DINOSAURS ALIVE! A 3-D LARGE-FORMAT FILM A Production Of DAVID CLARK INC. GIANT SCREEN FILMS MARYLAND SCIENCE CENTER STARDUST BLUE LLC In Association With AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY and HUGO PRODUCTIONS Narrated By MICHAEL DOUGLAS Final Script 4/4/07 Written by David Clark & Bayley Silleck CGI #1 Fighting Dinosaurs FADE UP on the eroded slope of a semi-vegetated sand dune in the Gobi Desert. The sky, full of menacing clouds, heralds an approaching storm. Sand is blowing. A small, four-legged, crested dinosaur – an herbivorous Protoceratops – ambles into view, looks about for food. Suddenly, from the top of the dune, a carnivorous Velociraptor leaps through the air and lands on the Proto’s back. The shrieking Proto takes off, runs out of frame. Locked in mortal combat, the dinosaurs plunge downhill toward us, getting larger and larger in 3D space. All at once the Proto stops, plants its forelegs in the sand, and throws the Velo off its back. The Velo attacks again, striking at the Proto’s neck and belly with its forelimb claws. The Proto retaliates by seizing the Velo’s neck in its hook-like beak and snapping down hard, then seizes the dangerous forelimb of the Velo in its mouth. Now the dinosaurs are right in our laps, the Proto on top and the Velo on its back, screeching at its adversary, as it sinks one of its toe-claws into the Proto’s belly. Both dinosaurs are fatally wounded. The action FREEZES on their deadly embrace. DISSOLVE to: Interior of Mongolian Museum of Natural History. Eighty million years have passed. The dinos’ entwined bodies are now perfectly preserved skeletons. The camera rises high over the fossils, and looks down on the two ancient adversaries. NARRATOR Eighty million years ago, two dinosaurs - - a crested Protoceratops and a sharp-clawed Velociraptor, fought to the death. Somehow, as they died in the sands of the Gobi Desert, their battle was frozen in time - - the Velociraptor flat on its back, its clawed arm caught in the jaws of the Protoceratops. DISSOLVE to: Close TRACKING shot past the skeletons, showing the supine Velo’s toe-claw stuck in the Proto’s belly and its forearm caught in the Proto’s jaws. An extraordinary fossil. A mysterious glimpse of life and death in the Age of Dinosaurs. DISSOLVE to: High-angle close shot: Wind blows the sand away to reveal what at first appears to be a fossil, but is then revealed as two words carved in stone. The title then lifts from the sandy matrix and grows larger in the blackness of 3D space. DINOSAURS ALIVE Once again we hear the screeching sound of the aggressive Velociraptor. Suddenly, the Velociraptor‟s clawed hand appears out of the dark background and smashes the Main Title logo to pieces; broken letters fly out into the audience. CUT to: Interior, American Museum of Natural History, Hall of Saurischian Dinosaurs. TRACK IN on the horned and frilled head of Triceratops. NARRATOR For more than 150 million years, dinosaurs roamed every corner of the planet. Only a very few left evidence of their existence - - their fossilized bones. CRANE along the spine of Stegosaurus, with its distinctive dorsal plates slicing though 3-D space. Below, we see its dangerous-looking tail spikes. And those bones never cease to fascinate us. DINOSAURS ALIVE Final Script 4/4/07 2 CRANE down from hip of Tyrannosaurus rex to legs and feet. Dinosaurs came in amazing shapes and sizes. Some were the largest animals ever to walk the Earth. CRANE into T. rex jaws, with its awesome, curved teeth. Paleontologists – the scientists who study prehistoric life… Tilt down from head of T. rex to awed visitors staring at its massive body and skull. In the background is a gigantic Apatosaurus. … are discovering more dinosaurs now than ever before. And this fossil evidence is allowing them to reconstruct not only their strange skeletons, but also their lives. CUT to: Interior of New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science. We CRANE UP from a Stegosaurus to reveal a gigantic skeleton of a Sauropod, filling the entire hall. An example is this gigantic long-necked, plant-eater known as Seismosaurus. Found in New Mexico it lived during the Jurassic Period, 150 million years ago, when many dinosaurs grew to unprecedented size. CRANE from close-up of the creature’s head, down its long neck vertebrae and into its massive rib cage. Seismosaurus means “earth-shaking lizard,” and there‟s no doubt that its footsteps echoed across the Jurassic landscape. Measuring 110 feet from nose to tail, it is one of the longest dinosaurs ever discovered. Strangely, when it was excavated, some 240 smooth, round stones were found in and around its huge stomach cavity. CGI #6 Seismosaurus An enormous Seismosaurus head comes into frame, bends down, and picks up some stones in its mouth. The camera pulls back and we see in the background, two smaller Seismosaurus walking and feeding. Some scientists believe Seismosaurus swallowed stones to help its digestion. Wide low-angle shot of Seismosaurus crossing a rocky riverbed toward a stand of trees, as a small flock of pterosaurs circle around it. The dinosaur approaches a couple of trees as its gigantic feet come uncomfortably close to the camera. Others say that finding the stones was a coincidence, that they were part of a riverbed where Seismosaurus was found. Medium-close shot of the vast expanse of Seismo’s back. Two pterosaurs fly into frame and we follow them, over the huge dino’s back and up its incredibly long neck to its relatively small head. With its rake- like teeth, Seismo strips foliage from a tree, and then turns toward camera, giving us an intimate close-up of this great herbivore. Seismosaurus weighed over 30 tons - - as much as eight elephants, and must have consumed hundreds of pounds of vegetation every day. Ground -level wide shot of the wide riverbed, fringed with evergreen trees. The Seismosaurus moves away from camera and, having eaten well, leaves a prodigious dump. DINOSAURS ALIVE Final Script 4/4/07 3 Sometimes scientists can even learn what dinosaurs ate, from clues they left behind… in their fossilized dung. CUT back to: Interior, New Mexico Museum. Crane shot moving back from the Seismo’s spacious rib cage and along its tail vertebrae. Dinosaurs were first discovered in Europe and America, but in the Twentieth Century scientific explorers struck out for the most remote corners of the Earth… Wide shot of mounted Daspletosaurus skeleton which seems to be attempting an attack on the much larger Seismosaurus. Crane down rapidly to the carnivore’s wide-open jaws and sharp teeth. …and the full extent of the dinosaur kingdom began to be revealed. Dissolve DISSOLVE to: vintage-looking map of Asia and ZOOM IN to Mongolia. MAP #1 OLD-FASHIONED MAP SHOWING ASIA, MONGOLIA, ULAANBAATAR The Gobi Desert spans a half-million square miles of Mongolia and China - - the ancient land of Chingghis Khan. CUT TO: A camel caravan crossing the Gobi sand dunes. Beneath sands that camel caravans traversed for centuries, lay a vast treasure trove of fossils, undisturbed for more than 70 million years that would forever change our view of dinosaur life. CUT to: Panoramic view of huge Gobi sand dunes. SUPERIMPOSE single panel archival 35mm black & white footage of Roy Chapman Andrews’ 1920’s Central Asiatic Expeditions: 1920s Dodge touring car rumbles through boulder-strewn desert valley. Several Dodges splash through a muddy stream. In the 1920s a team of scientists from the American Museum of Natural History set out to explore the little-known Gobi. Close-up of Roy Chapman Andrews drinking from water bag, smiling at camera. FREEZE FRAME Their leader was Roy Chapman Andrews. Dodge cars approach Great Wall of China at Kalgan. Cars pass through gate of the Great Wall. Andrews and his team traveled in a fleet of automobiles. Expedition team tries to push stalled motorcar out of muddy ravine. It was one of the first major expeditions to use motorized transport... Wider: With more men helping, car is extricated from the mud. ...in Central Asia. To keep his expedition supplied… Andrews watches as long line of heavily-loaded camels passes by. DINOSAURS ALIVE Final Script 4/4/07 4 …when the nearest gas station was a thousand miles away, he came up with a novel plan, sending out… Long camel caravan passing camera with Gobi cliffs in background. camel caravans in advance, loaded with food and fuel. Mongolians plucking hair from flank of a camel. And the camels provided an unexpected service to the expedition. Close shot: hair being plucked by hand. Hair, plucked from their shedding winter coats, was ideal… Scientists line wooden shipping cases with camel hair. for packing fragile fossils. Gorgeous, Lawrence of Arabia-like shot of camel caravan crossing a high dune. Camel caravan crosses a high dune. Mongolia was a dangerous place full of… DISSOLVE to: Still of Andrews with rifle. …roving bandits, but Andrews, thought to be the inspiration for “Indiana Jones,” reveled in the… DISSOLVE to: Still of Andrews scanning desert with binoculars. …adventure of it all. VOICE OF ANDREWS Never again will I have such a feeling… Wide shot: camel caravan in large dune field. as Mongolia gave me. All this thrilled me to the core. High angle dunes, camels, and mountain escarpment. Somewhere in the depths of that vast, silent desert… Andrews searches for fossils in rocky terrain. …lay those records of the past that I had come to seek. Andrews’s caravan rolls past camera, in a cloud of wind-blown sand.