of construction is older than any conflict.
Hasan turns his head.
Slowly.
Looks at Marko.
Marko is looking at the screen.
Marko is looking at himself.
Marko's face is doing something the audience has not seen it
do. It is making no effort to hide.
He cannot look away.
He cannot.
He is watching himself the way you watch a film of a man who
died yesterday. Someone you almost recognize. Someone you
almost are.
The film ends. The bedsheet goes white. The projector
clatters.
Pavkovi? turns up the lamp.
PAVKOVI?
(brightly)
Thank you. Fifteen minutes.
Silence in the tent.
Hasan stands.
He walks out.
A beat. Another prisoner stands. Walks out.
Another. Another.
In rows, in silence, the men leave. None of them speaks. None
of them looks at Marko.
Vedad rises last, the youngest, and pauses by Marko's row. He
does not look at Marko's face. He looks at Marko's hands.
He walks out.
Marko is alone on the bench.
Pavkovi? is at the back of the tent, winding the reel. He
does not approach. He is patient.
Marko stands.
He walks out.
Pavkovi? finishes winding the reel.
He turns the projector off.
He smiles.
It is not the same smile.
It is the smile of a man who has finally caught a fish he has
been working on for forty-nine days.
CUT TO:
EXT. BEHIND THE MESS TENT — CONTINUOUS
Marko walks away from the mess. Fast. Faster than the walk we
have seen from him.
He turns the corner of the tent.
He stops.
He puts both hands on the canvas. He leans into it. His
forehead almost touches the canvas.
He stays like that.
His shoulders move.
Once.
A small sharp inhale.
He is not crying. He is doing something worse. He is failing
to.
He pushes back from the tent. Straightens. Wipes his mouth
with the back of his hand.
He walks.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
31 -
Reflections in the Night
EXT. BEHIND THE CLINIC TENT — NIGHT — DAY FORTY-NINE
Amra outside the clinic, a cigarette. The night is cold and
clear. The bridge floodlit in the middle distance.
Marko approaches.
She does not look at him.
MARKO
(in Bosnian)
I need something to help me sleep.
She exhales smoke.
AMRA
I don't have that kind of medicine.
A beat.
MARKO
What does.
AMRA
(still looking at the
river)
Nothing does. You drink and you
don't sleep. You don't drink and
you don't sleep. You find a way to
live without sleeping.
A long beat.
MARKO
That's what does.
AMRA
That's what does.
She offers him the cigarette. He takes it. He has not smoked
in fifteen years. He smokes.
They stand in silence.
AMRA (CONT'D)
The film.
MARKO
Yes.
AMRA
He cut you into it.
MARKO
Yes.
AMRA
You're alive in it.
He does not answer.
She takes the cigarette back. Drags. Hands it to him again.
AMRA (CONT'D)
That is the part Hasan can't
forgive.
A beat.
MARKO
He's right not to.
Amra looks at him for the first time.
AMRA
(quietly)
I know.
A long beat. He smokes. She watches him smoke.
AMRA (CONT'D)
You are coming apart.
He does not answer.
AMRA (CONT'D)
I have watched a lot of men come
apart, Engineer. I know what it
looks like.
MARKO
(very quietly)
What do I do.
She does not answer at first.
She takes the cigarette back. Finishes it. Drops it. Steps on
it.
AMRA
(finally)
Decide what you are.
A beat.
AMRA (CONT'D)
Before someone else does.
She turns. Goes back into the clinic.
Marko stays.
He looks at the bridge.
The bridge looks back.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
32 -
A Dangerous Exchange
EXT. POW BARRACKS — NIGHT — DAY FIFTY-FIVE
The bread woman — late fifties, headscarf, a sack of brown
bread — at the rear of the supply lot. A guard checks her
sack. Lets her pass.
She crosses to the kitchen. Sets the sack on a counter.
She passes Branko — who is on cleaning detail — a folded
piece of paper inside a heel of bread.
The exchange takes less than a second.
She leaves.
Branko pockets the heel.
He does not move for a moment. He waits. He listens.
He looks at the door he came through.
In the doorway: Nikola. The narrow-eyed guard. Standing in
the half-light. Looking at Branko.
Branko's heart is in his throat. He cannot tell.
He picks up a bucket. He moves to the next counter. He keeps
cleaning.
Nikola watches him for a long beat.
Then turns. Walks away.
Branko exhales.
He keeps cleaning.
He does not put his hand near his pocket.
CUT TO:
INT. POW LATRINE — NIGHT — CONTINUOUS
Branko alone. The heel of bread in his hand. He extracts the
paper. Unfolds.
The note: a hand-drawn sketch of three points on the bridge.
Beneath the sketch, in pencil, in Bosnian:
If yes — leave the eastern lamp lit at midnight. E.Z.
Branko reads it twice.
He lights it with a match. Holds it in the latrine pit until
it burns out.
He waits there in the dark a minute longer than he needs to.
When he goes to leave, he pauses at the door.
He listens.
He hears boots.
He waits.
The boots pass.
He waits another full minute.
He leaves.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
33 -
Silent Struggles
EXT. POW BARRACKS — REAR — NIGHT — DAY FIFTY-FIVE
Falling snow. The yard empty.
Branko at the door of the small lean-to where Marko sometimes
sits at the end of the day. Marko is there now, smoking —
Amra's cigarettes — and looking at nothing.
BRANKO
(in Bosnian, very low)
A minute.
MARKO
Sit.
BRANKO
Behind the latrine.
A beat. Marko stubs the cigarette. Follows him.
CUT TO:
EXT. BEHIND THE LATRINE — NIGHT — CONTINUOUS
Snow falling. The two men against the wall. Their breath the
only sound.
BRANKO
(in Bosnian)
ARBiH demolition cell. Three
kilometers east, in the woods. They
want to take the bridge down before
April 15.
A beat. Marko's face does not change.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
They want the schematic. The new
reinforcements. The charge points.
They want to know if you'll help.
MARKO
Who are they.
BRANKO
A unit out of Goražde. The lead
sapper is named Zuki?. Emir Zuki?.
He says he knows you.
Marko does not breathe for a moment.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
He says you were his professor.
Sarajevo Polytechnic. 1989.
Structural engineering.
MARKO
(quietly)
He was the best student I had.
A beat.
BRANKO
He says you taught him to read a
load diagram.
MARKO
Yes.
BRANKO
He says he never forgot it.
Marko looks at the bridge through a gap in the planks.
Floodlit.
A long, long beat.
MARKO
Tell him no.
Branko looks at him.
BRANKO
Marko —
MARKO
Tell him no.
He turns. Walks out from behind the latrine.
Branko stands a moment in the dark.
Snow on his shoulders.
He follows.
CUT TO:
INT. POW BARRACKS — NIGHT — DAY FIFTY-FIVE
Marko on his mattress. Eyes open. Ceiling.
He does not get up. He does not turn his head.
He is calculating.
He has been calculating since the latrine.
He cannot stop calculating.
He turns onto his side. Faces the wall.
He places a hand flat on the wall.
He stays that way.
The wall is cold.
His hand is cold.
He does not sleep.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
34 -
Tension in the Yard
EXT. MESS TENT — DAY — DAY FIFTY-EIGHT
Senad at the breakfast queue. He intercepts a guard — the
friendly one, the older man — and speaks to him quietly, in
Serbian. The guard listens. Nods. Walks off toward the
office.
Branko, from across the yard, sees this.
So does Marko.
A beat. Marko's face does not change.
But he stops chewing.
He sets the bread down.
He stands.
He walks across the yard.
He passes Senad in the breakfast queue.
He does not look at Senad.
But Senad's face changes as he passes.
Senad puts down his bread.
CUT TO:
EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE — DAY — DAY FIFTY-EIGHT
Mid-morning. The friendly guard catches Marko at the western
approach.
GUARD
(in Serbian, casual)
A moment.
He pulls Marko aside, out of earshot of the prisoners.
GUARD (CONT'D)
Tomi? says the Serb — Branko — has
been talking to the bread woman.
MARKO
(in Serbian)
And?
GUARD
The Colonel wants to know if you
know anything about it.
MARKO
I don't.
GUARD
(after a beat)
Good.
He walks away.
Marko stands very still for ten seconds.
He walks toward the mess.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
35 -
Confrontation in the Mess Tent
INT. MESS TENT — DAY — CONTINUOUS
Almost empty between meals. Senad at a table by the stove,
eating bread.
Marko sits across from him.
He does not speak.
Senad looks up. Stops chewing.
Marko looks at him.
A long silence.
Senad's hand on the bread is white at the knuckles.
MARKO
(in Bosnian, level)
Senad.
SENAD
Yes, Engineer.
MARKO
What did Hasan look like on the
platform last week.
SENAD
(carefully)
I don't —
MARKO
Day eighteen. The platform. Hasan
stopped working for four minutes.
What did he look like.
SENAD
I — Engineer, I don't —
MARKO
You reported it.
A beat.
SENAD
(very quietly)
No.
MARKO
You reported it to someone. Who.
SENAD
Engineer —
MARKO
(quieter, harder)
Who.
A long beat.
SENAD
(barely audible)
Lieutenant Pavkovi?.
A very long silence.
Marko absorbs this.
His face does not change.
But under the table, his fist is closed.
He opens it.
MARKO
What did you tell him.
SENAD
That Hasan was tired.
MARKO
What else.
SENAD
That you climbed up to him.
MARKO
What else.
SENAD
That you sat with him.
MARKO
What else.
SENAD
That you touched him on the knee.
Marko does not respond.
SENAD (CONT'D)
(quickly)
I did not — I did not say what I
thought. I said what I saw.
A beat.
MARKO
What did you think.
A beat.
SENAD
(very quietly)
I do not think anything, Engineer.
A long beat.
Marko leans forward.
MARKO
Senad.
SENAD
Yes.
MARKO
If you report on this crew again.
To anyone. For any reason. I will
take you off the foremen. You will
go back into the labor pool.
Senad's face shifts.
SENAD
The labor pool —
MARKO
Do you understand what that means.
SENAD
I — yes.
MARKO
Say it back to me.
SENAD
(barely)
If I report — I go back into the
labor pool.
MARKO
And what does that mean.
A very long beat.
SENAD
It means I die slower.
A beat.
MARKO
Good.
Marko stands.
He pauses.
MARKO (CONT'D)
Senad.
SENAD
Yes.
MARKO
Tell me the truth. Once.
A beat.
SENAD
I have a wife.
A beat.
SENAD (CONT'D)
She is in Banja Luka. They told me
she would be released if I gave
them — what I see. They said small
things. Nothing — nothing that
hurts anyone.
A beat.
SENAD (CONT'D)
I am sorry.
Marko looks at him for a long moment.
MARKO
(quietly)
We are both sorry.
He walks out.
Senad sits at the table. He sets the bread down. He does not
eat it.
His hand finds his face. He covers his eyes with it.
He stays that way.
CUT TO:
EXT. THE BRIDGE — DAY — DAY FIFTY-EIGHT
Marko walking back toward the bridge. His own face. The way
he is breathing.
He stops at the abutment. He puts a hand on the stone.
Steadies himself against it for a second.
Then he straightens. Walks on.
The men working do not notice.
But Hasan, on the scaffold, has been watching.
He says nothing.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
36 -
Burden of Silence
INT. OBRADOVI?'S OFFICE — NIGHT — DAY FIFTY-EIGHT
A bottle of šljivovica on the desk. Two glasses. Obradovi?
pouring.
He gestures Marko to a chair. Marko sits. Obradovi? hands him
a glass.
They drink.
A long silence.
OBRADOVI?
(in Serbian)
My son is in Goražde.
Marko looks at him.
OBRADOVI?
He is twenty-three. He was studying medicine in Sarajevo
before the war. He chose his side. I chose mine. We have not
spoken in fourteen months.
A beat.
MARKO
Why are you telling me.
OBRADOVI?
Because when the offensive begins, he may die.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
The bridge we are building may carry the tank that kills him.
Marko looks at his glass.
MARKO
Then why are you building it.
OBRADOVI?
Because if I do not build it, they send me to fight. And then
I certainly die. And he still dies.
He drinks.
OBRADOVI?
This way, only one of us does.
A long beat.
Obradovi? sets the glass down.
He reaches into his desk drawer. Removes a small envelope.
Sets it on the desk between them.
He does not push it across.
He puts a finger on it.
OBRADOVI?
He wrote me. Three weeks ago. The letter came through a
journalist. A Frenchman.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
He wrote that he hopes I die in this war. He used my name. He
did not call me Father.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
He wrote my full name and rank in the address line. In case
the journalist made it through.
He looks at the envelope.
OBRADOVI?
He wanted the journalist to read it.
A very long beat.
Obradovi?'s hand on the envelope. His fingertip moves. Just
slightly. A small involuntary scratch at the corner of the
paper. As if to confirm it is real.
OBRADOVI?
(very quietly)
The journalist read it.
He does not look up.
OBRADOVI?
He found a phone in Sarajevo. He called Belgrade. He read it
to my wife.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
My wife read it to me.
A very long silence.
Obradovi? is sitting very still. His face has not changed.
But the hand on the envelope is trembling.
He notices it.
He puts the hand under the desk.
He breathes in through his nose. Out. In. Out.
He picks up his glass with the other hand.
It is steady.
He drinks.
He sets the glass down.
He looks at Marko.
OBRADOVI?
I tell you this because I want you to understand. I am not a
good man. I am not an evil man. I am a man who is trying —
He stops.
He has lost the sentence.
He tries again.
OBRADOVI?
I am trying to —
He cannot find the verb.
He stops.
He looks at the desk.
He sits for a long moment.
Marko does not move.
OBRADOVI?
(eventually, very quietly)
I am trying.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
That is all.
He looks up.
OBRADOVI?
Like you.
Marko does not answer.
Obradovi? refills his own glass. Does not refill Marko's. He
has forgotten.
He drinks.
OBRADOVI?
(quieter, recovering)
I read your footnote. Seven years ago. In the journal.
Marko looks up.
OBRADOVI?
I have wondered, all that time, whether you were correcting
me. Or protecting me. By leaving the name off.
A long beat.
MARKO
I don't remember writing it.
OBRADOVI?
(after a moment, almost smiling)
That is also an answer.
He raises his glass. Marko does not raise his.
Obradovi? drinks alone.
He sets the glass down.
OBRADOVI?
Go to sleep, Engineer.
Marko stands. He sets his glass on the desk.
He pauses.
He looks at the envelope.
MARKO
(quietly)
Colonel.
OBRADOVI?
Yes.
MARKO
Why did you tell me.
A long beat.
OBRADOVI?
(very quietly)
Because there is no one else in this camp who would
understand it.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
And I cannot carry it alone.
A very long beat.
OBRADOVI?
Forgive me.
Marko looks at him.
MARKO
(quietly)
There is nothing to forgive.
He leaves.
Obradovi? sits with the bottle.
He puts the envelope back in the drawer.
He closes the drawer.
He looks at the calendar on the wall.
April 15. Circled.
He puts his hand under the desk again.
The trembling has not stopped.
He sits with it.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
37 -
Reflections on the Bridge
EXT. BEHIND THE LATRINE — NIGHT — DAY SIXTY-THREE
Branko and Marko again. Snow.
BRANKO
(in Bosnian)
Zuki?'s team goes in on April 12.
With you or without you. He wanted
me to tell you that.
A beat.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
He also wanted me to tell you he
has selected the charge points. He
is confident in them.
MARKO
Show me.
Branko produces a folded sketch. Marko unfolds it. Studies it
under the floodlight glare reaching them between the
buildings.
He reads it without comment. His face does not change.
He sees, immediately, what the audience needs to see: the
points are correct. The bridge will fall.
He folds the sketch. Hands it back.
A long beat.
MARKO (CONT'D)
Tell him good luck.
BRANKO
That's it.
MARKO
That's it.
Branko looks at him a moment longer.
BRANKO
Marko.
MARKO
That's it.
Branko nods. Pockets the sketch.
He does not walk off yet.
BRANKO
(very quietly)
He has a younger sister. Zuki?. She
was in your class also. Did you
know.
A beat.
MARKO
No.
BRANKO
She died in Sarajevo. November.
Sniper.
A beat.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
He thought you should know.
Marko stares at the bridge.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
He thought you should know he isn't
holding it against you.
A very long beat.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
He said — that is what made him a
worse engineer than you were. He
never could hold it against anyone.
Branko walks off.
Marko stays.
His breath in the air.
He turns to look at the bridge.
He looks at it the way he has been looking at it for nine
weeks.
The way an engineer looks at a building.
The way a man looks at his life.
The way a man looks at the only thing in his life that is
still standing.
HOLD.
He turns. Walks back to the barracks.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
38 -
Struggles on the Bridge
EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE — DAY — DAY SIXTY-FIVE
Wide. The bridge nearing completion. Most of the deck poured.
The eastern parapet in form. Cranes still rolling.
But the men. Look at the men.
A prisoner stumbles on the deck — not dramatic, just a leg
that has stopped working. Another prisoner catches him. They
keep walking.
The wind off the river is harder now. The temperatures have
dropped again — a late freeze that should be over and is not.
Hasan on the scaffold. His hand wrapped — the second time. He
has not asked Amra for it.
Branko at the form. Coughing. He is wiping blood off his lip
with his sleeve. He does not stop working.
Vedad at his rebar table. He is wearing two coats. His face
is grey. His eyes are bright with fever. He is marking rebar
with chalk. He is not slow. He is fast. He is too fast. He
cannot stop moving because if he stops he will not start
again.
Marko crossing the site. He sees Vedad. He stops.
He puts a hand on Vedad's shoulder.
The boy is hot.
MARKO
(in Bosnian)
Vedad.
VEDAD
Engineer.
MARKO
You're sick.
VEDAD
I'm fine.
MARKO
Go to the clinic.
VEDAD
I'm fine.
A beat.
MARKO
Go to the clinic.
VEDAD
If I go to the clinic I am not
working. If I am not working I am
not on the crew. If I am not on the
crew I —
He stops himself.
VEDAD (CONT'D)
(very quietly)
I'm fine, Engineer.
Marko looks at him for a long moment.
MARKO
You will work half-shifts. With
Branko. The other half you will be
in the clinic.
VEDAD
Engineer —
MARKO
That is the work. That is what I am
assigning. You are on light duty in
the morning. You are at the clinic
in the afternoon. Is that clear.
A beat.
VEDAD
(very quietly)
Yes, Engineer.
MARKO
Look at me.
Vedad looks at him.
Marko studies his face.
MARKO (CONT'D)
Vedad.
VEDAD
Yes.
MARKO
(very quietly)
You are going to survive this
bridge.
Vedad's eyes fill.
VEDAD
(barely)
Yes, Engineer.
Marko walks on.
Behind him, Vedad sits down on his crate. He puts his head in
his hands.
He stays that way.
A guard across the yard sees this. He starts to come over.
Branko steps in front of him.
BRANKO
(in Serbian)
The boy is fine. He is checking a
measurement.
The guard looks at Branko. Looks at Vedad.
He walks on.
Branko crouches beside Vedad. He does not touch him.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
(in Bosnian)
The Engineer is not a liar.
VEDAD
(into his hands)
He's not.
BRANKO
Then breathe. Breathe and keep
working.
Vedad breathes.
He keeps working.
Across the yard, on the porch of his office, Obradovi?
watches.
He has been watching for some time.
He turns and goes inside.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
39 -
Silent Vigil
INT. POW BARRACKS — NIGHT — DAY SIXTY-EIGHT
A wide shot. Forty men asleep. The stove orange-red.
Marko on his mattress. Eyes open. Ceiling.
He turns his head.
In the next mattress: Hasan. Asleep, this time.
Marko studies Hasan's face for a long moment.
A long moment.
He sits up.
He gets dressed in the dark. Boots. Coat.
He crosses the room without waking anyone.
At Hasan's mattress, he pauses.
Hasan stirs.
Marko goes still.
Hasan does not wake.
Marko crouches.
He looks at Hasan for a long moment.
He reaches out. Adjusts Hasan's blanket — pulls it up over
the shoulder. The way a man might do for a child. Or for a
brother.
Hasan does not wake.
Marko stands.
He leaves the barracks.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
40 -
Reflections on the Bridge
EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE — NIGHT — CONTINUOUS
Marko walks across the yard. He passes a guard at the eastern
approach. The guard knows him. The guard nods.
Marko walks onto the bridge.
The floodlights are at half-power for night. The structure
half-shadowed.
He walks the western span. He runs a gloved hand along the
safety rail. He stops at the central span.
He stands at the rail.
He looks down at the river.
He stands there for a long time.
He puts both hands flat on the parapet.
He leans forward. His forehead nearly touches the steel.
He stays that way.
His breath fogs.
The bridge holds him up.
He stays a long time.
He walks the rest of the bridge. He touches each pylon. He
places his palm flat on the concrete of the eastern pylon —
the one he saved.
He stands there with his hand on it.
A long moment.
He talks to it. He does not say anything aloud. But his lips
move once.
His face does not change.
He walks back across the bridge.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
41 -
Reflections in the Drafting Room
INT. MARKO'S DRAFTING ROOM — NIGHT — CONTINUOUS
Marko at the table. He turns on the lamp.
He takes a clean sheet of paper from the drawer.
He begins to draw.
CLOSE on the drawing:
It is the bridge. His bridge. The one he has built.
He marks the points where, with his knowledge of every weld
and every reinforcement and every compromise he made and
every shortcut he refused — the charges should be placed.
The work is technical. Methodical.
He is calmer than he has been in three months.
He works until dawn.
When he finishes, he sits looking at the drawing.
He picks up his pencil. He writes — small, in the bottom
corner:
To E.Z. With apologies.
He stares at it.
He erases it.
The eraser tears the paper.
He looks at the small tear.
He puts the pencil down.
He picks up another pencil.
He does not write anything in the corner.
He folds the drawing carefully into three.
He puts it in the inside pocket of his coat.
He turns off the lamp.
He does not move from the chair for another five minutes.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Character Study"]
Ratings
Scene
42 -
The Weight of Destruction
INT. MESS TENT — DAY — DAY SIXTY-NINE
Breakfast. The men eating. Branko at the corner of a table,
alone.
Marko sits across from him.
He does not pass the drawing yet.
Branko looks at him.
A long beat.
MARKO
(in Bosnian, very low)
Tell Zuki? I am coming. Tell him I
will place the charges myself.
Branko sets down his bread.
BRANKO
Marko —
MARKO
Tell him.
A beat. Branko nods.
MARKO (CONT'D)
And tell him this. This is not for
him. This is not for the men. This
is not for Goražde.
Branko waits.
MARKO (CONT'D)
This is for me.
BRANKO
(quietly)
Why.
A very long beat.
MARKO
Because if I do not own this, I
cannot live with it.
A long beat.
MARKO (CONT'D)
The bridge is mine. The destruction
has to be mine.
A beat.
BRANKO
(very quietly)
Marko. You will not live with it
either way.
A long beat.
MARKO
I know.
A long silence.
Branko looks at him.
BRANKO
Tell me you have a plan to come off
the bridge.
A beat.
MARKO
Tell Zuki? I am coming.
BRANKO
Marko.
MARKO
Tell him.
He slides the folded drawing across the table, beneath his
hand.
Branko covers it with his own hand. Pockets it.
Marko stands. He takes his bread. He walks out of the mess.
Branko stays at the table. He finishes his bread. He does not
rush.
His hand under the table is shaking.
He notices.
He stops it.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
43 -
Reflections at the Bridge
EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE — DAY — DAY SIXTY-NINE
The bridge in full morning light. Almost finished. The deck
poured. The forms stripped from the central span.
Marko stands on the western approach.
He looks at it.
For the first time in three months his face is calm.
He is looking at the bridge the way an executioner looks at a
man who has accepted the verdict.
But there is more in his face than calm. There is something
underneath it. Something he cannot keep down.
He is looking at the bridge the way a man looks at the work
of his hands.
The way a father looks at a son he is about to send away.
He stands there a long moment.
A small movement at the corner of his mouth. He bites the
inside of his cheek. Hard.
He turns. Walks toward the office.
HOLD on his face.
FADE TO BLACK.
END ACT TWO.
ACT THREE
FADE IN:
EXT. THE BRIDGE — DAY — DAY SEVENTY-TWO
A wide shot. The bridge in clean morning light. The final
span being set into place by a Soviet-era crane that strains
and creaks.
The deck is poured. The eastern parapet is being formed. A
crew of prisoners works the western abutment, dressing the
stone.
Marko on the deck, level in hand. He sights down the camber.
He nods to Hasan, who is twenty feet ahead with a chalkline.
Hasan snaps the line.
The line is true.
Marko walks the deck. He runs his hand along the parapet. He
stops at the central span and looks down at the river.
He does not look at the river the way he looked at it last
week.
He looks at it the way you look at a thing you have already
said goodbye to.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
44 -
The Weight of Change
INT. OBRADOVI?'S OFFICE — DAY — DAY SEVENTY-TWO
A general on the phone. Obradovi? standing as he listens. His
face does not change.
OBRADOVI?
(in Serbian)
Yes, General.
(beat)
OBRADOVI?
April twelfth.
(beat)
OBRADOVI?
Understood.
He hangs up. He stands at the desk a moment.
He sits down. He picks up a pen. He writes on a single sheet
of paper:
12.04. — Otvaranje.
(12.04. — Opening.)
He underlines it.
He looks at the calendar on the wall.
He crosses out APRIL 15.
He writes APRIL 12 above it. Circles it.
He sits looking at the new date.
He stands up.
He crosses to the shelf. Picks up the framed photograph.
Turns it.
Looks at his son.
His face does not change.
He puts the photograph back.
Facing the wall.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
45 -
Silent Resolve
EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE — DAY — DAY SEVENTY-FOUR
Obradovi? crosses the yard. Pavkovi?, with the Betacam,
intercepts him.
PAVKOVI?
(in Serbian)
Colonel, I am told —
OBRADOVI?
The twelfth.
PAVKOVI?
General Lazarevi? is attending?
OBRADOVI?
Yes.
PAVKOVI?
For broadcast?
OBRADOVI?
Yes.
A beat. Pavkovi? smiles.
PAVKOVI?
I will need the engineer. On camera. For the ceremony.
OBRADOVI?
You will get what he gives you.
PAVKOVI?
Colonel — with respect —
Obradovi? stops walking. Turns.
PAVKOVI?
The film is for the General. For Pale television. The
Engineer is —
OBRADOVI?
You will get what he gives you.
Pavkovi? holds Obradovi?'s eyes a beat.
PAVKOVI?
Yes, Colonel.
Obradovi? keeps walking.
Pavkovi? stays. He raises the camera. He films Obradovi?'s
back.
He lowers it.
He smiles, but it is different now. Tighter.
He has three days. He needs Marko on camera and he is not
going to ask Marko this time.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
46 -
The Weight of Pride
EXT. THE BRIDGE — DAY — DAY SEVENTY-FOUR
Marko on the deck. Obradovi? approaches him from the eastern
end. He waits until they are alone — until the nearest
prisoner is twenty meters away.
OBRADOVI?
(in Serbian)
The opening is the twelfth.
A beat.
MARKO
Not the fifteenth.
OBRADOVI?
General Lazarevi? moved it forward. Pale television is
broadcasting. There will be a ceremony.
MARKO
The bridge will not be cured.
OBRADOVI?
It will be cured enough.
A long beat. They look at each other.
OBRADOVI?
The offensive begins on the fifteenth. The bridge has to be
opened first.
MARKO
You're telling me this.
OBRADOVI?
I'm telling you this.
He looks at Marko a moment longer.
OBRADOVI?
The men leave the morning after. I have negotiated a
transfer. Labor camp near Banja Luka. Not the front. Not the
woods.
Marko absorbs this.
MARKO
For all of them.
OBRADOVI?
For all of them.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
Engineer.
MARKO
Yes.
OBRADOVI?
You should be proud.
A very long beat.
Marko looks at the bridge.
MARKO
I am proud.
He looks back at Obradovi?.
MARKO (CONT'D)
That's the problem.
Obradovi? holds his eyes.
He understands. He has always understood.
OBRADOVI?
(very quietly)
Yes.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
I know.
He nods once.
He walks away.
Marko stays on the deck.
He looks down at the river.
He is calm. He is calmer than he has ever been on this
bridge.
The decision has been made.
There is nothing left to decide.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
47 -
Rain of Resolve
EXT. BEHIND THE LATRINE — NIGHT — DAY SEVENTY-FOUR
Marko and Branko. Snow turned to a fine cold rain.
MARKO
(in Bosnian, low)
The twelfth. Not the fifteenth.
Branko absorbs.
BRANKO
That's three days.
MARKO
That's three days.
BRANKO
Zuki? needs to know.
MARKO
Tonight.
Branko nods.
MARKO (CONT'D)
And tell him this. The opening
ceremony is at noon. The bridge is
empty by sixteen hundred. The night-
shift relief is at twenty-three
hundred. The window is between
sixteen and twenty-three. I move at
twenty-one hundred.
BRANKO
What do you need.
MARKO
The satchel at the foot of the
eastern pylon. Inside the form
scaffold. The blind spot from the
office is the southwest corner of
the eastern abutment. He drops it
there.
BRANKO
When.
MARKO
Twenty hundred. One hour before I
move.
BRANKO
Extraction.
MARKO
(after a beat)
No.
Branko looks at him.
BRANKO
Marko —
MARKO
No extraction. Tell him that.
A long beat.
BRANKO
He won't accept that.
MARKO
He doesn't have a choice.
A beat.
BRANKO
Marko. He won't accept that.
Marko looks at him.
MARKO
Then tell him I won't accept
extraction.
Branko looks at him a moment longer.
BRANKO
(very quietly)
Look at me, Engineer.
Marko looks at him.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
Tell me one true thing. Out loud.
A long beat.
MARKO
I cannot go home.
A beat.
BRANKO
Why.
MARKO
There is no one there.
A long beat.
BRANKO
That is why.
MARKO
Yes.
BRANKO
That is not a good reason to die.
MARKO
No.
BRANKO
Then —
MARKO
But I have a better one.
Branko waits.
MARKO (CONT'D)
If I walk off this bridge, in two
years I am working for them in
Banja Luka. In five years I am a
Saradnik Tehni?ke Službe in
Belgrade. In ten years I am
explaining to a young man how it
was complicated.
A beat.
MARKO (CONT'D)
I have watched it happen. To better
men than me.
A long beat.
MARKO (CONT'D)
The bridge took me back. Inside of
two months. It took me back from
where I had been. And I went.
A beat.
MARKO (CONT'D)
If I leave this bridge alive, I am
not coming back from where I went.
A very long silence.
Branko nods.
He turns to leave.
MARKO (CONT'D)
Branko.
Branko stops.
MARKO (CONT'D)
The morning after. The men leave
for Banja Luka.
BRANKO
The men.
MARKO
Tell Zuki?. The men leave for Banja
Luka the morning after. They are
not on the bridge. They are not at
the site.
BRANKO
He'll want to know if that's
confirmed.
MARKO
(quietly)
It's confirmed.
Branko nods.
He walks off into the rain.
Marko stays.
He turns his face up into the rain. He closes his eyes.
He stays that way for a long time.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
48 -
A Decision in the Dark
EXT. FOREST CLEARING — NIGHT — DAY SEVENTY-FOUR
Three kilometers east. A clearing in pine. A small fire,
shielded.
EMIR ZUKI? — 27, lean, beard now closer to the face — and
three OTHER SAPPERS around the fire. A radio crackles low.
A RUNNER comes in from the dark. Hands Emir a folded note.
Emir reads. He reads it twice.
He looks up at his men.
EMIR
(in Bosnian)
The twelfth. He places them
himself. He refuses extraction.
A LIEUTENANT, 30s, hard face, watches him.
LIEUTENANT
He refuses.
EMIR
Yes.
LIEUTENANT
Then he stays.
EMIR
He stays.
LIEUTENANT
You will leave him.
A beat.
EMIR
I will leave him.
The lieutenant studies him.
LIEUTENANT
You'll leave him because he's good.
Or because he asked.
EMIR
(after a beat)
Both.
The lieutenant nods.
He turns to the fire.
LIEUTENANT
Cover team. Two kilometers north at
twenty-one hundred. Diversion on
the VRS depot. Twenty minutes of
contact. Then we withdraw east.
EMIR
(quietly, to the
lieutenant)
Sir.
LIEUTENANT
Yes.
EMIR
Forty-five minutes.
LIEUTENANT
What.
EMIR
Forty-five minutes of contact. Not
twenty.
A long beat.
LIEUTENANT
We'll take losses.
EMIR
I know.
LIEUTENANT
Why.
A beat.
EMIR
(very quietly)
Because he is going to need every
minute of it. And he is going to
need it longer than he thinks.
The lieutenant studies him.
LIEUTENANT
Forty-five.
EMIR
Forty-five.
The lieutenant nods.
LIEUTENANT
Get the team ready.
Emir folds the note. Looks at it in his hand a moment.
He puts it in the fire.
He stays watching it burn.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["War","Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
49 -
Silent Confessions
INT. POW BARRACKS — NIGHT — DAY SEVENTY-EIGHT
Four nights later. The barracks dark. The men asleep.
Marko on his mattress. Eyes open.
Hasan, next to him. Awake. Watching the ceiling.
A long silence.
HASAN
(very quietly, in Bosnian)
You haven't slept in three nights.
MARKO
No.
HASAN
The men have noticed.
MARKO
I'm sorry.
A beat.
HASAN
For what.
Marko does not answer.
A long beat.
HASAN (CONT'D)
The ceremony is the twelfth.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
We leave the thirteenth.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
Banja Luka.
MARKO
Banja Luka.
A beat.
HASAN
And you.
A long beat.
MARKO
I am staying.
Hasan turns his head. Looks at him.
For a long moment, neither speaks.
HASAN
(quietly)
I see.
A beat.
HASAN (CONT'D)
The Engineer's position.
MARKO
The Engineer's position.
HASAN
He offered.
MARKO
He offered.
Hasan looks at the ceiling again.
A very long silence.
HASAN
(finally)
That is not the Marko I sat next to
on the scaffold.
MARKO
No.
HASAN
Then who is staying.
A beat.
MARKO
Someone who has to.
Hasan turns his head back. Looks at him a long moment.
He reads Marko's face. He has spent ninety days reading
Marko's face. He sees what is there.
He sees it.
His eyes change.
HASAN
(very softly)
Ah.
A long beat.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(quieter still)
You are not staying.
MARKO
(after a beat)
No.
A long beat.
Hasan does not move. He does not turn away. He does not turn
toward.
He just looks.
His face has stopped being Hasan's face. It has become a face
we have not seen in this film yet. It is a young man's face.
A man with a young son in Zenica.
HASAN
(very quietly)
When.
MARKO
The night of the ceremony.
HASAN
How.
MARKO
You don't need to know how.
HASAN
How.
A beat.
MARKO
Zuki?.
A beat.
HASAN
Your student.
MARKO
Yes.
A long beat.
HASAN
You are placing them yourself.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
Why.
A beat.
MARKO
Because he could not do it as well
as I can.
A long beat.
HASAN
That is not why.
A beat.
MARKO
No.
HASAN
Why.
A very long beat.
MARKO
(very quietly)
Because I built it as well as I
could.
Hasan absorbs this.
He turns his face away. To the wall.
A very long silence.
HASAN
(into the wall, almost a
whisper)
The boy.
MARKO
Vedad.
HASAN
He thinks you are leaving with us.
In the truck.
A beat.
MARKO
He'll be in the truck before he
understands.
HASAN
He will understand eventually.
MARKO
Yes.
HASAN
He will not forgive you.
MARKO
No.
A long beat.
HASAN
Then I will tell him.
Marko turns his head.
MARKO
Tell him what.
A long silence.
HASAN
(very quietly)
That you loved him.
A very long silence.
Marko cannot answer.
His hand goes to his face.
He keeps it there.
His shoulders move. Once. Twice.
Hasan does not turn.
Hasan does not look.
Hasan reaches a hand across the gap between the mattresses.
He places it flat on Marko's chest.
He does not say anything.
He holds it there.
He holds it there a long time.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(eventually, into the
wall, almost inaudible)
Hvala, brate.
(Thank you, brother.)
He takes the hand back.
He does not turn.
A beat.
HASAN (CONT'D)
Sleep, brate.
MARKO
(barely)
Yes.
Marko closes his eyes.
He turns his face toward the wall on his side.
He sleeps for the first time in three nights.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
50 -
Crossroads of Decision
EXT. THE BRIDGE — DAY — DAY EIGHTY-FOUR
A bright cold morning. The bridge complete. The deck swept
clean. The parapets dressed. The stone scrubbed.
A red carpet — actually red carpet, somehow procured from
Pale — runs across the eastern abutment.
Six VRS staff cars at the eastern approach. Soldiers in
parade kit. Pavkovi? with two cameras now — one on a tripod,
one handheld, manned by an ASSISTANT we have not seen before.
GENERAL LAZAREVI?, 60s, decorated, has stepped out of the
lead car. He is small and round and looks tired.
Obradovi? meets him. They walk slowly toward the bridge.
The forty prisoners stand at the rear of the yard, watching.
They have been brought up from the pen and dressed in clean
shirts. Pavkovi?'s idea.
Marko stands at the western abutment, alone.
He is wearing a clean coat. Someone — Amra, we will learn —
has given it to him. He has been shaved. His hair has been
combed back.
Pavkovi? has done this.
Marko knows.
The general crosses the eastern abutment with Obradovi?. The
cameras follow.
A small podium. A microphone.
OBRADOVI?
(in Serbian, brief)
General. The Crossing at Sutorina. Class sixty. Eighty-four
days from beginning to completion. The first vehicle will be
the General's car. Whenever you are ready.
He steps back.
The general takes the microphone. He clears his throat.
GENERAL LAZAREVI?
(in Serbian)
Thirty-three years ago this bridge was built in the spirit of
brotherhood and unity.
A small wind passes. The flags on the staff cars stir.
GENERAL LAZAREVI?
It is fitting that we have rebuilt it in the same spirit. A
bridge does not choose its travelers. It chooses to stand.
Pavkovi?'s voiceover from the documentary. The general is
reading from a card Pavkovi? prepared.
Marko, at the western abutment, hears it. His face does not
change.
GENERAL LAZAREVI?
I thank our engineers. I thank the workers. I thank the
Republic.
He steps back. He gets into his car.
The car pulls onto the bridge.
The cameras follow it.
The car crosses the bridge in twenty seconds. Stops at the
western abutment.
It is two meters from Marko.
The door does not open. The general does not get out. He
gives Marko a small nod through the window. He gives
Obradovi? — walking up from the eastern end — a different
kind of nod.
The car reverses. Drives back across the bridge.
Pavkovi?, with the handheld camera, has been on Marko's face
the entire crossing.
Marko has not given him anything.
But also: he has not turned away.
Pavkovi? lowers the camera. He smiles. The smile of a man who
got the angle of refusal he wanted.
PAVKOVI?
(quietly, to himself)
Da.
(Yes.)
Champagne is opened on the eastern abutment. Pavkovi? films
it.
Obradovi? crosses the bridge. He arrives at the western
abutment.
He stops next to Marko.
They stand together. Watching the celebration.
OBRADOVI?
(quietly, in Serbian)
The General asked me what your future would be.
MARKO
And.
OBRADOVI?
I said that depends on what you want it to be.
A long beat.
MARKO
What did he say.
OBRADOVI?
He said that the Republic has need of engineers. He said it
slowly. So I would understand it.
Marko nods, almost imperceptibly.
OBRADOVI?
You will be summoned to my office tonight. After the men go
to the barracks. I will have papers for you. A position. A
salary. A name on a different list.
He looks at Marko.
OBRADOVI?
I am telling you this now so you have time to think.
MARKO
I don't need time.
OBRADOVI?
Yes you do.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
You think you have made the decision. You haven't. The
decision is the moment your hand is on the pen.
MARKO
(quietly)
You sound like a man who knows.
OBRADOVI?
(after a beat)
Yes.
He stands a moment longer.
OBRADOVI?
Twenty-two hundred. The office.
He starts to walk back across the bridge.
He stops.
He does not turn.
OBRADOVI?
Engineer.
MARKO
Yes.
A very long beat. His back to Marko.
OBRADOVI?
(very quietly)
Whichever pen you put it in.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
Forgive me.
He walks on.
Marko watches him go.
He does not breathe for a long moment.
Pavkovi?, fifty meters away on the eastern abutment, has been
filming Marko's back this whole time.
Pavkovi? lowers the camera. He has not heard Obradovi?'s
words. But he has seen the back. He has seen what the back
did when Obradovi? said them.
He nods.
He raises the camera.
He keeps filming.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
51 -
Farewells in the Yard
EXT. THE YARD — DAY — DAY EIGHTY-FOUR
The trucks have arrived. The men are being loaded. Each
prisoner has a small bundle — what little they own.
Marko stands at the edge of the yard, near the office.
Hasan passes. He carries nothing. He stops.
He looks at Marko.
He looks at him a long moment.
He nods. Once. Slowly.
He climbs into the truck.
He does not look back.
Vedad passes. He stops. He turns.
He embraces Marko, brief and clumsy, the way a son might
embrace a father in front of strangers.
He does not speak.
He pulls back. Looks at Marko's face.
VEDAD
(quietly, in Bosnian)
You will come on the next truck.
A beat.
MARKO
(very quietly)
Yes, Vedad.
VEDAD
(searching his face)
Promise.
A long beat.
MARKO
The next truck.
Vedad nods. He believes him. He believes him because he needs
to.
He climbs into the truck.
Marko watches him go.
A small movement at the corner of Marko's mouth. He bites the
inside of his cheek again. Hard.
Senad passes. He does stop. He starts to say something.
Marko looks at him.
Senad changes what he was going to say.
SENAD
(in Serbian, low)
Sretno, Inženjeru.
(Good luck, Engineer.)
He climbs into the truck.
Branko passes last. He pauses beside Marko, hands at his
sides.
He does not look at Marko's face.
BRANKO
(in Bosnian, very quietly)
The satchel is in place.
A beat.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
(quieter)
Zuki? says — opraštam ti.
(Zuki? says — I forgive
you.)
A beat.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
He said you would know what for.
Marko closes his eyes.
He nods.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
And he said one more thing.
Marko opens his eyes.
BRANKO (CONT'D)
He said — come anyway. The window
is forty-five minutes. He moved it
for you.
A very long beat.
Marko's jaw moves.
MARKO
(very quietly)
Thank him.
BRANKO
Will you come.
A long beat.
MARKO
(quietly)
Thank him.
A beat.
Branko nods. He understands the answer.
He climbs into the truck.
The trucks pull out.
Marko watches them go.
Vedad is at the back of the second truck, looking out.
Looking at Marko.
His face has begun to understand.
The truck rolls past the gate.
The pen is empty for the first time in three months.
Amra is on the porch of the clinic, fifty meters away. She is
smoking.
She watches Marko watch the trucks.
She does not move.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
52 -
A Choice of Survival
INT. CLINIC TENT — EVENING — DAY EIGHTY-FOUR
Late afternoon. The light failing. Amra sterilizing
instruments she has already sterilized.
Marko enters.
She does not turn.
AMRA
(in Bosnian, without
looking)
You are not at the office.
MARKO
I will be.
AMRA
At twenty-two hundred.
He looks at her.
She turns.
AMRA (CONT'D)
This is a small camp. There are no
secrets in it.
A beat.
AMRA (CONT'D)
He is offering you a position.
MARKO
Yes.
AMRA
You will take it.
MARKO
(carefully)
He thinks I will.
A long beat. She reads him. She has read him in three
seconds, the way she did the first day.
She sets down the instrument she is holding.
AMRA
(quietly)
Oh.
A beat.
AMRA (CONT'D)
You stupid man.
A beat.
She crosses to him. She does not embrace him. She puts a hand
briefly on his chest — palm flat, just above the heart — the
gesture of a doctor checking for life.
She holds it there a second.
She takes her hand away.
But her hand does not go back to her side. It comes up. To
his face. She holds his face — both palms, briefly. She is
checking for fever. She is checking for the man. She is
checking for what is left.
She holds it.
Her hand is shaking.
She is shaking.
AMRA (CONT'D)
(very quietly)
Don't.
A beat.
AMRA (CONT'D)
Don't.
MARKO
(barely)
Amra.
AMRA
Don't do this. Get on the truck. Go
to Banja Luka. Survive it. Be a
coward. Be a coward for me, Marko.
Be a coward.
She is crying. Without sound. The tears running.
AMRA (CONT'D)
Be a coward for me.
A very long silence.
MARKO
(very quietly)
I can't.
AMRA
Why.
MARKO
Because I have been one for ninety
days.
A beat.
MARKO (CONT'D)
And it suits me, Amra. It suits me.
I cannot — I cannot live with how
well it suits me.
A beat.
MARKO (CONT'D)
Forgive me.
She closes her eyes.
Her hands fall.
A long silence.
She opens her eyes.
She steps back.
She turns to the instruments. She picks one up.
She turns back.
She holds it out.
AMRA
A scalpel. Carbon steel. Wrap your
hand. The blade is the cleanest
thing in this camp.
A beat.
AMRA (CONT'D)
If they take you, do not let them
take you alive. Do you understand.
A long beat.
MARKO
Yes.
She holds the scalpel out.
He does not take it.
She does not lower her hand.
He takes it.
He puts it in the inside pocket of his coat.
A long beat.
He turns to leave.
AMRA
Marko.
He stops.
She is looking at the floor.
AMRA (CONT'D)
(very quietly)
If I am alive in May. I will go to
Sarajevo. I will find someone who
knew you. I will tell them what you
did.
A beat.
AMRA (CONT'D)
I will tell them you came back.
She raises her eyes.
AMRA (CONT'D)
Do you understand.
A very long beat.
MARKO
(barely)
Yes.
AMRA
Go.
He leaves.
She does not watch him go.
She picks up another instrument.
She continues to sterilize what is already sterile.
She continues for a long time.
Her hands are steady.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama"]
Ratings
Scene
53 -
A Quiet Escape
EXT. THE YARD — NIGHT — DAY EIGHTY-FOUR
Twenty-one hundred hours. The yard quiet. The floodlights on
the bridge at full power for the night, casting hard shadows
across the gravel.
Marko crosses the yard.
He passes the empty pen. He does not look at it.
He approaches the eastern abutment.
A GUARD — the friendly older one — is on duty.
GUARD
(in Serbian, casual)
Engineer.
MARKO
A walk.
GUARD
The bridge is closed.
MARKO
For the night, yes. I want to see
it. Tonight.
The guard considers. Looks at Marko.
GUARD
Twenty minutes.
MARKO
Twenty minutes.
The guard nods. Lets him pass.
A beat. The guard speaks again, quietly, not looking at him.
GUARD
Engineer.
Marko stops.
GUARD (CONT'D)
The men got off safely.
A beat.
GUARD (CONT'D)
I drove them as far as the
junction. They are an hour past the
junction now.
A long beat.
MARKO
Thank you.
The guard nods.
He does not look at Marko.
GUARD
(very quietly)
Go on. See your bridge.
Marko walks onto the bridge.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
54 -
The Weight of Choices
EXT. THE BRIDGE — NIGHT — CONTINUOUS
He walks the deck slowly. He runs his hand along the parapet.
He stops at the eastern pylon.
He looks down. Then he climbs over the parapet and onto the
form scaffold below — still in place against the pylon, not
yet stripped.
He climbs down two levels.
The satchel is there. Wedged behind a crossbeam. Waterproofed
canvas.
He pulls it out.
He sits on the scaffold a moment, the satchel on his lap.
He opens it.
Six charges. Detcord. Detonator. A small folded paper — a
hand-drawn note, in Bosnian:
The cover team begins at twenty-one hundred. Forty-five
minutes of contact. Use them. — Your student.
P.S. — If you change your mind, the truck at the junction
will wait until twenty-two thirty. After that it leaves.
Marko reads it.
He folds it. He puts it in his coat.
He closes the satchel.
He climbs back up onto the deck.
He walks toward the central span.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
55 -
Silent Precision
EXT. THE BRIDGE — CENTRAL SPAN — NIGHT — CONTINUOUS
He kneels at the central span.
He works without hurry.
The first charge: the load axis under the central span. He
has identified this point three times in his head over the
past nine days. The placement is exact. He scores the steel
with a knife. He fixes the charge. He tapes it.
He moves to the second point. The eastern pylon. Below the
load axis. The shear plane Volkov nearly created.
A flat distant crack — a rifle. Two more.
Marko does not look up.
He continues.
Two kilometers north, the cover team. Forty-five minutes. The
work requires forty.
He works the third charge. The western pylon.
He moves to the fourth. The fourth is on the central span's
underside. He has to climb under the deck on the form
scaffold to reach it.
He climbs.
He works under the deck.
The distant gunfire continues. He does not hear it stop. He
is concentrating.
His hands are steady.
His hands are very steady.
He has not noticed when they stopped shaking.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","Thriller"]
Ratings
Scene
56 -
The Weight of Decision
INT. OBRADOVI?'S OFFICE — NIGHT — CONTINUOUS
Twenty-one twenty-two. The office. Obradovi? at his desk with
a folder open. A pen ready.
A paper on the desk: Imenovanje. M. Kova?. Saradnik, Tehni?ka
služba.
(Appointment. M. Kova?. Associate, Technical Service.)
He looks at his watch.
He waits.
A radio on the cabinet behind him crackles.
VOICE ON RADIO
(in Serbian)
Komandant. Kontakt. Dvije tisu?e
sjeverno. Mali odred.
(Commander. Contact. Two
kilometers north. Small
unit.)
Obradovi? goes still.
He looks at his watch again.
He stands up.
He crosses to the window. Looks out at the bridge.
Floodlit. Empty.
Empty.
He stares at it.
A figure — small, distant — climbing up onto the deck from
the form scaffold.
Obradovi? goes very still.
He stays at the window for a long moment.
He turns. Looks at the radio.
He looks at the folder on his desk.
He looks at the pen.
He picks up the pen.
He sets it down.
He walks to the cabinet. He unlocks a drawer. He removes his
service pistol from inside it.
He checks the magazine. Slides it back into the grip.
He looks at the pistol in his hand.
He looks at it for a long moment.
He puts on his greatcoat.
He picks up the photograph from the shelf. The one facing the
wall.
He turns it.
He looks at his son.
He puts the photograph in his breast pocket.
Facing his chest.
He buttons the coat.
He walks out of the office.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
57 -
The Final Decision
EXT. THE BRIDGE — CENTRAL SPAN — NIGHT — CONTINUOUS
Marko on the deck. He has finished the fourth charge. He is
connecting detcord between the placements.
His hands are cold. His hands are steady.
He hears boots on the deck.
He does not look up.
He knows.
He continues working.
He knots the cord at the central junction.
He sits back on his heels.
He turns his head.
Obradovi? stands ten meters away. The pistol in his right
hand, held at his side, pointed at the deck.
For a long moment neither man moves.
Obradovi? walks forward. Slowly. He stops three meters from
Marko.
He looks down at the charges. He looks at the placements.
OBRADOVI?
(in Serbian, quiet)
These are well placed.
MARKO
Thank you.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
The central span. The eastern pylon. The western pylon. The
underside.
MARKO
Yes.
OBRADOVI?
You will lose the whole bridge.
MARKO
Yes.
OBRADOVI?
You will lose the eastern pylon by water infiltration on the
cure surface. The pylon you saved.
MARKO
Yes.
A long silence.
OBRADOVI?
I saw the satchel from the office window. I have been
watching it for nine days.
A beat.
MARKO
I assumed.
OBRADOVI?
You did.
A long beat.
OBRADOVI?
You knew I was watching.
MARKO
Yes.
OBRADOVI?
You did this anyway.
MARKO
Yes.
A long silence. Obradovi? looks at the river. Looks at Marko.
OBRADOVI?
The cover team is being overwhelmed. They have eight minutes
before the reserve company reaches them. Then the reserve
company comes back here.
MARKO
I know.
OBRADOVI?
You knew that too.
MARKO
Yes.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
You did not plan to walk off this bridge.
MARKO
No.
A beat. Obradovi? studies him.
OBRADOVI?
Why.
MARKO
You know why.
A long beat. Obradovi? looks at the river.
OBRADOVI?
(quietly)
Yes.
A long silence.
Marko remains kneeling. The detonator is on the deck beside
him. The wire runs from the detonator to the detcord
junction. The junction connects to all four charges.
Obradovi? sees the detonator. Sees the wire.
He could put a bullet in Marko's head and the bridge would
live.
He does not.
OBRADOVI?
I have one question.
MARKO
Ask.
A long beat.
OBRADOVI?
Why did you build it well.
A beat. Marko looks at him.
A very long silence.
MARKO
(quietly)
Because I did not know how to build
it any other way.
Obradovi? closes his eyes for a moment.
He opens them.
OBRADOVI?
No.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
Neither did I.
A long beat.
OBRADOVI?
That was my question.
MARKO
That was your question.
A beat. Obradovi? almost smiles. He does not.
OBRADOVI?
We are not different men, Engineer.
MARKO
No.
OBRADOVI?
That is what frightens me.
A very long silence.
Obradovi? looks at the river.
OBRADOVI?
(very quietly)
My son will hear about this bridge tomorrow.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
He will hear that it fell.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
He will not know who I was, tonight, on it.
Marko does not answer.
A long silence.
OBRADOVI?
But I will know.
A long beat.
He raises the pistol.
He points it at Marko's chest.
He holds it there.
The wind moves the cable at the rail. The floodlights buzz,
distant.
Across the valley, the gunfire two kilometers north stops.
The silence that follows is enormous.
Obradovi?'s hand is steady.
He looks down the sight.
His finger is on the trigger.
He looks at Marko.
Marko looks at him.
Marko's hand is on the detonator.
Marko's hand is steady.
They hold.
CLOSE on Obradovi?'s eyes.
A long, long beat.
Obradovi?'s hand begins to tremble.
He notices. He stops it.
His finger on the trigger does not move.
He looks at Marko.
He looks at Marko a very long time.
He lowers the pistol.
Slowly.
He sets it on the deck.
He stands up.
He does not look at the pistol again.
He looks at Marko.
OBRADOVI?
(very quietly)
Do it.
A long beat.
OBRADOVI?
Engineer.
A beat.
OBRADOVI?
Do it well.
He turns.
He walks toward the parapet.
He does not look at the river.
He climbs over.
The fall takes less than a second.
The sound of water.
Then nothing.
Marko stays kneeling.
He does not move for a long moment.
His face does not change.
But his shoulders. The shoulders move. Once. Twice.
He turns his head toward the parapet.
He stays.
He looks at the parapet.
He looks at the river beyond.
He looks at the detonator in his hand.
The light is going on the river. Twenty-one fifty-seven.
He closes his eyes.
He opens them.
He stands.
He walks to the parapet. He looks down. The river. The mist.
The water has already closed.
He stays a long moment.
He turns.
He walks back to the detonator.
He kneels.
He puts both hands on it.
He looks up — at the bridge, at the deck, at the steel rising
above him, at the work of his ninety days.
His face does not change.
But his lips move.
Once.
We cannot hear what he says.
But it is in Bosnian. It is one syllable.
He presses the plunger.
CUT TO BLACK.
In the darkness:
A detonation.
The detonation is enormous. The black screen shudders. Glass
shatters somewhere off-screen. The river groans.
Then nothing.
A long held silence in the black.
Then:
The sound of water, rearranging itself.
The river. Finding its new shape.
HOLD on the silence. A long time.
CUT TO:
EXT. RIVER VALLEY — DAWN — DAY EIGHTY-FIVE
A wide shot. The river. The bridge is gone.
What is left of it lies in the river — three broken sections,
the eastern pylon entirely collapsed, the western pylon a
stump.
Mist rising off the water. First light.
A VRS soldier on the bank — young, maybe twenty — stands at
the water's edge with a rifle slung. He looks at the
wreckage. He does not know what to do.
Another soldier approaches him. A medic.
They speak briefly. The medic gestures toward something
downstream. The young soldier nods.
They walk together along the bank.
The camera does not follow them.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
58 -
A Moment of Decision
INT. OBRADOVI?'S OFFICE DAWN DAY EIGHTY-FIVE
The office. Empty. The window has cracked across.
The folder on the desk. The appointment paper. The pen.
The calendar on the wall: APRIL 12. Circled.
Below it, faintly visible, the crossed-out APRIL 15:
Operacija Prolje?e.
On the shelf, the framed photograph is gone.
A figure enters.
Pavkovi?. He is shaking not crying, just shaking with
adrenaline that has nowhere to go.
He stands in the doorway a moment.
He crosses to the window. Looks out at the river.
He raises the Betacam he is carrying.
He films the wreckage.
He films for thirty seconds. Forty seconds. A long time.
He lowers the camera.
He looks at the camera in his hand.
He ejects the tape.
He stands holding the tape.
He looks at the desk. The pen. The paper.
He looks at the tape.
A long, long beat.
He looks at the tape in his palm.
CLOSE on his face.
He is twenty-six years old.
He is going to make a choice now that will define the rest of
his life.
The film holds on him.
Pavkovi? puts the tape inside the breast pocket of his
uniform.
He buttons the pocket.
He walks out of the office.
We do not follow.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
59 -
Silent Grief
EXT. ROAD TO BANJA LUKA — DAY — DAY EIGHTY-FIVE
The truck. Stopped on a hill. The men have been let out to
relieve themselves.
Hasan stands at the edge of the road.
He is looking back toward the valley.
A distant column of smoke rises against the morning.
He is looking at the smoke.
His face does not change.
A small movement at the corner of his mouth. He bites the
inside of his cheek.
Vedad comes to stand beside him.
He sees the smoke.
His face begins to understand.
VEDAD
(very quietly, in Bosnian)
Hasan.
Hasan does not turn.
VEDAD (CONT'D)
Hasan.
A long beat.
HASAN
(very quietly)
Yes.
VEDAD
He is not on the next truck.
A very long beat.
HASAN
No.
Vedad's face.
He does not cry.
He stares at the smoke.
He stares at the smoke a long time.
HASAN (CONT'D)
(eventually, quietly)
He loved you, Vedad.
Vedad does not turn.
He stays.
Looking at the smoke.
After a long moment, his hand reaches.
Finds Hasan's.
Holds it.
They stand at the edge of the road.
Holding hands.
Two men. Looking at smoke.
A guard shouts — back in the truck.
They do not move yet.
The smoke rises.
CUT TO:
Genres:
["Drama","War"]
Ratings
Scene
60 -
Reflections on War's Aftermath
EXT. RIVER VALLEY — DAY — DAY EIGHTY-FIVE
A wider shot. The valley. The broken bridge in the river. The
mist clearing.
Spring is beginning. We can see it now — a green at the edges
of the grey, the first thaw cutting channels in the snow on
the bank.
Distant artillery, far off. Not at Goražde. Not yet.
The river runs. The wreckage stays.
A small fishing eagle lands on a section of broken span
sticking out of the water. It folds its wings.
It watches the water.
HOLD.
Over the image, in plain white type, no fanfare:
The Sutorina crossing was not rebuilt during the war.
The siege of Goražde was lifted by international intervention
in April 1994.
The town fell in 1995.
The war ended in December of that year.
Marko Kova?'s body was never recovered.
Colonel Dragan Obradovi?'s body was never recovered.
Lieutenant Milan Pavkovi? emigrated to Toronto in 1996.
In 2007, he released a forty-seven-minute documentary titled
"The Engineer."
It is available in the archive of the Sarajevo War Tunnel
Museum.
The text fades.
The image of the river and the wreckage remains.
The fishing eagle takes off.
The river runs.
FADE TO BLACK.