| "THE CANADIAN CONNECTION" BY CALLUM HOUSTON |
ONE
In this ancient, time-forgotten land half-a-dozen gigantic beasts loom
menacingly over everything. These backwards carnivorous creatures
with brains the size of walnuts indiscriminately devour individuals,
families . . . even whole communities and cities. They are
destructive terror machines incapable of empathy or compassion,
their only concern is self-perpetuation. But their endless food
supply, and their time, is running out. An unforgiving ice age is
approaching, a radical change in climate that will permanently freeze
these simple, lumbering Gargantuas off the face of the planet we call
Earth.
These prehistoric dinosaurs from another era, from another time
altogether, are the financial institutions of Canada. This story of
revenge takes place at the edge of that coming ice age, at the brink of
a financial services holocaust, at the threshold of the extinction of the
rampaging war monsters known as the Canadian banks . . .
TWO
Like a diseased and expiring old hag who can't quite clean herself
properly any longer, the once proud, once mighty, once iceberg-white
fifty-story Bank of Quebec skyscraper is now stained a permanently
dirty shit-brown by the ravages of time and neglect and nothing can
ever remove the unsightly corruptions of old age embedded into her
tarnished, deteriorating skin. Looming pathetically over the city of
Vancouver, British Columbia, the Bank of Quebec structure is
isolated and alone in the vacant terminal city where no one with any
sense or money goes any more. Forever trapped in the frozen
wasteland of the country's most notoriously savage ghetto, the BQ
high-rise is a Gothic anachronism in the desolate downtown core, a
disintegrating castle from a medieval era of barbarism.
A monument to corruption, the tower's glory days are a forgotten
memory from another forgotten time altogether. The bank's
employees are immoral automatons, robots, insolent zombies to
whom the client is seen as the sucker to be swindled. Assets on
deposit are assets waiting to be confiscated by the bank. The way
these bank crooks see it, a deposit into an account held at Bank of
Quebec is a payment to Bank of Quebec itself. Bank of Quebec is a
toxic, empty, dissolute corporation barely surviving on overextended
government loans and guarantees. On taxpayer-funded life support,
the plug will soon be pulled. Impossibly leveraged and unable to
support itself, this corrupt bank's days are numbered and its
administrators know it. No one with any common sense will go near
it. The hustlers and beggars and prostitutes and dealers of the city's
slum have taken over the premises. The building is infested.
Bankrupt, abandoned and hated by all, the helpless bank sat like easy
prey for a takeover. In 2007 the hungry vultures surrounded the bank
and with little fanfare or incident, that takeover, the first of many,
took place. Without warning the bank was forced into receivership
by the government and its administrators were immediately
expunged. An asset management firm called GordonCoopers &
Associates Inc., with the participation of the government of British
Columbia, swallowed defenseless Bank of Quebec whole like Jonah
got swallowed by the whale in the Old Testament scripture.
The pimps are in charge of Bank of Quebec now.
THREE
In this scene you're taken into the private lair of a wealthy regional
mob titan -- the deluxe President and CEO executive office suite of
Bank of Quebec's high-rise tower comprising the entire fiftieth floor
of the building. Despite the bank's poverty, this CEO's office is the
most elaborate and expensive corporate presidential office on the
west coast. One wall is a bank of high definition television screens
churning out colorful data from all of the world's international
financial markets.
Seated at his massive throne in this elegant office of ostentatious
largess is the conquering emperor himself, the Genghis Khan of
corporate takeovers, Michael J. Varmecken, and seated across from
him in the ominously darkened room is Richard D. Marquis, the man
closest to Varmecken and second only to him in terms of power
within the GordonCoopers organization. Michael Varmecken ate up
Bank of Quebec like a hungry hammerhead shark and now he's
picking bankers bones out of his teeth. Stay out of this man's way,
he's a dangerous predator. Intensely, alarmingly intellectual,
Varmecken's got it all; as much power, clout and entitlement as he
could ever have hoped to reached for. Now he works to protect his
dominion from the unwanted interference of interlopers and meddlers.
Both men are manifestly mute, no words are uttered between them,
their forcible silence says all that needs to be said. They ignore the
television screens. Seen it all before. They've no interest in the
latest plunging stock market numbers out of Hong Kong. There exists
another matter of mortal interest on their minds. The matter of a
telephone call.
When the ring comes it's a knife slicing across the intense heavy
silence of the executive suite. Varmecken doesn't answer
immediately, he allows a second ring. Then after the second ring he
picks up the telephone receiver and slowly puts it to his ear.
“Hello,” Varmecken answers chillingly. He listens to the message.
“Right.”
Varmecken hangs up the phone.
“That was the chief of police,” Varmecken says to Marquis.
“Westwood's flight just got in.”
FOUR
We hear the deafening roar of jet engines and then we're staring
straight up at the belly of the 747 jet airliner as it's dropped on us
from the heavens. It looks like it's going to land on your head.
There's the squeal of its rubber tires as we see it touch down on the
runway. You can smell the burnt rubber in your nostrils. Then we're
inside the airport. That's when we see George Westwood.
This man is obvious. He stands out. He's self-evident. Just take a
look at him and you'll see for yourself. His vitality renders him
conspicuous, his handsome good looks make him an unmistakable
focal point, his radiant energy makes you want to get close to him. In
his soulful blue eyes burns an intense, grounded determination. We
see him propel himself methodically through the brightly lit internal
futuristic maze of the airport, his only luggage the suitcase in his
hand. We gaze transfixed as Westwood smiles and shows his travel
documents to the pretty young customs clerk and we next see him
emerge like a timeless god through the electronic doors of the
international arrival gate. We watch riveted as he lights up a
Rothmans Special and waits for a cab.
George Westwood is the personification of cool on the west coast of
North America. This man is a star. If they made a movie about
George Westwood every major male actor in Hollywood would beg
like a child to play the role. You've got to witness this man in person
to see just how together George Westwood really is. He's money in
the bank, he's a brick of gold bullion, he's as cool as they come. All
other men are mere human beings. Westwood is immortal. He is
forever. He is what the ancients worshiped and mythologized.
He is the god of cool. Pure. Uncut. Cool.
In this ancient, time-forgotten land half-a-dozen gigantic beasts loom
menacingly over everything. These backwards carnivorous creatures
with brains the size of walnuts indiscriminately devour individuals,
families . . . even whole communities and cities. They are
destructive terror machines incapable of empathy or compassion,
their only concern is self-perpetuation. But their endless food
supply, and their time, is running out. An unforgiving ice age is
approaching, a radical change in climate that will permanently freeze
these simple, lumbering Gargantuas off the face of the planet we call
Earth.
These prehistoric dinosaurs from another era, from another time
altogether, are the financial institutions of Canada. This story of
revenge takes place at the edge of that coming ice age, at the brink of
a financial services holocaust, at the threshold of the extinction of the
rampaging war monsters known as the Canadian banks . . .
TWO
Like a diseased and expiring old hag who can't quite clean herself
properly any longer, the once proud, once mighty, once iceberg-white
fifty-story Bank of Quebec skyscraper is now stained a permanently
dirty shit-brown by the ravages of time and neglect and nothing can
ever remove the unsightly corruptions of old age embedded into her
tarnished, deteriorating skin. Looming pathetically over the city of
Vancouver, British Columbia, the Bank of Quebec structure is
isolated and alone in the vacant terminal city where no one with any
sense or money goes any more. Forever trapped in the frozen
wasteland of the country's most notoriously savage ghetto, the BQ
high-rise is a Gothic anachronism in the desolate downtown core, a
disintegrating castle from a medieval era of barbarism.
A monument to corruption, the tower's glory days are a forgotten
memory from another forgotten time altogether. The bank's
employees are immoral automatons, robots, insolent zombies to
whom the client is seen as the sucker to be swindled. Assets on
deposit are assets waiting to be confiscated by the bank. The way
these bank crooks see it, a deposit into an account held at Bank of
Quebec is a payment to Bank of Quebec itself. Bank of Quebec is a
toxic, empty, dissolute corporation barely surviving on overextended
government loans and guarantees. On taxpayer-funded life support,
the plug will soon be pulled. Impossibly leveraged and unable to
support itself, this corrupt bank's days are numbered and its
administrators know it. No one with any common sense will go near
it. The hustlers and beggars and prostitutes and dealers of the city's
slum have taken over the premises. The building is infested.
Bankrupt, abandoned and hated by all, the helpless bank sat like easy
prey for a takeover. In 2007 the hungry vultures surrounded the bank
and with little fanfare or incident, that takeover, the first of many,
took place. Without warning the bank was forced into receivership
by the government and its administrators were immediately
expunged. An asset management firm called GordonCoopers &
Associates Inc., with the participation of the government of British
Columbia, swallowed defenseless Bank of Quebec whole like Jonah
got swallowed by the whale in the Old Testament scripture.
The pimps are in charge of Bank of Quebec now.
THREE
In this scene you're taken into the private lair of a wealthy regional
mob titan -- the deluxe President and CEO executive office suite of
Bank of Quebec's high-rise tower comprising the entire fiftieth floor
of the building. Despite the bank's poverty, this CEO's office is the
most elaborate and expensive corporate presidential office on the
west coast. One wall is a bank of high definition television screens
churning out colorful data from all of the world's international
financial markets.
Seated at his massive throne in this elegant office of ostentatious
largess is the conquering emperor himself, the Genghis Khan of
corporate takeovers, Michael J. Varmecken, and seated across from
him in the ominously darkened room is Richard D. Marquis, the man
closest to Varmecken and second only to him in terms of power
within the GordonCoopers organization. Michael Varmecken ate up
Bank of Quebec like a hungry hammerhead shark and now he's
picking bankers bones out of his teeth. Stay out of this man's way,
he's a dangerous predator. Intensely, alarmingly intellectual,
Varmecken's got it all; as much power, clout and entitlement as he
could ever have hoped to reached for. Now he works to protect his
dominion from the unwanted interference of interlopers and meddlers.
Both men are manifestly mute, no words are uttered between them,
their forcible silence says all that needs to be said. They ignore the
television screens. Seen it all before. They've no interest in the
latest plunging stock market numbers out of Hong Kong. There exists
another matter of mortal interest on their minds. The matter of a
telephone call.
When the ring comes it's a knife slicing across the intense heavy
silence of the executive suite. Varmecken doesn't answer
immediately, he allows a second ring. Then after the second ring he
picks up the telephone receiver and slowly puts it to his ear.
“Hello,” Varmecken answers chillingly. He listens to the message.
“Right.”
Varmecken hangs up the phone.
“That was the chief of police,” Varmecken says to Marquis.
“Westwood's flight just got in.”
FOUR
We hear the deafening roar of jet engines and then we're staring
straight up at the belly of the 747 jet airliner as it's dropped on us
from the heavens. It looks like it's going to land on your head.
There's the squeal of its rubber tires as we see it touch down on the
runway. You can smell the burnt rubber in your nostrils. Then we're
inside the airport. That's when we see George Westwood.
This man is obvious. He stands out. He's self-evident. Just take a
look at him and you'll see for yourself. His vitality renders him
conspicuous, his handsome good looks make him an unmistakable
focal point, his radiant energy makes you want to get close to him. In
his soulful blue eyes burns an intense, grounded determination. We
see him propel himself methodically through the brightly lit internal
futuristic maze of the airport, his only luggage the suitcase in his
hand. We gaze transfixed as Westwood smiles and shows his travel
documents to the pretty young customs clerk and we next see him
emerge like a timeless god through the electronic doors of the
international arrival gate. We watch riveted as he lights up a
Rothmans Special and waits for a cab.
George Westwood is the personification of cool on the west coast of
North America. This man is a star. If they made a movie about
George Westwood every major male actor in Hollywood would beg
like a child to play the role. You've got to witness this man in person
to see just how together George Westwood really is. He's money in
the bank, he's a brick of gold bullion, he's as cool as they come. All
other men are mere human beings. Westwood is immortal. He is
forever. He is what the ancients worshiped and mythologized.
He is the god of cool. Pure. Uncut. Cool.
