The Abridged Script
FADE IN:
INT. FRANCES O'CONNOR'S HOUSE
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Check out my Stanley Kubrick impression. See, I frame shots in odd, noticeable ways. I even pace my film slowly! I'm truly doing him justice!
STANLEY KUBRICK'S GHOST
But I direct cold, detached films. I focus on style and technique to subtly tell a story without really making the viewer feel like a part of it. You, however, are just the opposite. You're a warm, fuzzy little guy who focuses on the characters and the heart of a story. You're a giant teddy bear!
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Giant teddy bear, eh? Great idea! I'll make him a robot!
STEVEN walks off, congratulating himself on being such a terrific guy.
FRANCES O'CONNOR
I lost my son to a coma. I want a new one.
SAM ROBARDS
There are these new robot children...
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
Hi. Doesn't it piss you all off to know I got here in a limo? Could somebody fetch me a bottled water please? Glacier only, none of that purified crap. Are we shooting? Oh, okay. Time to turn on the innocence.
(pause; whimpering)
Love me? I see real people.
FRANCES O'CONNOR
Hmm.. Well.. I did want another son. I'm not sure I should do this..
SAM ROBARDS
If you aren't sure, we should take him back because if he's imprinted to love you and you decide you don't want him, he'd have to be destroyed.
FRANCES O'CONNOR
(imprinting Haley)
Well, I just don't know.
SAM ROBARDS
What are you doing? Didn't you hear me say repeatedly that you shouldn't do this unless you're totally sure?
FRANCES O'CONNOR
Whoops. He's imprinted.
THE REAL SON
I'm back from my coma! I don't want a little brother. Especially one that keeps getting into situations, through no fault of his own, that make it look like he is trying to kill us.
FRANCES O'CONNOR
How unfortunate that such a large number of external things happened that cause him to appear so problematic. However, when you put yourself in my shoes, I'm sure you can understand how I'd want to get rid of him.
AUDIENCE
You're an awful piece of shit.
FRANCES O'CONNOR
Well I'm not so awful that I'll let him be destroyed! I'm going to instead take him to the middle of the woods and abandon him. I'm sure it's much better for him to spend the rest of eternity pining for my love, which he will never get, not to mention the likelihood that he will be picked up and destroyed in a flesh fair eventually anyway.
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
Wait, I'm a robot. Can't you just erase my memory or something?
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Of course not! You must suffer abandonment! Alienation! You must find solace only with those who have also been alienated!
(pause)
Why does this feel so familiar? Oh right, most of my career.
FRANCES O'CONNOR
Goodbye, Haley. And don't follow me home, either, you little shit.
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
(sobbing)
But I am programmed to love!
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Isn't it sadly ironic how humans can often be so inhumane?
EXT. THE WOODS
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
At least I still have you, teddy bear.
(pause)
Hey, I just realized you're the only truly likeable character in this mess. You aren't trying to upstage me, are you?
TEDDY BEAR
No, of course not! Sure, I'm adorable, funny, and my facial expressions are priceless, but this in no way detracts from your generally annoying presence!
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
Good. Hey, wait..
JUDE LAW
Hello. I am Robocock. Dead or alive, you're cumming with me.
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
You're a sex robot?
JUDE LAW
Yeah, I enjoy a little bit of the old in-out, in-out. Often accompanied by some of the good ol' ultraviolence.
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
Speaking of which, we are being chased! These people want to parade us out and destroy us in sick and twisted ways for entertainment!
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Isn't it sadly ironic how humans can often be so inhumane?
EXT. FLESH FAIR
SPECTATORS
Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill!
Robots are DESTROYED.
CHRIS ROCK
Hello! I am making a useless, distracting cameo! Bye now!
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
Don't kill me!
SPECTATORS
Hmm. I guess we ought to draw the line at obliterating children.
JUDE and HALEY escape, thanks to a SMALL SHRED OF HUMANITY displayed by the SPECTATORS.
JUDE LAW
Let's go ask Robin Williams where to go. We can find him in the middle of an unnecessarily long scene which serves no purpose but to get us to go to Manhattan.
They do so. Twenty minutes and some flashy, over-the-top Spielbergian CGI shots later, they go to MANHATTAN.
EXT. MANHATTAN
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
I desperately want to be a real boy.
STEVEN SPIELBERG assumes every person in the audience is a MORON and beats everyone over the head with the similarity to PINOCCHIO to the point that it actually becomes a plot device.
They find WILLIAM HURT.
WILLIAM HURT
Turns out I made you. You are one of many child robots.
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
But I thought I was special and unique!
WILLIAM HURT
But I didn't program you to feel special or unique.
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
Uh.. Number five is alive.
WILLIAM HURT
I see. I will walk off for a moment, feel free to walk around the creepy room full of robots that look almost, but not entirely, just like you.
HALEY leaves and uses a vehicle to dive to the bottom of the water, and stare hopefully at the BLUE FAIRY.
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
I am now destined to sit here forever, begging for a wish which can only come true in my robot mind. Look what I have been driven to by an uncaring, cruel world that rejects differences and is incapable of love in any broad aspect.
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Isn't it sadly ironic how humans can often be so inhumane?
AUDIENCE
(leaving)
What a beautifully tragic, if somewhat cheesy, look at some of the uglier aspects of humanity and its capacity for love.
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Did someone say cheesy? That's my specialty!!!
Suddenly, an EXTENDED, HAPPIER ENDING is awkwardly shoehorned on!
Silly looking robots fly around! They uncover HALEY and make his every wish come true!
AUDIENCE
What the fuck is this shit?
HALEY JOEL OSMENT
Now I can be reunited with my mother for one day! She seems to have oddly forgotten about her real son and husband! She loves me! What a happy ending!!!
STANLEY KUBRICK'S CORPSE hits 10,000 RPM.
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Hooray! It turns out, in the end, humanity isn't so bad after all if given very specific and forced circumstances! Love conquers all! Tragedy becomes happiness in the end!
AUDIENCE
...
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Er.. uh.. well, you see, the robots eventually rule the world and they make his every wish come true. They become more humane than the humans were. Don't you see the great irony?
AUDIENCE
...
DIRECTOR STEVEN SPIELBERG
Uh.. the teddy bear was cute though, right?
AUDIENCE
I hate you. Please return to directing your own god damn movies.
END