Arizona Dream: Script [top]

In a standard screenplay, a protagonist wants something, faces obstacles, and changes. In Arizona Dream , Axel doesn't seem to want anything until he is forced to want it. He is dragged to Arizona by his cousin, Paul (Vincent Gallo), to witness a wedding. The inciting incident is not a choice made by the hero, but an intrusion upon his life.

In the landscape of 90s cinema, few films are as stubbornly unclassifiable as Emir Kusturica’s 1993 cult classic, Arizona Dream arizona dream script

The Arizona Dream script explores the tension between . Kusturica once described the film as his reaction to Western civilization, viewing man as a "fish passing through a huge city," unable to truly understand it. Present Tense: Arizona Dream | Film Comment In a standard screenplay, a protagonist wants something,

Axel meets Elaine Stalker (Dunaway), a middle-aged woman obsessed with re-creating a Orville and Wilbur Wright flying machine. She is engaged to a ridiculous, insecure man named Leo (Jerry Lewis). The script’s most famous scene involves a car that drives itself, a turtle on its back, and a passionate sex scene that takes place inside a giant, unfinished flying machine. The inciting incident is not a choice made

script so enduring is its refusal to follow the "rules" of Hollywood screenwriting. Magical Realism:

The script spirals into tragedy. Elaine completes her flying machine. The climax is not a chase scene but a surreal musical interlude where Axel plays the accordion as Elaine leaps off a roof. The final pages of the script are abstract: Axel returns to New York, only to realize the fish has followed him. The last line is often cited as: “In the desert, you can see the end of the world. In New York, you can’t see past the next building.”