(4 pm. – promoted by ek hornbeck)
Hey, folks:
This is something that’s a little bit different from the usual Thursday Open Thoughts, in that I’m going to write about
what kind of events and what kind of an ending I would’ve put into a movie, or even a story if I’d been the one who’d written the story or the script for it. Some people would think that my story would be a boring, shallow movie or book, but what do they really know? Nothing, as far as I’m concerned, except that they sense that I have a different style of posting, communicating and conversing, take that and run with it.
To deviate momentarily from what I’m going to write for this week’s Thursday’s Open Thoughts, these make for some of the most, if not the most hateful people that have ever walked Planet Earth, imho. Some of these people are mental health councilors and social workers, actors and actresses, or just ordinary, everyday run of the mill individuals, both on and/or offline. To be honest, and I’ve even told some of these people what I’ve thought, it wouldn’t bother me if they were to get “:theirs”, as some people put it. Hopefully, maybe someday, they will. Some people that I’ve known in real life who are like that have “gotten theirs”. Whether they’ve shaped up as a result, in some cases, really remains to be seen, but the fact that they’ve led miserable lives since should be suffice.
Anyway, back to the subject at hand, it’s fun to pontificate about the kind of story and/or ending that one would want in a movie, or even a book, but this week’s Thursday’s Open Thoughts will be about a specific movie. Here goes:
Here’s how “The Town” would’ve been written, if it had been my story to write:
The beginning of “The Town” (i. e. the aerial shots of Charlestown and the opening bank heist is the same. Her assistant manager is beaten within inches of his life by “Jem”, who hits him several times, hard, with the butt of his rifle until Doug MacRay intervenes, and takes charge of the situation. Claire is taken as a hostage, driven in a van to Southie and let go, unharmed, but blindfolded, and left behind. Claire then manages to remove the blindfold and band that’s tying her hands, after much of a struggle.
Doug, who’s been tailing Claire, meets her “by chance”, in a laundromat, and asks Claire, who’s been weeping and groveling over the memory of the robbery, the beating and permanent injury to her colleague, and her abduction. Again, Doug humours Claire by joshing with her and telling dumb jokes, making Claire laugh. He then asks her out for a drink. After sizing Doug up and sensing that something’s not right, Claire turns him down. Doug, however, is very persistent, and finally Claire accepts, not knowing who Doug really is, or what his true motivations are; to put the romance moves on her in order to manipulate her into not talking to the FBI or the police.
Eventually, Doug and Claire get involved in a romance, where they begin dating in earnest. At length, Claire decides that getting romantically involved with Doug MacRay was a big mistake, and that she’s in way over her head. Claire decides to bail, and then seeks help and protection from Doug by FBI Special Agt. Adam Frawley, who’s been assigned to bring Doug MacRay and his guys to justice. Claire’s fears and suspicions are confirmed when Frawley shows her the picture of Doug MacRay, who turns out to be one of the guys who robbed Claire’s bank and abducted her at gunpoint. Claire agrees to help catch Doug MacRay( whose father was not only a bank robber, but a murderer), as well.), who also has a pretty extensive criminal record himself, including having served a 20 month jail sentence for aggrevated assault.
FBI Agt. Frawley and Claire engage in a number of discussions about what kind of strategies should be taken. At length, it’s planned for Claire to invite Doug over to her Charlestown condominium for an early dinner, and Frawley and the Feds, the Staties and local cops/crime fighters, as well as Claire’s lawyer would also be there, but it wouldn’t be obvious to Doug, since Frawley and his men have lots of skill at hiding out and surprising their target at inopportune moments.
Meanwhile, Doug has no idea what’s happening (since Claire’s decided to go anonymous with her contact with Adam Frawley), and continues to date and court her anyhow. During the last robbery performed by Doug and his men, at Fenway Park, a shoot-out erupts between the cops, the Feds and Doug MacRay and his men, thanks to the fact that Jem’s drugged out, alcoholic sister, Krista( who has a 2-year-old daughter), has ratted Doug MacRay and his crime buddies out, partially in anger at Doug’s having spurned her for Claire, and partly through fear of losing her child, after she has gotten into a DUI accident and is injured (and having had 2 y/o Shyne in the front seat with her, to boot). Krista ends up in the emergency room of MGH, and is visited by Agt. Frawley, who decides that he’d help her out and enable her to keep her house and her daughter, if she tells him the location of the next heist that Doug MacRay, Jem (who she’s grown up with her whole life) will be performing. Krista, not wanting to lose her house, or Shyne (her daughter) agrees, and tells FBI Agt. Frawley where the next heist by Doug, her brother and their other crime partners will be.
.Although Doug’s three partners in crime are killed in the shoot-out between them and the law, Doug miraculously survives, by hiding out in a more remote, much darker part of the inside of Fenway Park’s stadium. Doug MacRay calls Claire and asks her to come away to Florida with him, and that he should wait for her in her Charlestown condominium. He then goes to Claire’s garden and buries the duffel-bag full of the money from the Fenway Park heist (about 3 million dollars), for Claire, with a note that tells her to do whatever she wants with it.
Claire tells Doug that she must think about the idea of going to Florida with him a little bit first. Doug says okay. In the meantime, Agt. Frawley and Claire again get together, in order to discuss a date for their strategy, setting it for a week later. It just so happens that on that date, Doug, thinking that “Fergie” and Rusty might go after Claire and kill her, decides to go back to C-Town, and guns Rusty and Fergie down in their own flower shop. He then phones Claire and tells her he’ll pick her up so they can go to Florida together. Claire murmurs something in agreement. It so happens that this is the very date that Claire and Frawley have set for their strategy. Claire agrees to wait for Doug at her condo, and invites Doug over to her condominium for a meal, which Doug accepts, and he goes over to Claire’s at the appointed time.
Claire has a scrumptious meal all ready for both her and Doug (which she has secretly prepared in advance), which they both enjoy, with much relish. They eat, talk, and romance each other, and Doug has no idea what’s coming. Just as Doug and Claire are saying goodbye to each other and embracing for the last time, Frawley and his men, who’ve been hiding out the back part of Claire’s condominium, in her bedroom, take them both by surprise. Doug MacRay is handcuffed, arrested, put on trial, and sent to serve some long, hard time in a Federal penitentiary for his crimes; a 30-year jail sentence, for armed bank robbery and kidnapping.
After Doug has been sent to prison, Claire goes to her garden, retrieves the bag containing Doug’s ill-gotten (albeit stolen) money, and reads a brief note that he has enclosed for her, saying that she should take the money and do as she wishes with it, that he has a long road, and that he’d “see her again, this side or the other”. Claire, who has smartened up by now, realizes that she and Doug never will see each other again…not on this side, anyway. She then takes the money to Agt. Frawley, who advises her to turn it into the authorities, anonymously, which she does. Not long afterwards, Claire lands a prestigious job at another bank, acquires enough money to purchase a swankier condominium in Boston’s Back Bay, and moves there, realizing, with a clear conscience, that she did the right thing by having done sort of a “sting” operation to successfully catch Doug MacRay, rather than continue to have contact with him, be an accessory to his crimes, and risk her whole future.
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