The following is a summaryof a film proposal I recentlysent to several Hollywood directors, including Steven Spielberg and Jane Campion. Its working title is "The Powerbook."
The story takes place in 1995 New Zealand and revolves around a mother and her daughter. Hillary, the main character, is a self-imposed mute. Devastated by the trauma of her husband's impeachment as President of the United States, she has obtained a divorce and foresworn speech.
Seeking to escape her troubles, she agrees to become a mail-order bride. She is sent to rural New Zealand, with her teenage daughter Chelsea, to marry a sheep rancher.
As the film begins, Hillary and Chelsea are arriving in New Zealand. Despite the availability of airplanes, Hillary insists on coming ashore in a rowboat. As the boat reaches the beach, Hillary and Chelsea are met by the sheep rancher and his servants. While everyone else is attired in modern fashions, Hillary and Chelsea both wear black dresses and bonnets reminiscent of the 1850s, as they do throughout the film.
Hillary and Chelsea have not brought much luggage with them. Other than some clothes, their only other possession is Hillary's prized Powerbook computer.
After Hillary marries the sheep rancher, he takes the Powerbook away from her and gives it to his head servant. She becomes irate and protests, using Chelsea as her voice, that her Powerbook contains her treasured health care reform plan. The plan is the crowning achievement of her life and cannot be given to a servant who can barely read and write!
Her husband has little sympathy for her arguments and replies that women do not need access to the information superhighway. Desparate to win back her powerbook, Hillary next pleads for understanding from her husband's head servant.
The overweight and unsanitary servant tells Hillary that he will only give her the powerbook back after she teaches him how to use it. Left with little choice, Hillary agrees to the bargain.
It quickly becomes apparent, however, that the servant has little interest in mastering the Powerbook. Her Powerbook lessons are rather little more than excuses for him to look up her skirt, take off her clothes, or caress her skin.
At first, Hillary feels humiliated as she realizes that she is prostituting herself for her Powerbook. Slowly, however, Hillary falls in love with the servant, and their "lessons" become passionate sexual encounters.
Unfortunately, Hillary's marriage is not working out as she had hoped it would. Her husband becomes angered by her obstinate refusal to bake cookies and host teas. And he becomes even more irate when she tries to run the sheep ranch behind his back.
One afternoon, Hillary's husband walks in on one of the Powerbook "lessons." Flying into a rage of fury, he pulls Hillary outside and chops off one of her fingers with an axe.
Regaining his senses, the husband immediately rushes Hillary to the nearest hospital. Unfortunately, the doctors are not able to reattach her finger.
Angered by what she perceives as the poor quality and high cost of the medical care offered by the hospital, Hillary decides to begin a campaign to reform New Zealand's health care system.
She leaves her husband and travels the countryside with her lover, Chelsea and the Powerbook. In every town, big and small, she tries to explain her health care plan and mobilize public support behind it.
The task, however, is quite difficult. She struggles to explain such complicated concepts as regional health alliances, employer mandates, and payroll taxes through sign language. In the end, her audiences walk away confused and bored by her four hour presentation.
While Chelsea and Hillary's lover suggest that she simplify her plan so that someone else besides herself can understand it, she adamantly refuses to change a word. Only this exact plan, she writes on a notepad, can save New Zealand's health care system.
As the futility of her tour becomes obvious, Hillary descends into madness. After threatening to bomb the headquarters of New Zealand's greedy health insurance companies, whom she claims are consipiring to discredit her plan, she is forced by the government to leave the country.
As the film ends, she departs New Zealand the same way she arrived. Dressed in her black dress and bonnet, she leaves in a rowboat with her daughter, her lover and of course, the Powerbook.
