Blogging By Cinema-light: Don't Make a Scene: Raising Arizona

The Set-Up: One of those scenes that always makes me laugh and raises hackles, the sort of conflicted feelings that one expects from a Coen Brothers movie, even from Raising Arizona, which was only their second film.

It portrays another of the many cross-roads the film's protagonist. H.I. McDonnagh must navigate in his journey from felon to family man. This is the first role where I watched a performance by Nicolas Cage and was impressed, rather than appalled. Always an idiosyncratic actor, Cage's hystrionics finally found a perfect match in this role and his work actually becomes the script and turns "Hi" into the most haplessly sympathetic loser since Wile E. Coyote (whom he resembles).

Here, he is visited by the ghosts of jail-cells past, the Snopes Brothers, reminders of his sordid past, and risks (flight risks, certainly!) to his blissful future.

The Snopses have just burrowed out of prison and make a late-night call on H.I. and Ed McDonnagh, under the prankish guise of being police officers, particularly scary as the couple have welcomed a new addition to the family, acquired in a most non-traditional way.

They've kidnapped him.

Now H.I. isn't the sharpest tool in the machine shop, but his intentions are good, at least better than they had been in the past.

The Snopses, however, are not in the reforming mind-set and are quite happy with the joys of recidivism, at least as far as their own interests are concerned. And, although H.I. is initially quite happy with reuniting with his fellow residents in the "gray-bar hotel," his new marital status makes him re-think his former lone-wolf status, as far as his new family is concerned.

It's "complicated," in the parlance of social media.

But, their unexpected (and half-unwanted) late-night visit creates conflicts in H.I.'s mind. It will conjure up mental warnings that will disturb his slumbers.

This scene is immediately followed by Hi's nightmare.

The Story: Ex-con H.I. McDonnagh (Nicolas Cage) has married former prison guard Ed (Holly Hunter) and their plans to start a family has been medically squashed. If a new baby isn't in the cards, how about a "lightly used" baby? The two kidnap a baby from the prolific family of furniture entrepreneur Nathan Arizona, but it's not a perfect solution, at least in the eyes of local authorities. So, a late-night knock on the door puts them on high alert.

Action!

WIDE SHOT TRAILER LIVING ROOM

Late at night. Hi sits asleep on the sofa at the far end of the room, in a pool of lamp light.

We hear faint, distant knocking. As we track in toward Hi the knocking becomes louder and more present.
As we approach Hi we see that several Polaroids are spread over his gently rising and falling chest.

By the time we tighten on his face the knocking has become quite loud.
VOICE: Open up!
Hi starts awake with a grunt.

HI: Merry Christmas...

VOICE: . . .Open up in air!

He looks up, alarmed.
HI'S POV
The front door of the trailer. Someone is pounding insistently.
VOICE: Open up! It's a police!
BACK TO HI
He sits up and tenses. He looks around.
ED stands in her nightgown at the mouth of the hallway, holding NATHAN JR. and squinting at Hi. She hisses:

ED: Hi! What's goin' on?
VOICE: Po-lice, son! Open her up!

HI: You stay right there...
Hi gets to his feet, hurriedly tosses the Polaroids under a cushion of the couch and takes out a gun.
HI: ~~Get in the bedroom~~.

ED: They ain't gonna ~~take Nathan~~ split up the family?!

VOICE: Open up in there!

HI: Well I'd like to see 'em try.

AS ED turns back to the bedroom:
VOICE: Open up and maybe we'll letcha plea-bargain.

BEDROOM

As ED enters and shuts the door. She listens hard at the door:

Hi's footsteps cross the living room, the click of the door opening, silence ...

a burst of raucous male laughter.

HI'S VOICE: ... Honey! Come on out here!

HI: Want you to meet a couple friends of mine!
LIVING ROOM
AS ED enters, carrying NATHAN JR. All three men-Hi, GALE, and EVELLE-are beaming at her.

HI: Honey, like you to meet Gale

HI: and Evelle Snopes,

HI: fine a pair...

HI: ...as ever broke and entered.

GALE roars with laughter.

HI: ... Boys, this-here's my wife.

GALE: Ma'am.

EVELLE: Miz McDunnough.

ED smiles politely, then squints at Hi.

ED: Kind of...late for visitors, isn't it Hi?

HI: Uh. Well yeah honey,

HI: but these boys ~~tell me they~~

HI: ...just got outta the joint.

HI: Gotta show a little hospitality.

GALE is admiring the baby.

GALE: Well now H. I.

GALE: ...looks like you been up to the devil's bidnis!

EVELLE: Hey! Is that a him or a her?

ED: It's a...little boy.

GALE: Got a name, does he?

Hi and ED look at each other uncomfortably. Hi clears his throat.
HI: Well so far we just been using Junior.

ED: We call him junior.

EVELLE: Say, thairs good-

J.R., just like on the Teevee.

GALE is staring at the streamers and decorations. Reading aloud:

GALE: "Welcome ... Home ... Son."

GALE: Where's he been?
Hi and ED respond simultaneously:

HI: Tulsa. ED: Phoenix.

HI: He was, uh ...

HI: ...he was visiting his grandparents.

ED: They're separated.

GALE: Was that yer folks ma'am?
ED: No,

ED: ...I'm afraid not.

GALE: I thought yer folks...

GALE: ...was dead, H.I.?

HI(very uncomfortably): Well we thought Junior should see their final resting place-

HI: Whyn't you boys have a seat?

As the two men move toward the couch ED hesitantly pipes up:

ED: Hi, it's two in the...

ED: ...morning

...She wrinkles her nose.

ED: ... What's that smell?

Apologetically:

GALE: We don't always smell like this, Miz McDunnough.

GALE: I was just explainin' to yer...

GALE: ...better haff here that when we were tunnehn' out

GALE: we hit the main sewer-

GALE: dumb luck, that

GALE: -and just followed that to-

ED: You mean you busted out of jail!!

GALE: ~~Waaaal~~ ...

EVELLE: No. Ma'am?

EVELLE: We released ourselves on our own recognizance.

GALE: What Evelle means to say is, we felt the institution no longer had anything to offer us .
He is looking at the baby.
GALE: ... My

GALE: ...Lord he's cute.

EVELLE: He's a...

EVELLE: ...little outlaw, you can see that.

ED: Now listen,

ED: ...you folks can't stay here!

GALE, EVELLE, and Hi look up at ED, dumbstruck. After a beat:

EVELLE: ... Ma'am?

ED: You just can't stay!

ED: Now I appreciate your bein' friends of HI and all, but this is a decent family now ...

She looks at Hi.

ED: ... I mean we got a toddler here!

GALE leans in close to Hi,

a look of sincere concern on his face, and says under his breath:

GALE: Say, who wears the pants round here H.I.?

HI: Now honey-(these boys just got outta the joint...)

ED: (interrupting) Don't...

ED: ...you honey me.

ED: Now you boys can set a while and catch up,

ED: and then you'll be

ED: ...on your way.

There is an awkward silence as she leaves and slams the bedroom door.

GALE is carefully studying his thumbnail;

EVELLE stares fixedly at the ceiling.

Still looking at his thumb:

GALE: Gotcha on a awful short leash, don't she H.I.?

BEDROOM

Sometime later, as Hi tiptoes in.

ED lies in bed facing the wall;

we see only the back of her head.

Hi sits gingerly on the edge of the bed and, smiling, sticks a finger through the bars of the crib to play with the baby.

The sound of the TV set in the living room filters faintly in.

ED: They still here?
Hi is momentarily startled, then goes on playing with the baby.

HI: Yeah,

HI: they're just gonna stay a day or...two, honey.

HI: It's raining out ~~honey~~, they got nowhere to go.

ED finally turns to face him. We hear the two men laugh raucously in the living room.

ED: They're fugitives, Hi ...
HI turns to face her.
ED: . . .How're we gonna start a new life with them around?