FADE IN:

INT. LILI TAYLOR'S APARTMENT

LILI is talking to her EVIL BITCH SISTER and her HUSBAND.

EVIL BITCH SISTER

Thanks for taking care of our invalid mom for the past eleven years, during which time you haven't slept at all, judging by your facial expression.

LILI TAYLOR

No, I always look like that.

EVIL BITCH SISTER

Anyway, now that she's dead we're going to sell the apartment, leaving you homeless as well as emotionally scarred.

(to HUSBAND)

Honey, is there anything you can do to arouse more sympathy for Lili's character?

EVIL BITCH SISTER'S HUSBAND punches LILI in the stomach.

INT. LIAM NEESON'S OFFICE

LIAM NEESON

Ok, here's the deal. I'm going to take a bunch of insomniacs, who are generally one step closer to psychosis than most people anyway, and put them in a house from some movie I saw when I was a kid. Then when they get scared and irrational I'll make notes and shit. Because...um...I'm a scientist.

YODA

Fear is the path to the dark side. Dangerous, this is, and possibly unethical. Always changing, the future is...

LIAM NEESON

Oh, shut up.

EXT. HILL HOUSE

LILI arrives at the door. The CARETAKER'S WIFE opens the door.

LILI TAYLOR

Hi. I'm from the insomnia experiment thing that for some reason I was specifically asked to participate in.

CARETAKER'S WIFE

I am Frau Blucher.

HORSES neigh.

INT. HILL HOUSE

LIAM arrives with his MOUSY ASSISTANT and THE GUY FROM THE 'EYES WIDE SHUT' PREVIEW.

LIAM NEESON

Here we are in a secluded, gothic mansion, in which it would be very easy to get lost or injured. The townspeople are afraid of it and the gate is locked from the outside, so if anyone gets hurt they're pretty much screwed.

LILI TAYLOR

What a great place to conduct an experiment involving potentially psychotic insomniacs! I certainly hope there's at least one drug-user stereotype among us.

CATHERINE ZETA-JONES

I'm actually an artist stereotype, which means I'm bisexual and obsessed with fashion and my appearance. I'm also way too hot to realistically be doing anything creative with my life.

CATHERINE begins taking her shirt off for no reason.

OWEN WILSON

I'm...wait, who the hell am I? I don't even have a stereotype.

LIAM NEESON

You're the guy. Go hit on Catherine.

Suddenly someone from the SPECIAL EFFECTS TEAM spills espresso onto their ONYX WORKSTATION, and something flings up and rips out the MOUSY ASSISTANT's eye.

MOUSY ASSISTANT

Ow! Fuck!

LIAM NEESON

You, the guy from the Eyes Wide Shut preview, take her to a hospital. Call me as soon as she sees a doctor, but I won't find it odd or anything if you never call despite being totally uninvolved in the supernatural part of the story.

THE GUY FROM THE 'EYES WIDE SHUT' PREVIEW exits with the ONE-EYED, MOUSY ASSISTANT.

LIAM NEESON

Now, we're here to study the effects of insomnia on, among other things, the part of the brain responsible for rational decision. For example, Lili here has obviously not slept in her entire life, which is why she's throwing away all the credibility as an actress she gained from I Shot Andy Warhol and The Addiction to appear in this overproduced retread.

LILI TAYLOR

Hey, fuck you, Darkman!

LIAM NEESON

(enraged)

I told you never to speak of that!

OWEN WILSON

Um...Catherine, wanna have sex?

CATHERINE ZETA-JONES

(ignoring him)

Does this house have any kind of history we should know about, for plot purposes?

LIAM NEESON

Funny you should ask. It was built by an eccentric millionaire who for some reason looked like Cro-Magnon man in a cravat. He wanted children but his kept dying in childbirth, so he'd trap the souls of his employees' children in the house.

LILI TAYLOR

Wait a minute. Didn't Stauf do that in The 7th Guest?

OWEN WILSON

And Carno in Phantasmagoria?

AUDIENCE

Is he implying that this movie is derivate of those games? Doesn't he realize that they were both themselves inspired by the 1963 movie this is a remake of and the Shirley Jackson novel it was based on?

PETER RAUCH

Shut up.

EXT. HILL HOUSE

It gets dark. I mean, this isn't unusual or anything, but it's worth mentioning.

INT. HILL HOUSE

Someone notices that 'Welcome Home Eleanor' has been painted in blood on the wall, and someone has painted a skull over CRO-MAGNON MAN's face.

CATHERINE ZETA-JONES

Who the fuck is Eleanor?

LILI TAYLOR

That's supposed to be my name. I hate this stupid format.

OWEN WILSON

I bet Catherine put wrote it, since she's, like, artistic and stuff!

CATHERINE ZETA-JONES

Oh yeah? Well YOU probably did it, because you're...who are you again?

LILI TAYLOR

Well, one of you has to have done it, since I didn't do it and there's obviously no reason to suspect the guy who brought us here for the sole purpose of studying how we react to things like this.

Suddenly OWEN is decapitated.

OWEN WILSON

That's it? That's my part? Dammit.

OWEN walks off the set in disgust, severed head held under his arm.

Suddenly the house goes batshit, gargoyles come to life, walls bend, windows form faces.

LIAM NEESON

Why the hell is happening?

LILI TAYLOR

I think it has something to do with the fact that I'm the great- granddaughter of Cro-Magnon Man's second wife, and that it's my destiny to free the souls of the children imprisoned here.

CATHERINE ZETA-JONES

And you somehow failed to mention this!?

LILI TAYLOR

(shrugs)

Never came up.

Various parts of the house try to kill them. Using his high midichlorian count, LIAM allows them to escape to the front hall in front of CRO-MAGNON MAN's portrait, which comes to life in an orgy of CG that, well, actually looks kinda cool.

LILI TAYLOR

I'm freeing the children, fartknocker! Get into that bas relief over there!

After a great deal of CG things happening, he does, and LILI dies. Something that looks sort of like CRO-MAGNON MAN's second wife and sort of like LILI rises from her corpse.

AUDIENCE

What the fuck!?

DIRECTOR JAN DE BONT

It's symbolic of how the second wife had been present in Lili all along.

AUDIENCE

How the fuck would you know? You're the director! It's a glorified technical job! You didn't even write the screenplay based the a movie based the novel! How could you possibly have any perspective on the symbolism?

DIRECTOR JAN DE BONT

Um...

DIRECTOR JAN DE BONT blows up a bus and escapes in the confusion.

END