The X-Files Movie - Plotline, Notes and Quotes

Plotline

NOTE: The following plotline is for the movie seen in theatres, not the video version which includes one scene previously cut out to avoid confusion for the new fans. Check the Quotes for the missing scene.


First off, no credits at the beginning, just a black "oily" background (he, he, I did enjoy that part) and the words, "The X-Files", written in the same logo as the movie ads. It is NOT called Fight The Future, that was merely a tagline for the ads.


We open in North Texas, 35,000 B.C., in a snowstorm, as two humanoid-type cavemen carrying torches enter a cave looking for something or someone. Didn't hit me 'till later that the torches gave off a light similar to flashlights, thus making these two a prehistoric version of Mulder and Scully. Anyway, the cavemen come upon a rather nasty alien creature who proceeds to slaughter one of them in quick-camera flashes which shown us very little of the creature. The remaining caveman gets his revenge and kills the alien creature (stabs him with what looks like a stake, maybe his comrade's torch?) and we see it bleed ... black oil ... it takes on a life of its own as it changes direction and begins to flow towards the man. It enters his body, crawling under his skin from his feet on up to his eyes. The man starts to moan and cry out in pain as the camera pans upwards leaving us in darkness. My audience caught on right away, "Aha! So THAT'S where the oiliens come from!"


We cut to the present day, North Texas again, as the darkness is now the view from underneath a boy, Stevie, as he falls through the earth, landing in an underground cavern. His friends peer down at him from above (very reminiscent of Detour) to see if he's all right. Stevie's fine and having fun looking around the cave. He finds a skull and shows the others, all full of giggly-kid-fun. Suddenly, oil starts to seep through the earth beneath his feet ("Black gold, Texas tea", that's from the theme to "The Beverly Hillbillies", not the show). This ain't ordinary oil, boy, run! But, as usual, he doesn't listen to me and stands there as it soaks his shoes. His buddies watch in horror as worm-like creatures infest him, crawling all over his body underneath his skin. His eyes turn a familiar shade of black (see Piper Maru and Apocrypha for the first arrival of the oilien).


Time has passed and firetrucks now surround the scene, marked Blackwood County Fire Dept. Points if you remember when this movie project began it was called "Blackwood", and now we know why. Firemen are sent in to rescue the kid, but they're overtaken by the oilien as well. Next we see four men arrive in a black unmarked helicopter, dressed in biohazard suits for protection. They pull Stevie out in a bubbled container and whisk him off. The fire chief watches the kid being taken care of and equipment being set up around the cave's hole, and he yells, "What about my men?!". Behind one of the trucks, Dr. Ben Bronschweig makes a phonecall, "The impossible scenerio that we never planned for? Well, we better come up with a plan."


Cut to the rooftop of the Federal Building in Dallas, Texas, one week later. A helicopter lands and out comes Special Agent in Charge Darius Michaud. He instructs the FBI men to continue searching for the bomb they've been warned about. He then focuses in on the roof of the building across the street where he spies a familiar-looking redhead in an FBI jacket. The moment we've all been waiting for is finally here ... Scully steps out onto our screens, her cellphone to her ear and says ... "Mulder, it's me." Wild applause and hooting drowns out her next line as the audience celebrates our heroine's arrival. As we suspected when we saw that nasty fire in The End and heard Scully's phone conversation with Skinner, the X-Files department has indeed been shut down once again and Mulder and Scully have been assigned to help search the Federal Building, the possible target of a bomb threat. While everyone else, under the supervision of Darius Michaud, searches the building, Mulder has gone with a hunch and talked Scully into checking the opposite building. Having found nothing on the roof, they head for the exit door and Scully pretends it's locked, which Mulder falls for. "I had you big time."


They exit the stairwell next to the elevators, Scully says, "I saw your face, Mulder. There was a definite moment of panic." He answers, "You've never seen me panic. When I panic, I make this face." He then displays his "panic-face", which, of course, looks just like every other face he's ever made. She asks Mulder to go grab her a drink from the vending machine room and as he enters he notices a man leaving right before him. What he doesn't know is that the man has welded the door's keyhole shut causing the door to lock behind Mulder. Oddly, although the drink machine is all lit up, it's not coughing up a drink. Mulder whacks it a few times, which in light of what it really contains was a pretty dumb thing to do! He has another of those hunches and checks the back of the machine to find it unplugged.


He calls Scully on his cellphone, telling her he's found the bomb, but she thinks he's continuing the joke. He pounds on the door and tells her they have 14 minutes to evacuate the building. The camera pulls back to show the drink machine ... front opened and wired to the gills with explosives. The timer's ticking down. We all get panic-faces, even though windows are clearly visable behind Mulder, one shot and he'd be outta there.


Scully moves swiftly into action, calling Michaud and getting the building cleared. Her shout to the disbelieving guard, "Don't think! Just pick up that phone and make it happen!", elicited another round of applause and whoops from my crowd. Michaud arrives on the scene, Scully fills him in and we cut to Mulder sitting in a chair in front of the vending machine, staring at the bomb, making his panic face. His phone rings, startling him. He lets out the breath he was holding and answers it. "Scully, you know that face I just showed you? I'm making it again." The bomb team and Michaud cut the door open and Michaud orders Mulder and Scully to get out, he'll defuse the bomb himself. Mulder's very reluctant, but finally leaves. Michaud is now seated in the same chair in front of the bomb. Doesn't seem to be trying to defuse anything, just waiting for the inevitable.


The building is evacuated, all the nuns and Girl Scouts (or was it Boy Scouts?) are herded out of the place, along with everyone else. Mulder and Scully race outside, less than a minute remains on the clock. Mulder stops, turns around and says, "Something's not right." Scully stops him from going back, "There's no time!" and they start to take off in a police car just as the bomb explodes in big-screen movie fashion.


The action now moves to FBI headquarters in Washington, DC, and the Office of Professional Review. Assistant Director Jana Cassidy leads the inquiry board of approx. 5 members, including Assistant Director Walter Skinner (*sigh* and he barely registers a hoot from my crowd, the dogs. I clapped for ya, hun ... sorry, back to the plot). Scully is seated before the Review Board. Five people are dead (Michaud, of course, as well as three firemen and a young boy, Stevie. Gosh, where'd they come from?) and blame must be placed somewhere. Mulder arrives at the meeting late and starts to protest that they were told the building was clear, aside from Michaud, but Cassidy's not interested in Mulder's tale. He's late and disruptive, clear off and we'll listen to Scully's version. Mulder leaves.


He is seated on a bench in the hallway, eating sunflower seeds, husks and all (can't really spit them out on the FBI floor, now can he?), when he's joined by Skinner, offering some form of comfort as Scully finishes testifying. The big boys need to blame someone for all this or the FBI looks bad, guess whose necks are in the noose? Mulder's very concerned that Scully shoulder any of the blame, it was all his idea and his mess to deal with, she doesn't deserve this. But, Skinner tells him that she's already told them it was HER idea to get Mulder out of the building, thus leaving Michaud alone with the bomb.


Soon, Scully leaves the office, joining them in the hallway and Skinner heads back in. Poor Scully looks like she's been run over by a Mack Truck, or at least raked over the coals. She tells Mulder that they've been split up, she'll be reassigned tomorrow, but she's made a decision ... she's thinking about quitting the FBI altogether! Before Mulder has a chance to talk her out of it, he's called in to testify.


Next we see Mulder seated in Casey's Bar drowning his sorrows. As the bartender refills his glass, he notices a man watching him from the other end of the bar. After a long-winded explanation of the previous 5 years (see the Movie Quotes for the whole thing) Mulder is cut off. He pays his bill and notices that the other man is now gone. He wanders off to find the bathroom, finds the men's room out of order and the women's occupied, so he heads out to the alleyway to relive himself. As he does so, just below a poster for "Independence Day" (more in the Notes), he's joined by the man from the bar who introduces himself as Dr. Alvin Kurtzweil. He's an OB-GYN (Obstetrician-Gynecologist) and claims to have been a friend of Mulder's father, a "fellow traveller", and to have been following Mulder's career for quite some time. Kurtzweil apparently worked for the State Department on The Project, which Bill Mulder worked on (see Anasazi for further background), he wants to help Mulder sort out the truth behind the Dallas bombing before they pin the blame on Mulder and Scully.


Mulder is understandably skeptical of Kurtzweil's tale, what can he tell him that he doesn't already know? How about the real reason the building was destroyed? Kurtzweil tells him that the bodies of the firemen and the boy in the basement were in a medical quarantine set up by FEMA (The Federal Emergency Management Agency), they were already dead. Michaud never even bothered trying to defuse the bomb, he was a patriot who died rather than expose The Truth. Mulder isn't buying any of it and takes off in a taxi.


He seems to have a change of heart, though, and tells the driver to take him to Georgetown. It may be 3AM by now, but Mulder doesn't care as he heads for Scully's apartment. He doesn't wake her up, she's lying in bed wide awake and staring at the ceiling (wearing a lot more makeup than normal gals wear the bed!). His knocking arouses her from her thoughts and she asks him if he's drunk. Just what is he doing at her apartment at 3AM? He tells her to get dressed and come with him, he'll explain it all on the way. Instead of slamming the door in his face, she follows him yet again on his quest.


Next we see a pair of black helicopters driving across the Texas night sky. They land next to huge glowing domes, one covering the hole Stevie fell through in the opening. A figure emerges from one of the 'copters, his pant legs flapping in the blades' backwash. Doesn't stop him from lighting a cigarette ... Cancer Man has arrived on the movie scene. Mucho applause, tempered with movie-bad-guy hisses from the peanut gallery in front of me. Dr. Bronschweig leads Cancer Man, both now clad in biohazard suits, into the cave's hole covered by a clear hatch. Inside, it's freezing cold. They walk over to a table holding something weird-looking covered in a jelly-like substance (more commonly known among xphiles as good old goo).


It's the body of one of the firemen, still barely alive, as we can see from the clear view we have of all of his internal organs through his skin. Ewwwww. Dr. Bronschweig explains, "The developing organism is using his life energy, digesting bone and tissue." He's had the temperature turned down in the cave to slow the growth of the organism. Inside the man's body, we now see a living creature moving around his stomach area. Cancer Man orders the doc to test the vaccine on it and if it doesn't work, "Burn it like the others." The usual cover-up will be in place.


After bluffing their way past the one guard on duty, Mulder and Scully get into the morgue at the Bethesda Naval Hospital. They find one of the dead firemen, supposedly killed in the explosion, covered by a sheet. Mulder whips back the sheet and it doesn't take a doctor like Scully to see the guy wasn't killed by a bomb. Scully's shocked and fascinated by the body, what's left of it having turned into goo. Wanting to help clear their names and breaking all the rules (go, Scully!), she stays behind to do an autopsy as Mulder leaves to pursue other leads.


Mulder tries to see Dr. Kurtzweil at his apartment, but the cops have beaten him there, packing up evidence on possibly false accusations of kiddie porn (according to the doc later). One of the detectives asks Mulder what he wants with the doctor? "I had an appointment for a pelvic examination." That Mulder, even during an impending armageddon he can crack wise with the jokes, ya gotta love 'im.


He makes his way out of the apartment and finds Kurtzweil hiding in a nearby alley. He's raving like a lunatic again, tells Mulder that the newspapers are saying FEMA was called out to control an outbreak of the Hanta virus and that they have the power to suspend constitutional government upon declaration of a national emergency (umm, no, they don't actually ... or so They say). What the heck is FEMA doing managing a small outbreak in Texas? Mulder asks if he means it's not a small outbreak, Kurtzweil says, "No, I’m saying it wasn’t the Hanta virus." He tells Mulder he worked on a project with his father years ago, what they were told was biological warfare, a virus. So what did kill the firemen, a plague? "The plague to end all plagues, Agent Mulder. A silent weapon for a quiet war." The men who've been working on this for 50 years have no cure yet and he tells Mulder it'll happen on a holiday when people are away from home, the president will declare a state of emergency and all federal powers will come under the control of FEMA, "the secret government." Kurtzweil suggests Mulder head back to Dallas and dig around.


Meanwhile, back at the morgue, Scully conducts the autopsy, cutting out a piece of the ribcage and holding it up to look at it. It's clear, whatever *that* means. All of a sudden, she hears footsteps and sees a soldier and two policemen silhouetted in the frosted window of the autopsy room. The soldier opens the door, looks around, but finds no Scully. The scene cuts to inside the refrigeration room where the bodies are being kept, Scully's slowly closing the door behind her. She removes her mask and gloves as her cell phone rings, echoing off the walls, making it sound twice as loud as usual. She grabs it quickly and punches the button to answer, cutting off the noise.


It's Mulder wanting to know what she's found and she tells him she found signs of a massive, unknown infection. He tells her he's booking a flight to Dallas for both of them but she argues that she has a hearing to attend the next day. He promises to have her back in time, maybe with evidence to blow the lid off the investigation. She has to hang up without giving him an answer as one of the guards opens the door to the room Scully's in. She hides under one of the tables and, yes, I'm guessing that the stuff that drips down from the table is goo, ewwww. Don't ask me how, but she eludes the guards and gets out.


Our heroes meet up at the Dallas FBI Field Office, where Scully tells Mulder what she found during the brief autopsy, something she's never seen before which may pose a serious health threat. The office is jammed with FBI agents looking over the bits of debris found at the bomb site. Mulder, of course, asks if they've found anything strange, out of the ordinary. It's all gone to Washington, he's told, except for some fossilized remains which FEMA salvaged from a dig. They're shown one of the vials containing some fossil fragments and Scully checks them under a microscope. Bingo! The remains display the same odd characteristics as the dead fireman's body. They want the directions to where FEMA found these fragments. Mulder's lip curls slightly in a yeah-sure-it-was-an-archeological-dig sneer.


Next we see Dr. Bronschweig readying the vaccine for the fireman. He turns to the body and is shocked to see a huge empty hole where the man's stomach used to be. Something has escaped! He looks around the cave, trying to find it and from his face, it appears to be huge. "So much for little green men." Suddenly we see claws grow from the creature's fingertips as it goes for Bronschweig (very b-movie cheesy, but effective), ripping into him with his teeth and claws. He yells for help and his collegues look down on him through the open hatch. Thinking he's saved, he relaxes, then as the creature starts to attack him again, the hatch is closed and the men start to cover it with dirt. He's trapped in a struggle to the death with this hideous mutant. Some friends, eh? From the darkness, the alien grabs him and pulls him down. We hear a scream ....


The scream was the playful yell of a small child playing in a lovely British garden with his friends. They run around for a moment or two then a woman, possibly the nanny, claps her hands as they run off. The camera pans to a man seated on the terrace of what appears to be a huge mansion, watching with a smile. It's the Well-Manicured Man. He sips his tea and gives a small chuckle at the goings-on. A servant appears from out of the mansion and tells him he has a phone call. He reluctantly goes inside and answers the phone. It's Cancer Man informing him that Strughold has called an emergency meeting for that night in London. The Well-Manicured Man hangs up and rushs outside as his grandson appears to trip on something and falls to the ground as the other kids surround him.

Next we see a building in London, the setting for the latest meeting of The Consortium (called The Syndicate in the movie, but known as The Consortium to us for the last five years, so deal with it). The others, including Cancer Man and the leader of the group, Conrad Strughold (a fact you wouldn't know without hearing Chris Carter's hidden message), have already gathered and are watching surveillance videos of Mulder and Scully's visit to Bethesda. I had a brief flash of that smokey room looking like any normal XF Viewing Group meeting, but it soon passed. The Well-Manicured Man arrives, apologizing for his delay as his grandson broke his leg. Nobody seems to give a darn about the poor kid and the meeting continues.


They're very concerned about what they've discovered, and it's going to change their role in Colonization. "The virus has mutated" and it now no longer simply takes over a human's brain (hey, that they could deal with, apparently!) but it modifies the host's body. "Into what?" the Well-Manicured Man asks, obviously alarmed by this new tidbit. "A new extraterrestrial biological entity," Strughold says. "My God!" You just knew the Well-Manicured Man would say it at some point here, he just HAS to. He's shocked and beside himself at this hideous thought. Seems they've been lied to all along by the aliens they've been helping with the Colonization (I'm pretty sure they've just been playing a waiting game as they worked on the vaccine, without the aliens' knowledge). Strughold suggests they tell the Colonists what they've found, that way if Colonization has begun, maybe it will buy them more time. The Well-Manicured Man's ticked they ever hooked up with the Colonists. I'm pretty ticked at the idea myself, fella! Regardless of all this, Strughold thinks they should stick with the Colonists, "to use them as they do us." They just need time to work on the vaccine or they'll have no chance of surviving.


Cancer Man reminds them that they have to deal with those two trouble-makers, Mulder and Scully, as someone has obviously tipped them off, probably Kurtzweil. But, in an echo of Cancer Man's own speech in Ascension, the Well-Manicured Man says, "Kill Mulder, we take the risk of turning one man's quest into a crusade." Strughold cryptically adds, "Then you must take away what he holds most valuable. That with which he can't live without." You know, he might make a more menacing German if he spoke proper English! Oh, no, wait, that doesn't make sense. Well then, throw in a damn good accent, sheesh!


The scene cuts to Scully, ooooooo, foreshadowing. She's walking (in a Power Suit which looks fantabulous on the Big Screen) with Mulder to the dig site where the fossils were supposedly found. Strangely, they can't find anything that looks like a site or any sign of the cave and dome we saw earlier. All they find is a brand-new playground area in the middle of a desert-like setting surrounded by houses. The grass appears to be freshly sodded (and, boy, have I had my share of days like that). Three kids on new bicycles arrive on the scene and we recognize them as Stevie's friends. Not believing they're FBI agents, the kids aren't talking, until they flash their badges, then they all point in the direction of where the men who put the playground together went ... barely 20 minutes ago ... driving unmarked white tanker trucks. Got get 'em, gang!


Next we watch an ad for Oldsmobile's Intrigue ... oh, sorry, no, it's still the movie. Mulder and Scully are driving and he queries, "What are archeologists hauling out in tanker trucks?", knowing full well it must be the alien virus. They come to a halt as the main drag ends continuing to the right and left as a paved highway, unpaved straight ahead. They each want to go a seperate direction, not sure where the trucks have gone. They look at each other, Mulder looks to the right-side highway then begins drumming his fingers on the steering wheel as he stares straight ahead. The car takes off with a squeal. As usual, Mulder's taking a leap of faith and forging straight ahead. "Five years together, Scully. How many times I been wrong?" She rolls her eyes, thinking, do you want a list?! "Never. Not driving anyway."


Hours pass, they find nothing, and come to a dead end in the middle of Nowhere, USA. Scully's furious (too mad for PG-13 ears, here's where we lost at least one of Scully's f-words) and rants at Mulder about jeopardizing her career yet again for his elusive search for the truth. Once again, it's gotten them nowhere, what are they following here anyway? Mulder sheepishly admits that the trucks may be carrying a virus ... "The virus may be extraterrestrial." Before Scully can go right off her nut, she's silenced by a railroad crossing signal clanging right next to them. They watch, stunned, as a train whizzes past carrying two of the unmarked tanker trucks they were searching for. Handy, eh? They're back in their car and the chase resumes.


They come upon the trucks' destination, a cornfield in the desert surrounding two large glowing domes. Throwing caution to the wind, they go inside one of the domes. Mulder opens one of the dome's doors (it's unlocked ... yeah, right) and a blast of air from inside shoots out. They enter, Mulder's tie askew from the wind, Scully's raven locks flowing in the breeze. When they close the door behind them, fans on the ceiling suddenly blast on, startling them. They walk further in. Inside the dome it's all metal, stark and futuristic. The sound of Scully's boot heels echo in the structure as they walk along a raised walkway. To either side of the walkway are box-like structures. Lots of boxes, instead of "lots of files" (see Paper Clip), their slotted tops closed. A hum heats the air, maybe electrical in origin. Scully points out the vents in the roof, just as they suddenly shoot open and the humming becomes louder.


Going on another of those hunches, Mulder yells at Scully to "Run!" and the boxtops start to open. Hundreds of bees escape from the boxes, filling the dome as the agents run for their lives and take off towards the door. They stop before they exit and stamp their feet under the doorway's fans to remove the bees from their clothing. They brush themselves off and barely have time to check themselves for any hangers-on before another ominous humming is heard. This time it comes from two unmarked helicopters, shining their searchlights in their direction. Mulder and Scully run into the cornfield, towards their car, dodging the lights. As suddenly as they appeared, the helicopters take off, allowing Mulder and Scully to reach their car unharmed. The domes and corn are silent again.


Scully arrives back at the Office of Professional Review, dusting herself off as best she can, ready to present them with new evidence; the fossilized bone fragments. She explains that the bombing may have merely been staged to conceal the real reason behind the firemen's deaths, as well as the boy's. She can't tell them what yet, as she's working with Mulder on the evidence. Scully doesn't notice what the audience can see. Somehow, through the huge fans and shaking off at the domes, the corn field chase, the run for their car, the drive to the airport, the airplane ride, the drive to the hearing and even Scully's last suit brush off ... a single dedicated bee has managed to hide under the collar of Scully's jacket and it now begins its slow ascent up and over her shoulder towards the back of her neck. Little theory I'm working on here, might it be attracted to the implant she has in her pretty little neck? See the episodes Redux and Redux 2 if this confuses you or you haven't seen season 5 yet.


Meanwhile, Mulder meets with Kurtzweil again at Casey's Bar, telling him all about what he and Scully found in Texas. Mulder speculates that the bees are part of a transportation system and the corn is a transgenic crop with pollen genetically altered to carry a virus. Kurtzweil doesn't know anything about this, which leads Mulder to ask if Kurtzweil has any answers for him at all. Maybe he's been using Mulder to collect information for his books, maybe he never knew his father at all. Kurtzweil leaves the bar and Mulder follows him into the alleyway. He's furious at Mulder, saying he wouldn't have found anything without his help and he's put his ass on the line for him. "Your ass?! I just got chased through Texas by two black helicopters!" Mulder yells. "And why do you think it is you’re standing here talking to me? These people don’t make mistakes!" Kurtzweil storms off and Mulder hears footsteps on the fire escape above him. We can see it's The First Elder, but Mulder has to shield his eyes from the sun and doesn't appear to recognize him. Mulder stalks off, appears to open the doorway to the bar and next we see him enter his apartment.


The following two paragraphs are fully transcribed on the Quotes page.


As Mulder sits in his apartment, going through an old family picture album, (when did this dysfunctional family ever take the time to capture a Kodak moment?!) he finds one taken at a family picnic. Sure enough, there's a younger Kurtzweil in one of the pictures. Before he has time to ponder this, there's a knock on his door. Scully doesn't wait for an answer and opens the door. She stands there looking like she's been figuratively and literally put through the wringer. Her jacket is undone and her shirt is untucked. She tells him she's been reassigned to Salt Lake City. Rather than take the new assignment, she's decided to quit the FBI and leaves his apartment. Mulder follows her into the hallway and pleads with her to stay, he can't do this without her and if he quits now, They win. Scully's eyes tear up, she hugs him and kisses his forehead. They stand with their foreheads touching for a moment, then Mulder takes her face in his hands and leans in for a kiss. The audience here in Toronto all took a collective breath ... Scully's face shows surprise, then acceptance as she also leans towards him. Just at the exact moment that their lips finally touch after 5 long years ... Mulder's hand moves to the back of her neck, awakening the bee (possibly) and it stings her, halting the kiss proceedings as she yells in pain and grabs her neck. The audience breathes again, some applause, murmers of "Aww, man" in disappointment. Stupid damn bee!


Scully pulls the bee out from under her collar, but before Mulder can check her neck, she collapses in his arms. In a truly wonderful Dr. Scully Moment, she lies on the floor and describes her symptoms for Mulder, in case she passes out. Sounds like anaphylactic shock, but Scully has no alergy to bee stings. Mulder races into his apartment and calls for an ambulance. When they arrive, as they load Scully into the ambulance, Mulder tells the paramedics that the bee which stung her may be carrying a virus. They slam the doors in his face and he runs to the driver's side to ask where they're taking her. He exchanges looks with the driver for a second (could he be the man that locked Mulder in the vending room with the bomb?) and the driver pulls out a gun. He shoots Mulder in the head, grazing his temple, and he falls onto the street. Mulder's out of it as the ambulance peels out ... and the real one arrives right behind it.


We cut to an airport, a private jet sits waiting in the darkness. An unmarked truck pulls up, men in black fatigues unload what appears to be a glass coffin. It's actually a cryolitter - a sophisticated life support system. It contains an unconscious Scully. Cancer Man waits inside the plane and takes a drag of his ciggie as he watches Scully's "coffin" being loaded onboard.


Mulder recovers in a hospital bed, opening his eyes to see The Lone Gunmen standing over him, or as he calls them, "The Cowardly Lion, The Scarecrow and ... Toto." When he asks what he's doing there, Byers reminds him that he was shot. Langly tells him they found a bug in his phone line. And one in his hallway apparently as Frohike holds up a vial containing the bee with the worst timing in movie history. So, Mulder's 911 call was intercepted and whoever bugged the phone must have Scully.


Skinner arrives, telling Mulder they haven't found Scully yet, does Mulder know where she is? No, but he knows someone who might. As Mulder struggles to get up and get to work on finding Scully, Skinner stops him and says they'll find him as soon as he puts a toe out that door. Langly offers to help, but what can they do? Mulder orders the other two Gunmen to "strip Byers naked" (I'd like to think this line was for gizzie's benefit, 'cause I know she loved it!), and he uses Byers' clothes as a disguise to get out of the building. Then he calls Kurtzweil and sets up another meeting.


He's only a few minutes late for the meeting, but it's far too late for Kurtzweil. Mulder spots the Well-Manicured Man in the alley (have these people nowhere else to meet?) as his driver closes the trunk of their car. Was Kurtzweil dead and stuffed in the trunk? Having no one else to talk to, Mulder asks the Well-Manicured Man about Kurtzweil and he says he's prepared to tell Mulder everything. He hands Mulder a small pouch, saying it contains, "The location of Agent Scully, and the means to save her life." With nothing else to lose, Mulder follows the Well-Manicured Man into the back seat of the car as he's instructed.


They drive off and Mulder finds the pouch contains a weak vaccine to use against the alien virus Scully has been infected with, but it must be administered within 96 hours. The Well-Manicured Man tells Mulder that the virus may have been the original inhabitant of Earth. Aliens arrived on Earth millions of years ago, in whatever form they may have chosen. Some of them didn't leave when their friends went home, instead choosing to lie around dormant as a virus. Like ya do. They've been waiting all this time for reconstruction when we would be ripe for Colonization, using humans as hosts.


(from the missing scene, NOT in the original movie, but included in the video release): Mulder is told that without a vaccination, the only survivors would be those that are immune; human-alien clones. This is why Mulder's sister, Samantha, was taken, so she'd have a chance of survival as a genetic hybrid. Mulder's father saw hope in his children. Hope that Mulder would uncover the truth about The Project and stop it. "That you would fight the future."


Mulder asks why he's told him all this, why help him save Scully? The Well-Manicured Man says, "For the sake of my own children. Once it's learned what I have told you, my life will be over." Mulder's getting nervous, what happened to Kurtzweil? He tells the driver to stop the car and they pull into yet another alleyway. The Well-Manicured Man tells Mulder the men he works with will stop at nothing, "I was ordered to kill Dr. Kurtzweil, as I was ordered to kill you." He holds a gun on his lap, pointed at Mulder, then suddenly shoots the driver in the head. "Trust no one, Mr. Mulder." He's ordered out of the car, the Well-Manicured Man gets out as well and they talk in the alleyway for a minute. Mulder is told that the vaccine may destroy all their plans, but he must use it to save Scully. "Find Agent Scully. Only then will you realize the scope and grandeur of The Project." (He unfortunately doesn't say what's in the novel, "For only her science can save you." Love that line.) Mulder starts to walk away as the Well-Manicured Man gets back in the car and we see a rat scuttle past (Hi, Krycek!). The next second, the car explodes in a fireball, possibly killing him. *sniff* We hardly knew ya, Man.


Armed with the coordinates the Well-Manicured Man gave him, Mulder arrives in Antarctica 48 hours later, driving a snowdunebuggy (yeah, real technical term there). Don't ask me HOW he got there, what route he took, whether it should even be night or day in Antarctica, how he learned to drive a snowdunebuggy, I don't care. It's a movie, he got there and if it were nightime, we'd lose half the great scenes coming up, DEAL! So, according to his gadgets, he's close to the right spot, and he can't quite tell if he's out of gas as the gauge keeps sticking. He leaves the vehicle and trudges up the rocky cliff in front of him. At the top, he spots an ice station with connected snow domes and tractors parked around the area. Through his binoculars, he watches as Cancer Man exits one of the domes and gets into a tractor to leave (is the ambulance driver/vending room bomb guy driving the tractor?). Mulder now races to the station through the heavy snow. Just before he reaches the domes, he falls through the ice as it collapses beneath his feet and he drops into a deep crevice.


He lands on a metallic surface or structure covered in the snow with a vent blowing out hot air and forming a pocket in the ice. Mulder pulls himself through the vent and ends up inside the metallic structure, which looks like something out of an old sci-fi movie. He looks around, shining his flashlight on everything and spies a prehistoric man encased in ice (possibly one of our warriors from the opening scene). He soldiers on and comes upon a huge part of the structure, open like an operating theatre in a hospital. At the bottom, something catches his eye. Racks of coffin-like cryopods are moving as if on a conveyer belt.


He falls down the side of a wall, sliding out of control until he lands harshly on a ledge, hanging by one hand as he teeters over the edge. A bottomless well of metal lies below, the belly of the beast-ship. Using his legs and feet to anchor himself, he makes his way around the edge-corner and ends up sitting, catching his breath. The flashlight in use again, he slides gently over a huge cylinder, landing on a walkway. At the end, he finds an empty cryopod ... containing Scully's clothes and her cross necklace. He grips the necklace in one hand and sets off determined to find her.


He comes upon a rack of the cryopods, shining his flashlight from one to another, a frozen face in each caught by his beams. The eyes on each one are open in shock, their mouths held open by a tube, a picture of silent horror. Finally, the flashlight lands on his quarry .... Scully! Using his hand and then the butt of his flashlight, he begins to hammer at the ice keeping her captive.


Meanwhile, elsewhere in the structure, after Cancer Man has spotted Mulder's vehicle, he yells at an army of soldiers that they've had a breach and everyone must arm themselves. They scurry about readying for action.


Back to Mulder as he breaks through Scully's ice-coffin, releasing an ocean of goo which encased her naked body (calm down, you only get to see her bare back and shoulders). He jabs her with the syringe containing the vaccine and begins dragging out a tube-like material she had jammed down her throat. Just before he pulls it all out, the vaccine takes effect and the tube starts to shrivel. It's dying, affecting the whole metallic structure as it begins to shake, rattle and roll around them, a reaction to the vaccine's unwanted intrusion. Scully starts to gulp in air as the tube is removed and she looks at Mulder. In a bare whisper, she manages to say, "Cold." Mulder pulls her out of her enclosure as he breaks away the last of the ice.


Meanwhile, in a room full of equipment and monitors, a man seated in front of a monitor showing a graph of some kind yells to Cancer Man, "There's a contaminate in the sytem!" Old Smokey stares at the graph and says, "Mulder has the vaccine!" As the structure continues to shake they must give up the ship and start to evacuate. Cut to outside as an alarm sounds and men race out from the domes, running for the various Sno-Cats. Cancer Man gets into one, his mouth dangling open in shock as it "all falls apart". The vehicles drive off.


Now dressed in some of Mulder's clothing, Scully is dragged away from the pods. He starts to pull her up a ladder. Far below them, the defrosting has begun and water drips down the walls. They come to resting spot as Scully is weak and can barely move. Mulder picks her up in a fireman's lift (over his shoulder) and moves towards a vent leading up to the surface. Suddenly, he spots movement in one of the pods. The creatures within have begun to stir. The vaccine has affected the whole structure, as the bodies were all obviously attached to the one creature.


As their ice starts to melt, Scully suddenly passes out. Mulder checks for a pulse then resuscitates her with a mean version of CPR. She comes to and, for some reason, as it's THE worst place or time to make a joke, says, "I had you, big time." No time for chitchat, Scully, the creatures inside the bodies are struggling to break free!


The sound of the ice cracking from the bodies alerts Mulder to trouble. He sees the creatures busting through, or at least their arms. He grabs Scully off the floor, shoving her towards the vent through which he arrived. An alien hand grabs for Mulder's ankle, he kicks it off and just gets out of his way as a blast of steam keeps the creature at bay. Through a mutual push and shove, Mulder and Scully finally escape the structure.


They pull themselves up to where Mulder first stopped after he fell through the ice, a slight turn in the vent. Just as Mulder clears the turn, an alien lashes out from behind but is cut off by the twist in the tunnel. They step over the part where Mulder first fell all the way down and make their way out the hole he originally made. Scully falls onto the snow, exhausted and Mulder perches next to her on one knee. He hears a sound and looks around for the origin. It's the ice ... it's cracking under their feet! He grabs Scully and throws one of her arms over his shoulder as they begin to run away. He stops for some ungodly reason and looks back seeing vents of steam starting to shoot out of the ice. They begin to run again as the ice begins cracking and falling away causing a huge crater to form. Suddenly the crater overtakes them and they disappear into the hole, but next we see them shoot into the air and slide off of the surface of the rising ship. They land on the edge of the crater.


The structure continues to rise and the ice begins to rain down on our agents as they lay in the snow. Mulder covers Scully, trying to protect her from the falling debris. As it finally stops raining ice and rocks, Mulder looks up to see ... The Classic Huge Spaceship rising into the air and flying off into the sky. Mulder watches the spaceship as it flies overhead, his face glows with a heart-melting grin of childlike wonder and awe. Scully's face is turned towards the snow, too tired to move, as Mulder says, almost along with the audience ... "Scully, ya gotta see this!" It's quiet, it's barely a mutter above a whisper, but we DO hear her say ... "I see it."


Spent from exhaustion, Mulder drops his head into the snow. Scully, finding the strength God gave 20 hearty men, scoots her body over to cover him from the freezing cold. She lifts him into her arms and cradles him as the camera pans back to show two lone figures perched alone on the edge of the bottomless crater left by the departing spaceship.


The next thing we know (don't start with me on the how-did-they-get-out questions, it's a movie), Scully is seated in front of the Review board again, her lovely face marked by the effects of her ordeal all frostbite and scratches as Cassidy speaks. "Agent Scully, though there is now direct evidence that a federal agent may have been involved in the bombing, the other events you've laid down here are too incredible on their own, and quite frankly implausible in their connections." They have decided to remove any references to these events from their report to the Justice Department until hard evidence warrants an investigation. Scully walks over and hands Cassidy the vial containing the bee, saying, "I don't believe the FBI currently has an investigative unit qualified to pursue the evidence at hand." Scully then turns and leaves the room. Skinner looks at Cassidy, then the entire panel turns to stare at him. What are ya gonna do about THIS, Skinner?


During the above scene, we see a man entering the field office where the fossilized samples were kept. In the darkness of the closed office his flashlight lands on the tray containing the samples and he takes it away. We then cut to somewhere in America's heartland as a freshly-painted tanker truck is prepared. The new sign painted on the side reads "Nature's Best Corn Oil". Next we see soldiers with flame torches setting a corn field ablaze.


On a bench near the Capitol Mall, Scully finds Mulder sitting with a newspaper in his hands. He shows her the cover story that's been reported, but Scully doesn't care, she's told the Review board everything. Mulder believes they'll just cover it all up anyway and tells her, "You were right to want to quit! You were right to want to leave me! You should get as far away from me as you can! I'm not going to watch you die, Scully, because of some hollow personal cause of mine. Go be a doctor. Go be a doctor while you still can." Scully looks at him, her beautiful face covered with the marks left by the frostbite, and says she will be a doctor and a cure will be found. Echoing his earlier words to her, she says, "If I quit now, they've won." She takes his hand in hers and they walk off into the sunset. Well, there's no sunset, but you get the idea.


For the last scene, we travel to Foum Tataouine, Tunisia and watch as a helicopter lands near a cornfield in the desert. Cancer Man gets out and walks towards Strughold, who seems angry to see him there, there are channels he should have gone through. But, Cancer Man tells him he couldn't wait, Mulder has seen too much. "What has he seen? Of the whole he has seen but pieces." Strughold says. Cancer Man says, "He's reinvested." Strughold says, "He is but one man. One man alone cannot fight the future." Cancer Man pulls a telegram he's received from out of his pocket and hands it to Strughold to read. He does then tosses it to the ground and walks off to be swallowed up by the corn.


The telegram, dated September 6, 1998, reads:

X-FILES REOPENED. STOP. PLEASE ADVISE. STOP.

Notes

In your eyes
The option of a warm embrace implies
You're my friend
Happy endings keep our love alive ...
Hope I got a future in the big picture
At the last embrace
From the first kiss

from Elton John's "The Big Picture"


Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, lots of other stuff happened in the movie ... but, come on, they finally kissed! Yes, technically they did, hence the quote. Deal with it. And how could he not care for her? The man placed his lips over hers to breathe in the oxygen she desperately needed AFTER he dragged that gooey tendril thing out of her throat! Man, if that's not devotion, I don't know what is.


Overall, I say it made a great big 2-parter episode, and that's all I really asked for. Over the years, we've been treated to some beautiful movie-like images on the small screen, how could they possibly mess up the move to the big screen? I'm not saying it was perfect, there were plotholes you could drive a snowdunebuggy through, but in the end, I left the theatre with a huge silly grin on my face, isn't that enough?


Forget the oiliens, forget the all-too-brief appearances by Skinner and The Lone Gunmen, what it all came down to was something we've been waiting a long time to have confirmed. These two NEED each other to exist, it's as simple as that. Whether this relationship and "missed" kiss will be continued in season 6, as it should, is not really important to me. I can't see an amicable resolution anyway. I've joked with some friends that maybe Mulder should just drop off the earrings she left at his place the night before, or Scully should start wearing "Ravish Me" perfume, whatever, but when it comes down to it, how could you honestly portray them as having a relationship and still continue the storylines we've grown to love? Fine and dandy then, at least we have the movie under our belts and know how important these two are to each other.


Other than the fantastic action sequences, including the mind-blowing final scenes in the Antarctic, the relationship was the key to why this movie worked for me. As season five dragged on and the fans began to notice how distant the agents became to each other, I kept singing the same song, "It's all for the movie ... just you wait and see." Sweet justice now tickles my tongue. The opening scene on the rooftop was a breath of fresh air after a mostly stale season for me. Without these two, the show would be lost (please read this, Chris Carter!). While it may have been Mulder's quest for his missing sister which brought them together on this journey, it's to the point now where most long-time fans could care less if she's ever found or The Truth is revealed. Stick a fork in it, it's done.


The growth of Scully's character in particular drives this machine. Just exactly what did she see in the Antarctic? The Queen of Reviewers, Autumn Tysko says, "Mulder the believer sees the proof of his quest and a weary Scully sees it in him as she mutters 'I saw it' into the snow." A beautiful thought really, if she didn't actually see the ship, but after being flung like toys on its back, is that possible? I look forward to season six with even more anticipation than before the movie opened. Scully just may finally Believe.


So what the heck were those bees all about, eh? As you may recall, we first encountered them in Herrenvolk, where Mulder was shown the Samantha kid-clones. They were followed up in Zero Sum, where Skinner paid his price to the devil by cleaning up after the smallpox bees were let loose. A key moment in that episode occurs when Cancer Man goes to see the Consortium, handing over the last of the dead bees. The First Elder asks, "Should we assume that the trial run is proceeding as planned?" and Cancer Man says "It's already begun." The scene then switches to the playground as the bees start to attack. Sooooo, stay with me now, it seems to me that the smallpox bees were just that, a test to see if the method works, preparing for the future tests, namely the oilien bees we see in the movie. As I see it, and you're more than welcome to debate this with me, the corn contains a form of the oiliens, which the bees pick up on their fuzzy little legs then carry back to the domes to create a type of corn oil. Hence the tanker trucks at the end are carrying the oilien virus. Voila!


If you've never heard of the oiliens before, check out these episodes, in order: Piper Maru/ Apocrypha, Tunguska/ Terma and Patient X/ The Red And The Black


Please note that this new form of the oilien is NOT the same as we've seen before, it has mutated into something apparently no one in the Consortium dreamed of. Instead of merely taking over a person's brain, making them ripe for easy pickings come Colonization Day (think Hallmark has a good greeting card for this?), this new form of the oilien actually grows an alien creature inside their new host. Nasty creatures, really, or as one poster on the newsgroup called them, Angry Badger Aliens. So the question is, why is Cancer Man taking care of a spaceship full of bodies in the Antarctic, including cavemen, if he didn't know anything about this new mutated oilien? In my opinion, before the mutated virus appeared, this ship was full of bodies containing the "regular" oiliens. No alien growths in their stomachs, just infected and iced to wait for Colonization. Maybe they're the ones they've been testing the vaccine on all along.


As a matter of interest, I immediately flashed on the spidery creatures from Travelers when Kurtzweil told Mulder that he and his father had been "fellow travellers". But, according to more than a few postings, the term "travellers" was used in the 40's and 50's to identify a person who believed in Communism. Gosh, I'll bet that was covered in Travelers, but I was too bored to notice ;-)


One nitpick I honestly did find on my own, which has become one of the top ten "hey, did you see that?" messages on the newsgroup and lists, the licence plate on the Well-Manicured Man's car when we see it in the alleyway reads "LA365". Cute nod to the move to LA, or pure luck? Yeah, right.


I've heard that the bombing was supposed to take place elsewhere and was moved to Dallas later. Either way, having the conspiracy begin in Dallas seems a typical Chris Carter brush-stroke. Can't we all (or at least folks our age) trace our first dealings with conspiracy back to Kennedy's assassination in Dallas? And with Mulder and Scully visiting the Bethesda Morgue ... gotta be a nod to Kennedy buffs.


Some of us got a huge chuckle out of the stuffed moose head in the bar. Moose and Squirrel is a nickname the duo has held online for a long time.


Has Skinner ever met The Lone Gunmen before? Heck, half of the movie's audience hasn't seen any of them before, so why not toss 'em together, huh? Seemed odd to me that Skinner was suddenly in cahoots with these three dweebs (physically speaking, that is) to get Mulder out of the hospital.


Nitpickers Anon.- Scully's cell phone number in the movie is 555-0113, not 555-1013.


Two similarites to earlier eps I enjoyed: The first meeting between Mulder and Kurtzweil cheekily mirrors Mulder's first meeting with Deep Throat. And when Scully slaps down the vial with the bee at the end of the movie, I flashed to the scene near the end of The Pilot when she slapped the vial containing the implant down on Blevins' desk.


Seems the folks at FEMA (The Federal Emergency Management Agency) weren't too impressed with the movie's portrayl of them and their "powers". According to an article in The Washington Post, extra security has been put in place at all FEMA facilites just in case some movie-goers take it all a bit too seriously. Who, us? ;-)


If you're interested in that sort of thing, you can find daily box office receipt updates at Mr. Showbiz. No big whoop to me, as new movies open, the movie will slip in the box office, it happens. Over the course of the summer, as it's released in other parts of the world, I can assure you it will recoup its 60 million dollar pricetag. In spades!


If you're curious what other fans have rated the movie and want to add your two cents, you can vote at The Internet Movie DataBase, or go to the direct link for The X-Files Movie.


Movie Homages or "Hey, that scene reminds me of ...":

- "Star Wars" - Well, duh! The whole series reminds us of this movie in places, it's obvious someone's a fan. But the one scene that really screamed "Star Wars" to me in the movie was the final shot in another desert, this time identified as Foum Tataouine, Tunisia. Remember the great scene of R2-D2 and C3P0 bickering in the desert? Right, they were not only on Tatooine, Luke's home planet, but SW buffs informed us on the newsgroup that the scenes in the SW movie were filmed in Tunisia, near a place called Foum Tataouine.

- "Alien" - I've only seen the first movie in this series but I did catch the similarity, what with mutated alien forms ripping the shreds out of people.

- "North By Northwest" - Hitchcock classic where Cary Grant was chased through a cornfield by a menacing airplane. In a neat twist, Martin Landau costarred in the flick as Leonard, a bad guy. You may recall his classic scene: Cary's hanging off Mount Rushmore and Martin tromps on his hand. He has a great line (and an even MORE delicious XF twist) in it, "Sometimes, the truth does taste like a mouthful of worms." (thanks to Tara Charnow for reminding me via the newsgroup, great movie)

- "Snow White" - Scully in a glass "coffin". A lot of people mentioned "Sleeping Beauty" for the same image, but I'm pretty sure it was "Snow White".

- "Twin Peaks" - Was the word COOPER on the ambulance doors a nod to Agent Dale Cooper from "Twin Peaks"? If you weren't aware, David Duchovny played the role of Dennis (Denise) a cross-dressing DEA agent.

"2001: A Space Odyssey" - The opening scene with the cavemen.

"Independence Day" - Okay, let's tackle this one, shall we? Yes, you can see a poster for this movie on the wall in the alleyway ... ahem ... just above where Mulder relieves himself. Good for a giggle, sure, but was it a homage? The ever-diplomatic Frank Spotnitz, co-producer for "The X-Files" movie (and writer on the show) said in an interview that it was a gentle tip of the hat and he was "mortified" to think people saw it as a snub. Well, along comes Entertainment Weekly to set the record straight. Director Rob Bowman says, "Chris (Carter) saw ID4 and hated it." and that it was Chris' idea all along. Naughty boys.


Some casting notes, or Where Have I Seen Them Before?:

Martin Landau (Dr. Kurtzweil) - His first big role you remember was in the cheesy cult TV series "Space:1999", costarring his wife at the time (I think they've split up now, my apologies, Martin, if not!) Barbara Bain. One of my personal faves was his costarring role in "Tucker: The Man And His Dream", still makes me weep like a baby when he gives The Speech to Jeff Bridges' Tucker. And, of course, he dazzled us all with his Oscar-winning role as Bela Lugosi in "Ed Wood".

Armin Mueller-Stahl (Conrad Strughold) - His most famous role to date, I believe, was as the father in "Shine".

Terry O'Quinn (Darius Michaud) - "Millennium" fans will recognize him from his role as Peter Watts. Yes, he's been on the show before, in Aubrey, and NO, he wasn't the truck driver in The Red And The Black.

Glenne Headly (Barmaid) - Adored by me, personally, for her Noah Wyle-heart-breaking role in TV's "ER", others may recognize her from "Dick Tracy" and "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels".

Lucas Black (Stevie) - From the late and lamented Shaun Cassidy produced series, "American Gothic".

Blythe Danner (Jana Cassidy) - She's had a long and successful career and you may remember her from "Futureworld".

Gary Grubbs (Fire Chief) also played the sheriff in Our Town.

Jason Beghe (FBI Agent) also played Ranger Moore in Darkness Falls.

1. Full Transcript

Quotes

Scully's walking around the rooftop talking to Mulder on her cellphone


Scully: "Mulder, when a terrorist bomb threat is called in, the rational purpose of providing that information is to allow us to find the bomb. The rational object of terrorism is to promote terror. If you'd study the statistics, you'd find the model behavioral pattern for virtually every case where a threat has turned up an explosive device; and if we don't act in accordance with that data, if you ignore it as we have done, the chances are great that if there actually is a bomb, we might not find it. Lives could be lost .... Mulder. Mulder?" (he appears behind her)

Mulder: "Boom."

Scully: (startled) "Jesus, Mulder!"

Mulder: "Whatever happened to playing a hunch, Scully? The element of surprise, random acts of unpredictabilty? If we fail to anticipate the unforeseen or expect the unexpected in a universe of infinite possibilites, we may find ourselves at the mercy of anyone or anything that cannot be programmed, categorized or easily referenced. (he pops a sunflower seed into his mouth) What are we doing up here, Scully? It's hotter than hell."

Scully: "I know you're bored in this assignment, Mulder, but unconventional thinking is only gonna get you in trouble now."

Mulder: "What makes you think I'm bored?"

Scully: "You've gotta quit looking for what isn't there. They've closed the X-files. There's procedure to be followed now ... protocol."

Mulder: "Maybe we should call in a bomb threat to Houston. I think it's free beer night at the Astrodome."

(Scully attempts to open the door)

Scully: "Aww, now what?"

Mulder: "It's locked?"

Scully: "So much for anticipating the unforeseen. (Mulder tries to open the door and it opens easily, Scully smiles.) ... I had you."

Mulder: "No, you didn't."

Scully: "Oh, yeah. I had you big time."

Mulder: "You had nothing. Come on, I saw you jiggle the handle."

(They exit the stairwell, next to the elevator at the bottom floor, a group of children is being led into the elevator.)

Scully: "I saw your face, Mulder. There was a definite moment of panic."

Mulder: "You've never seen me panic. When I panic, I make this face." (Mulder's face registers no emotion.)


____________________________________________________________


Scully: "Don't think! Just pick up that phone and make it happen!"


____________________________________________________________


Outside the Review Office after she's been questioned

Mulder: "Whatever you told him in there, Scully, you don't have to protect me."

Scully: "All I told him was the truth."

Mulder: "They're trying to divide us on this and we can't let them."

Scully: "Mulder, they have divided us. They're splitting us up."


____________________________________________________________


Mulder: "This is not about you, Scully. They're doing this to me."

Scully: "They're not doing this. (pause as she collects her thoughts) Mulder, I left behind a career in medicine because I thought that I could make a difference at the FBI. But it hasn't turned out that way. And now if they were to transfer me to Omaha or Cleveland, or some field office, it just doesn't hold the interest for me that it once did. Not after what I've seen and done."

Mulder: (realizing what she's saying) "You're quitting."

Scully: "Maybe you should ask yourself if your heart's still in it, too."


____________________________________________________________


Mulder's in a bar, knocking 'em back

Barmaid: "So, whaddya do?"

Mulder: "What do I do?"

Barmaid: "Mmm hmm."

(Mulder takes a sip from his drink, puts it down and begins his tale.)

Mulder: "I'm the key figure in an ongoing government charade, the plot to conceal the truth about the existence of extraterrestrials. It's a global conspiracy actually, with key players in the highest levels of power, that reaches down into the lives of every man, woman and child on this planet, so of course no one believes me. I'm an annoyance to my superiors, a joke to my peers. They call me Spooky. Spooky Mulder, whose sister was abducted by aliens when he was just a kid and now chases after little green men with a badge and a gun, shouting to the heavens or to anyone who will listen that the fix is in, that the sky is falling, and when it hits it's gonna be the shit-storm of all time."

Barmaid: (taking his glass away from him) "Well, I would say that about does it, Spooky."

Mulder: "Does what?"

Barmaid: "Well, looks like eighty-six is your lucky number."

Mulder: "You know, one is the loneliest number."


____________________________________________________________


Mulder's ... ahem ... busy in the alleyway as Kurtzweil joins him

Kurtzweil: "That official FBI business?"

Mulder: "What?"

Kurtzweil: "Bet the Bureau's accusing you of the same thing in Dallas. Standing around holding your yank while bombs are exploding."


____________________________________________________________


Mulder goes to see Kurtzweil at his apartment but finds it being searched by cops

Detective: "You looking for him for some other reason?"

Mulder: "Yeah .. I had an appointment for a pelvic examination."


____________________________________________________________


After leaving the apartment, Mulder finds Kurtzweil in the alleyway behind his bulding

Mulder: "They want to discredit you, for what?"

Kurtzweil: "Because I'm a dangerous man. Because I know too much about the truth."

Mulder: "Oh, that end-of-the-world apocalyptic garbage you write?"

Kurtzweil: "You know my work? (he smiles hopefully, but Mulder gives him a slight snort and smile, then turns and starts to walk away.) I was right about Dallas, wasn't I?"

Mulder: (he stops and turns around.) "How? How were you right?"

Kurtzweil: "Are you familiar with the Hanta virus, Agent Mulder?"

Mulder: "Yeah, it was a deadly virus spread by field mice in the southwestern United States several years ago."

Kurtzweil: "According to the newspaper, FEMA was called out to manage an outbreak of the Hanta virus. Are you familiar with what the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s real power is? FEMA allows the White House to suspend constitutional government upon declaration of a national emergency. Think about that! What is an agency with such broad-sweeping power doing managing a small viral outbreak in suburban Texas?"

Mulder: "You’re saying it wasn’t such a small outbreak."

Kurtzweil: "No, I’m saying it wasn’t the Hanta virus."

Mulder: "Well, what was it?"

(Another police car pulls up to the front of the building. Mulder and Kurtzweil walk farther into the alleyway.)

Mulder: "What was it?"

Kurtzweil: "When we were young men in the military, your father and I were recruited for a project. They told us it was biological warfare, a virus."

Mulder: "What killed those men?"

Kurtzweil: "What killed them I won't even write about! We have no context for what killed those men, or any appreciation of the scale at which it will be unleashed in the future."

Mulder: "A plague?"

Kurtzweil: "The plague to end all plagues, Agent Mulder. A silent weapon for a quiet war. The sytematic release of an indiscriminant organism for which the men who will bring it on still have no cure! They've been working on this for fifty years! While the rest of the world have been fighting gooks and commies, these men have been secretly negotiating a planned armageddon!"

Mulder: "Negotiating with whom?"

Kurtzweil: "I think you know. The timetable has been set. It will happen on a holiday, when people are away from their homes. The president will declare a state of emergency, at which time all government, all federal agencies, will come under the power of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. FEMA, the secret government."

Mulder: "And they call me paranoid."

Kurtzweil: "Go back to Dallas, Agent Mulder, and dig. Or we're gonna find out along with the rest of the country, when it's too late."


____________________________________________________________


The agents have arrived at the scene of the cavein where Stevie died, now a very new looking playground, an oasis in the surrounding desert. They see his three friends on brand-new bikes, riding towards them

Mulder: (getting the kids’ attention) "Hey -- hey!"

Scully: "Do you boys live around here?"

Kid: "Yeah."

Mulder: "You see anybody diggin' over there?"

Kid: "We're not supposed to talk about it."

Scully: "You're not supposed to talk about it? Who told you that?"

Kid2: "Nobody."

Mulder: "Nobody? The same nobody that built that playground? Nobody buy you those new bikes, too?"

Scully: "I think you better tell us."

Kid: "We don't even know you."

Scully: "Well, we're FBI agents."

Kid: "You're not FBI agents."

Mulder: "How do you know?"

Kid: " 'Cause y'all look like door-to-door salesmen!"

(Mulder whips out his badge and shows it to the kid)

Mulder: "Hey, you wanna buy a badge?"


____________________________________________________________


They arrive at what appears to be a dead end

Scully: "This is great, this is fitting."

Mulder: "What?" (he pulls out the map.)

Scully: "I have to be in Washington, D.C. in eleven hours for a hearing, the outcome of which might possibly effect one of the biggest decisions of my life, and here I am in the middle of Nowhere, Texas chasing phantom tanker trucks!"

Mulder: "We're not chasing tanker trucks, Scully, we're chasing evidence." (still consulting the useless map.)

Scully: "Evidence of what exactly?"

Mulder: "That bomb in Dallas was allowed to go off, to hide something. Bodies infected with a virus you yourself detected!"

Scully: "Mulder, they haul oil in tanker trucks, they haul gas in tanker trucks, they do not haul viruses in tanker trucks!"

Mulder: "Well, they may be hauling a virus in these tanker trucks."

(She looks at him quizzically.)

Scully: "What do you mean? .... Mulder? .... What are you not telling me? (he is folding the map elaborately, avoiding her stare and her question.) Mulder?"

Mulder: (hesitant) "The virus may be extraterrestrial."


____________________________________________________________


Excellent scene, Mulder and Scully have entered the huge "Jiffy Pop Poppers", the floors a sea of metallic slots. Suddenly, the vents above their heads open ... a loud buzzing sound fills the air


Mulder: "Scully?"

Scully: "Yeah?"

Mulder: "Run!"


(the slots open, releasing thousands of bees into the domes. Not much of a quote, but a great scene)


____________________________________________________________


While Scully's at her hearing with a bee crawling up her suit, Mulder meets with Kurtzweil at Casey's Bar

Mulder: "What are they?"

(Kurtweil pauses as he doesn't have a sweet clue.)

Kurtzweil: "What do you think?"

Mulder: "A transportation system. Transgeneric crops that are polygenically altered to carry a virus."

Kurtzweil: "That would be my guess."

(He dabs his mouth on a napkin, looks around, gets up and starts to walk away. Mulder is stunned and gets up to follow him.)

Mulder: "Guess? What do you mean your "guess"?! Hey!"

(Mulder grabs Kurtweil's shoulder and turns him around to face him.)

Mulder: "You told me you had answers!"

Kurtzweil: "Yeah, well ... I don’t have 'em all ..."

Mulder: (disgusted) "You didn’t know my father ..."

Kurtzweil: "Like I told you, he and I were old friends ..."

Mulder: (angrily) "You’ve been using me! You’ve been using me to gather information for your god-damned books!"

(Kurtweil is looking left and right to see if anyone is paying attention as Mulder's voice has risen.)

Kurtzweil: "Lower your voice!"

(Kurtzweil leaves through the back exit. Mulder follows him into the alley.)

Mulder: "Kurtzweil? Kurtzweil!"

(Kurtweil stops and turns to Mulder.)

Kurtzweil: "Yeah, well, you’d be shit out of luck if it wasn’t for me! You saw what you saw 'cause I led you to it! (he stabs Mulder in the chest with his finger for emphasis.) I’m putting my ass on the line for you ..."

Mulder: "Your ass?! I just got chased through Texas by two black helicopters!"

Kurtzweil: "And why do you think it is you’re standing here talking to me? These people don’t make mistakes!"


____________________________________________________________


The Hallway Scene. We see Mulder sitting in his apartment, a family album open as he stares at a young version of Kurtzweil at a family picnic. Is that actor Chris Owens seated at the table in the lower right-hand side of the pic as a young Cancer Man? Not confirmed, just speculating. The door opens as Scully enters Mulder's apartment.

Mulder: "What's wrong?"

Scully: "Salt Lake City, Utah. Transfer effective immediately. (Mulder turns his body away from her, throws his head back, his eyes to the heavens with a this-can't-be-happening attitude.) I already gave Skinner my letter of resignation."

Mulder: "You can't quit now, Scully."

Scully: "I can, Mulder. I debated whether or not even to tell you in person, but ..."

Mulder: "We are close to something here! We're on the verge!"

Scully: "You're on the verge, Mulder. Please don't do this to me."

(Mulder leaps out of his chair and walks over to Scully.)

Mulder: "After what you saw last night, after all you've seen, you can just walk away?"

Scully: "I have, I did, it's done."

Mulder: "I need you on this, Scully."

Scully: "You don't need me, Mulder. You never have. I've just held you back. (Mulder looks at her with that hurt puppy dog look in his eyes. She drops her eyes from his and turns to leave.) I gotta go."

(Scully goes out into the hall and Mulder follows her)

Mulder: "You wanna tell yourself that so you can quit with a clear conscience, you can, but you're wrong!"

(She stops and turns to face him.)

Scully: "Why did they assign me to you in the first place, Mulder? To debunk your work .. to rein you in .. to shut you down."

Mulder: "But you saved me! As difficult and as frustrating as it's been sometimes, your goddamned strict rationalism and science have saved me a thousand times over! You've kept me honest ... you've made me a whole person. I owe you everything ... Scully, and you owe me nothing ... I don't know if I wanna do this alone ... I don't even know if I can ... and if I quit now, they win."

(Scully's eyes well-up with tears and they hug. She pulls back and kisses his forehead, then touches her forehead to his before pulling back again. A tear gently drifts down her cheek. Mulder cradles her face in his hands. In my opinion, as Mulder's face becomes serious, so does hers. She does NOT exhibit Small Potatoes face, as some have speculated. She's as ready for this moment as he is and smiles as her tears flow. Mulder begins to move his face towards hers ... a kiss is imminent ... Scully moves towards him ... lips touch for a brief second ... that darn bee stings her neck and she pulls back quickly, her hand on her neck)

Scully: "Ow!"

Mulder: (very quietly, thinking he's done the wrong thing) "I'm sorry."

Scully: "Something stung me."

(Mulder reaches down and plucks out the bee, holding it in his fingers, its little legs squirming in the air.)

Mulder: "Must've gotten in your shirt."

Scully: "Mulder ... something's wrong."

Mulder: "What?"

Scully: "I'm having lacinating pain in ..."

Mulder: "What?"

Scully: "... my chest."

Mulder: "Scully ..."

Scully: "My motor functions are being affected."

(She begins to fall into Mulder and he grabs her.)

Mulder: "Scully ..."

(Mulder gently but quickly lays her down upon the hallway floor)

Scully: "My pulse is thready ... a funny taste in the back of my throat."

Mulder: "I think you're going into anaphylactic shock."

Scully: "No ... I have no alergy."

(Mulder races into his apartment and quickly pushes 911 on his phone)

Mulder: "This is Special Agent Fox Mulder. I have an emergency! I have an agent down!"

(Next we see the ambulance and paramedics arrive)

Paramedic 1: "Can you hear me? Can you say your name?"

Paramedic 2: "She's got constriction in the throat and larynx."

Paramedic 1: "Passages are open. OK. Let's get her in the van right away. Look out. Coming through. Watch your back."

(Now we're out on the street, as Scully is loaded into the ambulance)

Mulder: "She said she had a funny taste in the back of her throat. But there was no pre-existing allergy to bee sting. Now the bee that stung her might have been carrying a virus."

Paramedic 1: "Virus?"

Mulder: "Will you tell that to the doctor?"

Various Paramedics Voices: "... virus ... advise ... reaction ... stat!"

Mulder: "What hos ... what hospital are ... (the ambulance door closes, showing the word "COOPER" written on the doors for some reason, Mulder goes to the driver) What hospital are you taking her to?"

(They stare at each other for a second, suddenly the driver whips out a gun ... BLAMMO! ... Mulder is shot in the temple and falls onto the pavement. Behind him, we see the real ambulance just arriving)


____________________________________________________________


Mulder's in The Well-Manicured Man's car after being handed a pouch containing coordinates and a small bottle filled with green liquid

Mulder: "What is it?"

WMM: "A weak vaccine against the virus Agent Scully has been infected with. It must be administered within 96 hours. That leaves you little time to reach those coordinates."

Mulder: "You're lying."

WMM: "No. Though I have no means to prove otherwise.The virus is extraterriestrial. We know very little about it except that it was the original inhabitant of this planet."

Mulder: (unbelieving) "A virus..."

WMM: "What is a virus, but a colonizing force that cannot be defeated? Living in a cave, underground, until it mutates--and attacks."

Mulder: "This is what you've been conspiring to conceal? A disease?"

WMM: "No. For God's sake, you've got it all backwards! AIDS, the Ebola virus, on an evolutionary scale they are newborns. This virus walked the planet long before the dinosaurs."

Mulder: (smiling in disbelief) "What do you mean walked?"

WMM: "Your aliens, Agent Mulder. Your little green men arrived here millions of years ago. Those that didn't leave have been lying dormant underground since the last ice age in the form of an evolved pathogen, waiting to be reconstituted by the alien race when it comes to colonize the planet -- using us as hosts. Against this we have no defense, nothing but a weak vaccine. Do you see why it was kept secret? Why even the best men, men like your father, could not let the truth be known. Until Dallas we believed the virus would simply control us, that mass infection would make us a slave race. Imagine our surprise when they began to gestate."

(Mulder lets it all sink in, the driver eyes look at him through the rear-view mirror. Darn good driver if he ain't watching the road!)

Mulder: "Why are you telling me this?"

WMM: "For the sake of my own children. Once it's learned what I have told you, my life will be over."

(WMM looks ahead, possibly at the driver. Mulder looks at the driver.)

Mulder: "Where's Dr. Kurtzweil? (no response) I'd like to get out of the car now. (to the driver) Stop the car!"

WMM: "Driver. (the car pulls to a stop in yet another alleyway.) The men I work with will stop at nothing to clear the way for what they believe is their stake in the inevitable future. I was ordered to kill Dr. Kurtzweil, as I was ordered to kill you."

(Suddenly, WMM grabs a gun (from his lap?) and shoots the driver in the back of the head, BLAMMO! Mulder recoils.)

Mulder: "Ow!"

WMM: "Trust no one, Mr. Mulder. " (an echo of my personal fave informant, Deep Throat's dying words in The Erlenmeyer Flask. Nice homage IF these are The Well-Manicured Man's dying words as well.)

(WMM opens his own door and exits, holding the door open.)

WMM: "Get out of the car."

Mulder: "Why? The upholstery is already ruined."

WMM: "Get out of the car! (Mulder scoots over to WMM's door and exits the car.) You have precious little time. (Mulder slams the door shut angrily.) What I've given you the alien colonists don't yet know exists. The vaccine you hold is the only defense against the virus. Its introduction into an alien environment may have the power to destroy the delicate plans we have so assiduously protected for the last 50 years!"

Mulder: "What do you mean, "may" have?"

WMM: "Find Agent Scully. Only then will you realize the scope and grandeur of the project. Go. Go now!"

(WMM points his gun in Mulder's face. Mulder starts to walk away, WMM opens his door again, a rat scuttles past (Hi, Krycek!), WMM reenters the limo, closes the door and it explodes, knocking Mulder off his feet. He sits on the ground watching the flames burn, then pulls out the pouch and checks to see that the bottle is still intact. It is. He puts it back in the pouch, gets up and after one last look at the burning car, begins to run for his life.)


____________________________________________________________


The Scene In The Antaractic

Mulder: "Scully, ya gotta see this! Scully!"

(It's quiet, it's barely a mutter above a whisper, but we hear ...)

Scully: "I see it."


____________________________________________________________


Mulder is sitting on a bench by the reflecting pool reading a newspaper. He stares at a headline: "Local Hanta Virus Outbreak In Northern Texas Contained", looks up and sees Scully walking toward him. When she arrives, he hands her the paper.)

Mulder: "There's an interesting work of fiction on page 24. Mysteriously, our names have been omitted. They're burying this thing, Scully. They're just going to dig a new hole and cover it up."

Scully: "I told OPR everything I know. What I experienced, the virus, how it's spread by the bees from pollen in transgenic crops."

(He gets up and starts to walk away. She joins him.)

Mulder: "You're wasting your time, Scully. They'll never believe you, not unless your story can be programmed, categorized, or easily referenced."

Scully: "Well, then we'll go over their heads."

(He stops and turns to her.)

Mulder: "No. No. How many times have we been here before, Scully? Right here. So close to the truth and now with what we've seen and what we know to be right back at the beginning with nothing."

Scully: "This is different, Mulder."

Mulder: "No it isn't! You were right to want to quit! You were right to want to leave me! You should get as far away from me as you can! I'm not going to watch you die, Scully, because of some hollow personal cause of mine. Go be a doctor. Go be a doctor while you still can."

Scully: "I can't. I won't. Mulder, I'll be a doctor, but my work is here with you now. That virus that I was exposed to, whatever it is, it has a cure. You held it in your hand. How many other lives can we save? Look ... (she clasps his hand) ... If I quit now, they win."

(Hand in hand they walk off into the sunset .... sort of anyway.)


____________________________________________________________


Cancer Man arrives in a cornfield in Tunisia

Strughold: "You look hot and miserable. Why have you traveled all this way?"

Cancer Man: "We have business to discuss."

Strughold: "We have regular channels."

Cancer Man: "This involves Mulder."

Strughold: "Ah. That name, again and again."

Cancer Man: "He's seen more than he should have."

Strughold: "What has he seen? Of the whole he has seen but pieces."

Cancer Man: "He's determined now. Reinvested."

Strughold: "He is but one man. One man alone cannot fight the future."

Cancer Man: "Yesterday, I received this."

(From out of his pocket, he pulls a telegram and hands it to Strughold. He reads it then drops it to the ground and walks away. Cancer Man looks down at the telegram, it reads:

X-FILES RE-OPENED. STOP. PLEASE ADVISE. STOP.


____________________________________________________________


Here's what we didn't see in the original release of the movie, it was cut so as not to confuse new fans, but is now included in the video. It takes place in the Well-Manicured Man's car and this version is from the novel, I'll "fix" it when I get my copy of the video.


The Well-Manicured Man nodded grimly. "Imagine our surprise when they began to gestate. My group has been working cooperatively with the alien colonists, facilitating programs like the one you saw. To gain access to the virus, in hope that we might secretly develop a cure."


"To save yourselves," broke in Mulder.


The Well-Manicured Man shrugged, "When war is futile, victory consists of merely staying alive. Survival is the ultimate ideology." He hesitated, then gave Mulder a cool smile. "Your father wisely refused to believe this."


"My father sacrificed my sister!" cried Mulder angrily. "He let them take Samantha--"


"No." For a moment the Well-Manicured Man looked almost sorrowful. "Without a vaccination, the only true survivors of viral holocaust would be those immune to it: human/alien clones. He allowed your sister to be abducted to be taken to a cloning program for one reason."


"So she'd survive," Mulder breathed in sudden understanding, "As a genetic hybrid ..."


The Well-Manicured Man nodded, "Your father chose hope over selfishness. Hope in the only future he had: his children. His hope for you, Agent Mulder, was that you would uncover the truth about the Project. That you would do everything you could to stop it --- That you would fight the future."


He fell silent. On the other side of the backseat, Mulder sat stunned, feeling as though all at once his destiny had been validated, or maybe simply justified.