Andrew Wright
Blind Man's Bluff: Sample pages (opening credits)


Above the clouds, a Pan-American jetliner flies across the sky.

Inside, a man moves the curtains to look out his window. A voice is heard on the in-flight P.A. system:

"Please fasten your seat belts. We are preparing to land at Orly airport, Paris."

The plane glides along the runway, touching down on a sunny day.

Inside, the man looks anxious. The plane makes a safe landing. The man detaches his seat belt, rises as he smiles and says something to a woman beside him. Passengers prepare to debark.

Outside, on the tarmac, passengers file down a stairway from the plane.

The man slings a bag over his shoulder and walks towards the exit. As he debarks down the stairway, he puts on a pair of sunglasses. A man dressed in an airline uniform approaches and says:

——Monsieur, You are Monsieur Claude Marchand, Holiday Magazine?
— Yes.
— Would you please check with Pan American. There is a message for you.
— Merci.

Claude Marchand replies, as he turns and walks toward the terminal.

At a counter inside, he inquires:

— Madamoiselle, my name is Claude Marchand. I believe there is a message for me.
— Oui, monsieur Marchand. Here it is. It arrived this morning.
— Thank you. Hmph! My editor always finds me.

Claude reads the note that she passes to him:
— Change of plans…Interview… Change of plans… Interview… Photo Assignment… Sculptor Badulescu… Pin-de-rer-ra… Let's see, that's in Spain isn't it?
— Oui, monsieur, on the Costa del Sol, near Malaga.
— Good. I was looking forward to a rest after my last assignment.
— Je m'excuse monsieur, but 'ere are your tickets to the Costa del Sol, and a time schedule. Your baggage as been taken care of, and there will be an auto at your disposal when you arrive.
— Un-hunr. Now that's what I call really efficient service!

He extends a finger to quickly rub under her chin. She giggles:

— Heh-hun!

Another plane flies across the sky. From above, the red tiled roofs of small houses along the shore drift by. Words appear on the screen as though drenched in blood. Soft guitar music plays.

The sea gives way to a view of a spit of land, then a beach dotted with the sails of small boats. The music changes to swelling strings. A blond-haired woman wearing a blue one-piece appears, sitting on a jetty. She applies sun-tan oil to her legs, enjoying the smoothness. She lays back flipping her hair. All goes black, except for the white bones of a skeleton where the woman sits.

The bones rearrange themselves to spell out the words "Cauldron of Blood". A red disk grows in size behind the boney words. The disk turns into a bubbling and smokey cauldron, and the bones fall into it and disappear. The music changes.

More words appear on the screen as though drenched in blood: "starring: … Jean-Pierre Aumont … Boris Karloff … Viveca Lindfors …" A older man appears. His face is drenched in red light and he wears large, dark, round sunglasses. His face splits in two and separates to reaveal the turning head of a severe-looking woman drenched in blue light. "… Rosenda Monteros … " The cauldron changes from red to blue and back again. It transforms into a single skull, bathed in red light. The skull turns back and forth to reveal more blood-drenched words.

The skull transforms back into a cauldron. "…and Jacqui Speed as Pilar". The smoke of the cauldron fills the screen, and the credits continue.