Hooten & The Lady

The simple truth is,

that with the wilful looting

and destruction of religious and

historical monuments throughout the Middle East,

priceless artefacts

are being traded on the black market by thieves

and opportunists.

And...

we face similar challenges all over the world.

As we sit here,

a vaste swathe of Amazonian rain forest

first charted

by Victorian explorer, Percy Fawcett,

is being destroyed.

Fawcett was a visionary, and,

with the recent discovery of the lost Urutu tribe,

we have a real opportunity to find

Fawcett's last known camp.

And yet, all you having me do, is

sit behind a desk, and... fill out budgets,

- and-and viability studies... - Yeah, I-I think...

- what Alex's trying to say... - What I'm saying is...

is Fawcett, Carter, Livingstone,

Mary Kingsley, these were not people who sat behind desks.

They went out into the world,

and they found what they were looking for.

Let me go out there...

and try to emulate these men and women.

These decisions take time,

but you've done all you can

for today.

We have an exhibition,

in six weeks time,

to be opened by Lord Carnarvon

and a member of the Royal Family.

If you give me this chance, I will find

Fawcett's camp, and I will bring back artefacts

for that exhibition.

The media attention such

an exhibit would attract,

would firmly put the museum back in the public eye.

Just as... the chancellor's new budget

is due to be delivered later,

that very same month.

In which he seeks to cut

public funding. As part

of his new... austerity drive.

You've promised them

continued government's funding, from a budget you have no control over,

based on the discovery of something

we don't know actually exists.

What do you think?

I think you better not come back empty-handed,

or we're all screwed.

Oh, what could possibly go wrong?

_

_

It's a fake.

I give you 50 bucks.

I'm surprised it's worth 50.

Because it's not the stone I came in with.

You switched.

It's okay, Clara. I've got this.

Really?

Ya!

Clara, hold on!

Stop! Stop!

I... think you dropped this.

Ah!

Oh, come on, guys!

You're eating Clara, really?

Are you completely stupid?

Who the hell are you?

I was asking for directions from the hunting party.

Then you attacked them. They assumed I was a diversion.

They went from happy to help to string her up.

Pull out there!

What's going on?

They're going to stake me over that fire ant's nest.

That's standard punishment for errant women.

Nasty.

- What about me? - You're a thief.

They're holding yohimbi trial.

I'm not a thief!

- What's the yohimbi trial? - The Urutu

are notoriously bisexual.

They'll smear you in monkey blood,

and they'll send you into the chief's hut, for sex.

- Come on, he's 90 years old. - That's where the yohimbi comes in.

It's a sexual stimulant made from tree bark.

There may be another way, Mister...

Hooten, no mister.

The Urutu are immensely proud of their warriors.

If you were to challenge and defeat their strongest warrior,

- they'd see it at the will of the gods. - So if I win,

they have to let us go?

So I believe.

Have you thought about not getting quite so close to him?

Perhaps, try a little more jab and move?

- Which way you're gonna run? - South, I have a boat on the river.

Wait, why are we running? They're letting us go, aren't they?

Where's your damn boat?

Keep going!

- Why are they chasing us? - I don't know, sore losers?

You start the engine, I'll cast off.

Clive.

Uh...

Base camp lost contact with Alex.

You've got a name?

Alexandra Lindo-Parker.

Lindo?

That's a hell of a middle name.

No, my middle names are Diane Elizabeth.

My third name is Lindo-Parker.

You have five names?

Well, strictly speaking, only four names;

Lindo-Parker is hyphenated.

No shit! So what, your parents couldn't make up their mind?

They're all family names.

So what are you doing out here, Miss... Alexandra Lindo-Parker?

I work with the British Museum.

We're here searching for the last camp site

of the Victorian explorer, Percy Fawcett.

He came here in 1925 in the spring to search for Eldorado.

fabled the city of gold.

The lost city of Z.

"Zee"?

- Z. - And let me guess, he didn't find it.

No one knows, he was never seen again.

So you find this camp and then what?

The idea is to create a tableau

in the Museum, using all the Fawcett's original artefacts.

Oh, that'd shake up the world!

- You don't like museums? - People spend too much of their time

looking back or forward.

That's why everybody's now is turning to shit.

I think History is important.

It helps us to understand where we come from.

Sometimes that's not such a great idea.

What do you do, Mr Hooten?

This and that.

And are either this or that an occupation of any kind?

You know, you ask a lot of questions.

And you have a canny knack of avoiding answering.

It's a gift.

It's gonna get dark soon.

We should pull over somewhere and bed down.

So, what do we know?

It's gonna be dark there soon. Her phone's

dead, she's been off radar for... eleven hours.

- Team on the ground? - Pascal Bodin;

embassy guide, he's only just begun to put a search party together.

To leave at first light. Uh...

Last known point of contact was north

of the Urutu hunting grounds, and it's just too much ground to cover.

Only possible by air.

I can't imagine what the board are gonna say when they'll find out.

Well, let's just hope we'll find her then, before they do.

- What's that? - I grabbed that before we left the camp.

It seemed like the smart thing to do.

It looks like meat.

Hm.

You're eating your horse?

It's what she would've wanted.

No, thank you.

People're gonna be worried sick about me.

What about you, Mr Hooten, anyone worrying about you?

No mister!

And I had one friend, I've just eaten her.

I think I dropped my hammock back there, when we were running.

- That was careless. - We were been chased!

I didn't drop mine.

- You know, you can be very rude. - Thank you.

- It wasn't a compliment. - Look, Lady, I don't wanna be here

with you anymore than you wanna be here with me. So let's just...

get some sleep and we'll say our goodbyes in the morning.

- Fine. - There's a supply post

four miles north of here, you can drop me off there.

Nope, sorry.

What?

I'll be heading south.

With my boat.

- South? - I was being given directions

by the Urutu tribe, before we were so rudely interrupted.

There's a high ridge, south from here, and I think

that's where Fawcett's made his camp.

So you can drop me off first.

In the opposite direction, that's hardly practical.

You can stay here or you can walk to your supply camp...

You want me to hack my way through four miles of dense jungle?

I cannot tell you how many people tried to talk me out of

coming to the Amazon, Mr Hooten.

They said that it was impossible, that I was doomed for failure...

I am not returning empty-handed.

It's a little selfish.