FADE IN:

EXT. POST-REVOLUTIONARY FRANCE

The CHOREOGRAPHER immediately STUMBLES OVER A CLIFF AND DIES. All songs will henceforth be performed by people STANDING AROUND, WALKING AROUND, or on occasion SITTING IN CHAIRS.

RUSSELL CROWE

Hugh, you have your freedom

But also my disdain

Because I love the law so much

I'm basically insane.

HUGH JACKMAN

Yuck, is that your singing voice?

It's amateur and bland

I guess Tom Hooper never heard

Your awful, shitty band.

HUGH is serially turned out by every INN, EATERY and PROSPECTIVE EMPLOYER ON THE PLANET. Eventually he's taken in by a KINDLY OLD PRIEST.

HUGH JACKMAN

Wait, is this a new song?

Or is it the same one?

We seem to start afresh

Before the last one's even done!

COLM WILKINSON

Well yeah, it's like an opera

All the dialogue's in verse

Even if sometimes we have to cheat the meter a little

And rhyming can seem forced.

HUGH JACKMAN

Not to mention the fact that there are like half a dozen regular spoken lines thrown in just to confuse everybody.

HUGH tries to ROB THE PRIEST, rather than ask for help getting a job or anything.

COLM WILKINSON

You want to take my silver?

Well, get this: fine, you can!

It comes with this free guilt trip

Go be an honest man!

HUGH JACKMAN

Okay, I'll be the honest man

That God wants me to be

By hiding from the law

Under a false identity.

(ANGSTY BALLAD)

EXT. EIGHT YEARS LATER

HUGH is now RICH with his OWN FACTORY where ANNE HATHAWAY works and also he's the MAYOR. It made sense in the book, okay?

EVIL FACTORY GUY

Excuse me, Mr. Boss Man

It seems Anne's got a brat

Which means that she had sex once

Can I fire her for that?

HUGH JACKMAN

Huh? This is a bad time

I just saw Russell Crowe

So go and do that thing you said

Or don't, pfft, I don't know.

ANNE is FIRED, is IMMEDIATELY ON THE STREETS, sells her HAIR, then her TEETH, then finally becomes a PROSTITUTE.

ANNE HATHAWAY

Wait, how quick did that happen?

It seemed like, what, a day?

I guess important plot points

They just get in the way

We rattle them off quickly

And while you're all still reeling

We take the time we saved up

To whine about our FEELINGS!

(ANGSTY BALLAD)

HUGH JACKMAN

Oh shit, this is all my fault

And crap, you're dying now

I'll go and fetch your daughter

And thus fix things somehow!

But then due to CONTRIVED CIRCUMSTANCES he has to REVEAL HIMSELF TO RUSSELL, and then ANNE DIES. HUGH runs off to buy ANNE'S DAUGHTER off of SASHA BARON COHEN and HELENA BONHAM CARTER, who look like they escaped from CARRY ON NAPOLEON.

SASHA BARON COHEN

I'm a fawning, thieving sleazoid!

She's a screeching, strident hag!

In the book we're fearsome villains

Here, a stupid running gag!

We spend the movie randomly

Appearing here and there

You easily could leave us out

And who would fucking care?

HUGH gets away with YOUNG AMANDA SEYFRIED, before RUSSELL shows up too late to catch them!

RUSSELL CROWE

I'll use my dogged cop skills

To hunt him across France!

Or rather, do fuck all

Then one day meet by random chance.

EXT. NINE YEARS LATER

EDDIE REDMAYNE

Now it's a war movie!

French Revolution II!

Let's go and shoot policemen

Like all worthy heroes do!

We patriots have no time

For pleasure, fun, romance

OH LOOK SOME RANDOM BLONDE CHICK

I'M IN LOVE NOW, SCREW YOU FRANCE!

AMANDA SEYFRIED

My heart is conquered also!

What wonderful sensations!

Our love is just as deep

As our characterizations!

SAMANTHA BARKS

But I'M in love with Eddie!

Now I've lost all hope!

We swear this is great literature

Not mediocre soap!

Like Helena and Sasha

I've been de-fanged too

No longer tough and sassy

Now I'm BOO A BLOO HOO HOOOO!

(ANGSTY BALLAD)

Then HUGH hears a LOUD NOISE, and immediately moves himself and AMANDA to a different house and makes plans to flee the country under new identities, because he's PARANOID AS FUCK.

EDDIE REDMAYNE

Oh no, you mean the blonde chick

Doesn't live here anymore?

Only one thing for it:

I'm off to die in war!

RUSSELL CROWE

Hey, it's time for one of

Those act-end Broadway stunts

Where the cast all get together

And sing like five songs at once

HUGH JACKMAN

It gets a bit confusing

The way we overlap

EDDIE REDMAYNE

And drown each other-

SAMANTHA BARKS

-isolated snippets-

AMANDA SEYFRIED

-only audible for-

RANDOM EXTRA

-and whistled for a baboon-

EVERYONE

(incomprehensible)

The FIGHTING BEGINS! For various reasons, HUGH goes into the barricades to retrieve EDDIE, and for various other reasons he finds the rebels are holding RUSSELL prisoner.

HUGH JACKMAN

I know that I showed up here

Dressed like the other guys

But surely you can trust me

To sneak off with their spies?

He takes RUSSELL away and only PRETENDS to kill him.

AARON TVEIT

The barricades have fallen!

It seems we're all that's left!

If you're not in the final act

Come get your poignant death!

As everyone lines up to get TRAGICALLY SHOT, HUGH legs it through the sewer with an injured EDDIE. At the other end they run into RUSSELL, but instead of tragically shooting them, he lets them go!

RUSSELL CROWE

A crook saves a policeman?!

The cop saves him in kind?!?

This oddity is too much

For my fragile little mind!

To deal with this, something that

You've all been waiting for:

An angsty ballad OH GOD

I CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE

He THROWS HIMSELF INTO THE SEINE, hitting the rocks with a comically loud CRACK which instanty kills both him and any chance of the scene being taken seriously.

EDDIE REDMAYNE

All my friends are dead now

But I'm rich again, that's nice

Now to marry what's-her-face

That girl I've met like twice.

HUGH JACKMAN

Good luck with your marriage

It's time for me to go

You see, I am a fugitive

Just thought you ought to know

You're better off without me

And the bounty on my head

Although the only guy who cares

Is, as of recent, dead.

HUGH abandons his adopted daughter forever with no explanation on her wedding day, just to make it as NEEDLESSLY TRAUMATIC as possible. But then EDDIE gets EXPOSITED AT!

EDDIE REDMAYNE

So it was HUGH who saved me?!

Let's bring him right back here!

(You see, I didn't know that--

Did we not make that clear?)

HUGH JACKMAN

You want me to come back again?

I say, that's mighty pleasin'

Sadly, though, I'm dying now

For no apparent reason

Just one more angsty ballad

Where everybody cries

Then finally this fucking film

Is hack cough wheeze hurk

(dies)

END.