START VIDEO
[01:00:00]
FADE IN:
EXT. FIELD - DAY
We open on a shot of a marijuana garden in an undisclosed location.
[01:00:13]
RED
We don't really want to use guns as a weapon, to try to harm anybody. That's not what we're about, but we are about protecting our hard work.
[01:00:22]
GREEN
I'm hoping it’s what, 75 pounds?
RED
I'd be happy with that.
GREEN
I'd be happy with 75 pounds..
RED
Hopefully, my partner would be happy with that? Otherwise we're looking for new jobs next year buddy....back to framing...slinging asphalt.
[01:00:39]
We faintly hear a helicopter in the distance. The sound grows stronger and louder as we feel it moving closer.
[01:00:53]
RED (CONT'D)
It sounds like this thing is coming directly over us.
GREEN
It's probably CDF.
RED
More than likely. Can you see it?
[01:01:04]
GREEN
Oh, there it is, up on the left.
RED
It's right over here.
GREEN
What is that?
RED
It's coming across that other ridge. I don't know. Let me get to a better...I can't really...
CUT TO: BLACK
[01:01:15]
OPENING "THE GREEN RUSH" TITLE HERE
[01:00:18]
INT. TRAILER - DAY
RED
I grow marijuana for a couple of reasons. One for the medicinal reason. I think that it probably does ease pain, you know? It creates a little bit of an appetite for people that can't eat. Helps them sleep. I also so it because it's a way to make some money, you know? A way to survive. Something that I know how to do and I feel I do a pretty good job at it.
[01:01:42]
EXT. TRAILER - DAY
GREEN
I guess the main reason would be for the love of it, man. It's a great lifestyle. You get up here in the woods, you live off the land and you got your plant, which makes you money. You're basically like a farmer....instead of corn, we got dope.
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
We see Blue and his helper walking through the garden checking on their plants.
[01:02:00]
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
BLUE
Well, I'm providing a service like any other merchant...supply and demand. You know, people derive happiness from this. I've never seen anybody smoke weed and do anything real stupid
CUT TO:
Beauty shot of the clouds nestled into the mountain tops of Northern California.
[01:02:12]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
When I first moved to the woods in 1974, I didn't come here to grow marijuana. I came here to be at peace with the land...fresh out of Vietnam. I didn't know then how crazy I was. We just started growing a few marijuana plants for personal consumption. One day you figure out that you can grow marijuana for personal consumption. You can make enough money to buy, like you once said, christmas presents, send the kids to school, school clothes. We're not rich, but we're not on welfare, either. And we don't steal.
FADE TO: BLACK
[01:02:53]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“Marijuana growers from three Northern California
operations have agreed to let filmmakers document
them over the course of one grow season. Their locations and identities have been concealed.”
[01:03:07]
CUT TO:
“Red & Green” Title Card Graphic
EXT. BASE CAMP - DAY
RED
My name's Red. I been up here, approximately on and off, for the last 10-15 years.
[01:03:14]
GREEN
This is basically my first grow season up here. I'm the greenhorn around here.
CUT TO:
Truck backing up. Green and Red start to unload supplies.
EXT. BASE CAMP – DAY
[01:03:25]
RED
Right now, this is my livelihood. This is what I'm doing. I'm giving it 110% and just hoping for the best.
[01:03:33]
GREEN
Been in the business for years as far as doing my own thing, little small-time shit...growing indoor. Got an opportunity to come up here, get an outdoor grow season in and I said, "Fuck it! Let's go for it!"
Red and Green load truck up and close tailgate.
GREEN (CONT'D)
Big bags of dirt!
[01:03:50]
RED
What I was doing was I owned a construction company and it just wasn't profitable. I almost had to go through bankruptcy and just made the decision that I needed to change something in my life...and decided to come up here and give it a shot.
[01:04:05]
CUT TO:
“Yellow” Title Card Graphic
[01:04:08]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
I had 225 medical marijuana plants, and I wound up getting in trouble in federal prison. I did 6 years in federal prison for 225 plants. They took everything I had, everything. Even things I was inherited, things that they don’t care. Once they get on you, you’re history and it’s a terrible, terrible mistake because it hurt my younger children. I had to leave my six year old son and he needed me there.
[01:04:34]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
PHILLIP
Um, I think it probably affected it greatly, not having my dad around for awhile.
[01:04:40]
“Phillip” Graphic Card
PHILLIP CONT’D
I was in school, I remember the night before dad was there, and then the next day and, he wasn’t there.
[01:04:48]
INT.YELLOW’S KITCHEN – DAY CONT’D
“Pink” Graphic Card
PINK
That was a big surprise because I felt like there was a lot of protection and safety up here.
YELLOW
A lot of times that type of situation can make couples, friends or whatever. It can put a (sigh) a really damaging effect on a relationship, but it seemed to..
PINK
We got through it..
YELLOW
It made us stronger.
[01:05:14]
INT. ORANGE COUNTY COURTHOUSE
JUDGE JAMES P. GRAY
My name is James P. Gray and I’m a judge of the Superior Court here in Orange County, California. Have been for about 23 years now.
[01:05:20]
INT. ORANGE COUNTY COURTHOUSE
JUDGE JAMES P. GRAY CONT’D
It is legal, it is constitutional in the state of California now, to be involved with medical marijuana. The federal government does trump state law. People ask, how can we do it right? I tell them go talk to the chief of police in your city, but understand that this is, no matter what you do, a violation of federal law. And if the DEA decides that they’re going to prosecute you, they can, and they will.
[01:05:48]
“Blue” Title Card Graphic
EXT. BLUE’S SPRING GARDEN
BLUE
The year I bought this place, I was rolling pretty hard, living large, you know? Thinking you know, complacent like fuck everything’s cool, I’m bad, whatever . . Fucking CAMP’d on, big time. They came, DEA came looking for me specifically
[01:06:04]
“Campaign Against Marijuana Planting (CAMP)” Graphic Card
BLUE
They didn’t know who I was, but they photographs, aerials, they had the whole fucking thing, had warrants sworn out and I was scared. So I took that money and I bought this place, and I chilled for a year.
[01:06:20]
EXT. BLUE DRIVES TRACTOR
BLUE CONT’D
Myself, I know I’ve done various things in the past..
PRODUCER
Such as?
BLUE
Such as, oh I was a firefighter for years, I was a general contractor, building contractor. I did have a travel agency, come to think of it (laughing), you know, various things. But it’s good to maintain a straight sort of an image so people don’t just mark you for what you really are right off the bat.
[01:06:52]
INT. BLUE’S INDOOR GROW
BLUE CONT’D
You know, you’re like running a constant like laboratory-type experiment. And you want everything to be as close to perfect as possible. Ultimately the water has to be a good PH and the dirt has to be PH seven.
[01:07:05]
INT. BLUE’S INDOOR GROW
“April” Graphic Card
BLUE CONT’D
So, we got the mother plants here, these are about . . oh four months old. We just keep them alive in the light, the 600 watt, metal halide light. Just enough to keep them in a vegetative state. They’re not going to every bud until they go . . And these are on 24 hours, so they won’t bud until they go into a 12 hour cycle.
[01:07:28]
BLUE CONT’D
So when we snip a clone out of here, which we’ll find a likely candidate . . and we just snip this baby down here. I just snip it with the scissors. Then I look for a couple of nodes here, these little nodes here. So what we’ll do is, we’ll snip that off and then we’ll snip this off. Then we’ll just take a leaf up here so that it doesn’t burden the plant too much.
[01:07:50]
BLUE CONT’D
And then what I do, in earnest here, is I cut this this at a 45 degree angle like that. (Cut) And then this thing gets dipped in a cloning solution, that’s a growth hormone and then sits into the “Easy Clone.” In about 10 days time, you’ll see root coming out looking like.. well, here’s the beginning stages of root there.
[01:08:20]
BLUE CONT”D
It’s like a little fish bone right? It just starts to throw-out from that Callus there. And then we put them in dirt after that.
[01:08:33]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN – DAY
“May” Graphic Card
YELLOW
This is the beginning. The difference between an indoor clone is seven weeks and it’s in the bag and we’re gonna enjoy it. This is six months, this will be in here for six straight months.
[01:08:55]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN – DAY
YELLOW CONT’D
Wow! This is my world, I’m showing my private world to the world, I must be getting close to retirement. Little “Chamba..” this is where “Chamba” will live for six months. Chamba will be as tall as the trees. “Chamba,” we love you.
[01:09:35]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN – DAY
YELLOW CONT’D
This is your classic, four-pound plant. She’s been transplanted for two minutes and she’s looking for the sun. CUT TO BLACK
[01:09:45]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
““Yellow” is planting 99 marijuana plants this season.
He’s hoping to average one pound per plant.
A pound sells for between $2,500 and $4,000 US DOLLARS”
[01:09:55]
“June” Graphic Card
EXT. WOODS - WATER PUMP SHED - DAY
Red and Green are working on a waterline, trying to get it going.
RED
We got up here about two weeks ago and hiked down, and a pump like this was gone. We think it was an inside job because not many people know, this location. And it was about a $2,700 hit. And that's money that can be used towards soil, garden supplies, food. This is basically our source. If we don't have this water, there's no need for us to attempt to put those gardens in up there.
[01:10:28]
EXT. BASE CAMP - DAY
GREEN
I known Mr. Red for 15 years, maybe 20? Always been honest, all we know. We've had good fuckin', good work together in the past. So he gave me this opportunity and you've gotta earn your shit to get up here. You can't just walk on up here and think you're gonna do it.
[01:10:55]
EXT. BASE CAMP - DAY
RED
Up to date, you know I’ve probably put around ten grand into it. By the time, we’re done setting everything up, it’s probably gonna be on the upper side of 18 grand, around there.
[01:11:20]
EXT. RED AND GREEN DAY
GREEN
This is where we’re trying to get our water to, right here. (Banging)
RED
Tomorrow we have to clean that thing because there’s dead rats in the bottom of it, from over the winter time. Someone left the lid open.
[01:11:41]
EXT. RED AND GREEN DAY CONT’D
GREEN
I love the land and I know in the end if we’re successful, these guys are gonna hook me up. You never know where opportunities can lead once you start getting into this business. And it is kind of a business, you know? We’re here to make money. Let’s hope we’re successful.
[01:12:05]
EXT. RED AND GREEN DAY
RED
We scouted it out earlier and kind of had an idea of where we were gonna put them, our gardens. And what you want, is we wanted the full sun and well, the sun rises right here. This is a south-side slope, sun rises to the east here, goes directly over us and sets over here. You know, that’s your optimal sun.
GREEN
That’s what we want..
RED
You don’t wanna be on the North side with all the big trees and all the shade. Especially us being kinda late into the year.
[01:12:42]
EXT. RED AND GREEN DAY CONT’D
GREEN
Here are the snips, alright this is where the fun begins!
[01:12:53]
RED
As a job, I mean this, uh, this isn't easy work at all. I mean I did asphalt and concrete before and I would say that this is just as physically demanding as that was. It's not easy by any means. Ya know, you have to be self-motivated. If you're lazy, it's not gonna happen. You have to make yourself get up every morning, hike the hills, hike the soil, get the water going and take care of it. And if you don't, it's gonna, you're gonna fail. You're gonna see it in your product. So this goes back to all the people that, you know, think they're just gonna get a free ride up here...growing some marijuana. They have no idea about the long days and hours that we put in to make this successful.
[01:13:38]
CUT TO:
EXT. WOODS - WATER PUMP SHED - DAY
RED.
We're running out of time and this, this has been giving us problems for the last two days. And we figure if it doesn't work today we're going to have to come up with a new configuration.
GREEN
If we don't get water to this tank, we don't get water to our plants.
[01:13:54]
RED.
This crop to me, this is my livelihood right now. I have everything invested in this, if I don’t pull this off I have no idea where I’m headed or what I’m gonna do. I’m banking on this. You know this is my baby right now.
[01:14:10]
RED
Hey Tripper, do you copy?
GREEN
Yeah, I copy.
RED.
Do we have flow?
GREEN
Sounds like a goddamn waterfall up here.
[01:14:20]
RED
So he said it sounded like a waterfall. This is good news guys.
The natural spring is right here. And basically what we've done is ran some plastic down from the spring with the springbox and the screen. Filters the water and goes down into this box with another filter..."Come back with that?"
GREEN
Water flow has stopped.
[01:14:50]
RED
Alright, hold on. I gotta run down.
Red scurries down the hill back to the shed.
RED. (CONT'D)
It’s pretty scary sometimes. I try not to dwell on it, I try to just go out there and put a hard day of work in, do the best I can to try and cover all those issues and then we just have to see at the end, you know?
CUT TO:
EXT. BASE CAMP - DUSK
Red and Green sit in a couple of chairs at base camp and give us a wrap up of the day.
[01:15:15]
RED
We just got back to base camp and it was a pretty good day today. We um, got to the pump and got the pump working.
GREEN
Getting water up there today is freaking huge. We're done with the day's work. Drink a few beers, have some fucking fun.
RED
And get ready for tomorrow.
GREEN
Get ready for tomorrow, do it all again.
[01:15:15]
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. CITY COUNCIL MEETING
“CITY COUNCIL MEETING
PALM DESERT, CA” GRAPHIC CARD
ATTORNEY THOMAS O’BRIEN
The term you use, “medical marijuana,” I’ve been asked to address what the federal government’s position is on this . . I will use that term, though it is not a term that the US government uses . .
[01:15:45]
ATTORNEY THOMAS O’BRIEN CONT’D
Marijuana is considered to be a category one, controlled substance. It is against the federal law to possess it, it is against the federal law to distribute it . . it is against the federal law to cultivate or manufacture or possess for distribution, marijuana.
[01:16:00]
INT. ORANGE COUNTY COURTHOUSE
JAMES P. GRAY
One thing California has done is back in 1996, is passed Proposition 215, which is a medical marijuana program.
[01:16:12]
INT. UCSF MEDICAL CENTER
DR. DONALD ABRAMS
I’m doctor Donald Abrams and I’m a professor of clinical medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. I’m the only one who can prescribe marijuana, because I have a Schedule One license for doing my research. But physicians can’t prescribe a prescription for marijuana, because where would a patient take that? There’s no pharmacy that dispenses marijuana.
[01:16:30]
INT. UCSF MEDICAL CENTER
DR. DONALD ABR
AMS CONT’D
So, in California, we can facilitate patients getting an identification card, so that they can access marijuana from the dispensaries. So that if they’re found with marijuana on their person, or their caregiver is, that they have legitimate reason to be using cannabis.
[01:16:53]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“With a California Caregivers Card, growers
are permitted up to 50 plants, depending
on the county in which the card is issued.”
[01:16:55]
INT. TRAILER - DAY
RED
We couldn’t do this without the cards. We need these cards to keep it legal. I don’t think I would do it without the cards. There’s too much to risk. It would be setting myself up to possibly end-up in prison . .
[01:17:10]
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
BLUE
I’ve got a couple prescriptions. I try to stay as legal as a guy can be, ya know?
PINK
There are so many wonderful things, as we all know about smoking marijuana and . . a lot of people went through a lot of changes in their lives to keep, feeling, good. It didn’t matter, it was like, fuck the laws! Fuck it, ya know? We are just going to do what we think is the right thing to do. Lots of terrible things happened to people growing marijuana.
[01:17:43]
PINK CONT’D
Having a doctor’s permission to smoke marijuana that allows you to grow your own, or go to some little cannabis club and buy your own, takes away that fear!
[01:18:00]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
Well, we have some “Green Urkel” that's going to be purple one of these days. And we have a couple of sliders, and we have a couple uh, Grandaddy Blueberry...all nice strains. We've had a lot of trouble in this garden this year because we had some water problems, some bad water. And we just about lost everything and it was, it was a tragedy. They weren't accepting nutrients.
[01:18:27]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
To a farmer, watching your stuff die is...it's real, real hard on everybody and everybody involved. And I take this real emotional. I love it. And we're real happy. We're glad we got 'em back and they're gonna be really nice this year. When we see you guys again you'll be quite surprised with the change. They change daily. When you look at them everyday you don't always see it, and then one day you walk in here and you go, "Wow!" Heaven and nature is right here. If you look out this way you can see why we do it. That's our city right there. And those are all our people, those trees.
[01:19:00]
EXT. BASE CAMP
Green works on trailer.
[01:19:20]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
GREEN
Ya know, it's your basic trailer, dude. You got what you need. We got fuckin' some books that we read up here. This is my sleeping area. It's cool. You gotta a little bed. I got my little fuckin' closet, I guess you'd call it? When you get bored, I got my little fuckin' harmonica. (Harmonica)
[01:19:40]
GREEN (CONT'D)
We can cook, ya know, mac and cheese, top ramen, grilled cheese. It's basically like camping living, just easy things that are quick and easy to make. How we live up here? It’s the forest, so I mean, you’re living in the forest. I don’t have a toilet, I don’t have TV, I don’t have cable.
[01:20:00]
GREEN (CONT'D)
You read books, play guitar. There’s sacrifices you make up here but in the end they’re such like, small sacrifices that like . . it’s not even a sacrifice man. You know it’s so nice up here, it’s beautiful, it’s living!
[01:20:20]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
RED
As you can see, money’s tight, so sometimes breakfast turns into lunch. Extra hot sauce takes a lot of the . . adds a lot of flavor, let’s just put it that way. There’s lunch.
[01:20:37]
EXT. RED’S GARDEN
RED
I like living outside of the city. Being up here in the land, being able to do what I want to do. Gives me a sense of freedom, you know? Where as when I was tied-up with my job down south, it was just the rat race. I didn’t feel like I was living for me.
[01:21:00]
EXT. GREEN’S GARDEN CONT’D
GREEN
The crop to me, like this year personally . . it means a lot of things. It means if I’m gonna be living and like, paying my bills. Or I could be out on the streets looking for another carpentry job. If we don’t get this, then it’s gonna be devastating.
[01:21:25]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
This garden's done quite well. It's been in the ground about six weeks. We're real proud of it. This is purple urkle. She's not purple yet, but she will be. This is called a hindu kush. You can see the difference in the bud structure. As you can see in here these are really accpetable to leaf mold, which we have to control. And it won't hurt you now, but it'll hurt you later when they're in full bud so we have to keep 'em cleaned up. We spray 'em with an organic organicide, which you can spray up until the day you harv so you don't have to worry about it hurting people's lungs or anything like that.
[01:21:56]
YELLOW CONT’D
We're into dirt, we're into PH. We're as respectful to the land as it is to us and I think everybody should be that way...and it's a terrible thing. As a farmer, and I hear on the news everyday 30,000 plants, 40,000 plants busted by this and that mafia. And then they show the creeks and they're all full of bags of chemicals that are poisoning my land, not their land. And I think it's very irritating and I don't like and I don't stand for it. And I don't associate with those people, nor does my family.
[01:22:28]
YELLOW CONT’D
We don't have chemicals running on the ground. We don't have overrunning reservoirs. We don't have buckets of hard chemicals laying around. It's all organic, nothing will eat nothing. You don't see anything yellowing, dying because when this pot garden is done and I'm done, these woods will still be alive for my grandkids. And I mean that in here, not in here (wallet).
[01:23:00]
“August” Graphic Card
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
BLUE
Huh? Si, cual planta? Mucho? Yesterday he encountered some mold on this kola right here. It's been cut and disposed of, but this is just one more thing that a person's gotta be on their toes. I mean, ya know, you can ignore and walk away and not notice it, but in two days time this plant could be totally infected and you might as well throw it away.
[01:23:40]
JUANCHO
Es un ratto.
BLUE
A ratto?
JUANCHO
Si.
BLUE
Hoy? Oh, si? This is what happens here. I don't know if you can get in on it, ya know? This is not a total loss, but you really never know the extent of the damage until you get into it. And it's really unfortunate. It's very sad to work for eight months and see this happen. It's very disheartening. I mean this on the street is a potential $50 bill. Ya know?
[01:24:14]
BLUE CONT’
So that's really not the biggest thing. It's just all the time and effort that goes into it and then it's like Mother Nature is saying, "Hey, pay attention!" Cause this could do you in overnight.
CUT TO:
[01:24:35]
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
Blue examines some of his plants very closely.
BLUE
Well, we're at various stages here. Some of these strains, the more Afghani strains are going to go, uh, the sativa I should say are gonna go a little bit longer before they get to bolting. Bolting means that when there's a sustained period of moisture and no sun that the plant will actually go back into a vegetative cycle. And it will air out this bud. I could show you this is right here.
[01:25:05]
BLUE CONT’D
This is a pretty good example right here where this, the terminal koli here has actually started to go into a growth cycle again. And usually it goes this way around this time of the year. You get 2 or 3 days of rain and people freak and think oh shit, this is it. The sun's never coming back out. Might as well take it and be done with it. Now, if I knew that an imminent storm was coming in and we were going to have sustained rain, I would take these plants. I just prefer not to cause it's a lot of work all at once, too.
[01:25:36]
BLUE (CONT'D)
So this is my compadre. He's been helping me since the early part of the year. I guess it would probably be what, March?
[01:25:43]
“Juancho” Graphic Card
BLUE CONT’D
And he's been right by my side every minute. I trust him implicitly. He knows the business. This business he was involved in old Mexico with his family, years ago. He's like my little brother. I trust him with my life. And there's no arguments. He knows whose in charge. He does what he's asked to do. And as you can see, these are the fruits of our labor.
[01:26:13]
INT. BLUE'S HANGING SHOP - DAY
JUANCHO
I'm 22 years old. I have a girlfriend, but not a wife. My family lives in Oaxaca, Mexico. When they're like this I have to trim the leaves so the plant can get some sun. With the cold weather, they can get a little color.
[01:26:30]
PRODUCER
In Mexico, how long did you work in marijuana fields?
JUANCHO
About five years.
PRODUCER
Five years, five years that you worked in the marijuana fields. So you understand a everything about growing weed, right?
JUANCHO
Si, si!
PRODUCER
So how long have you been here in the United States?
JUANCHO
About two years. I like this work and that's why I do it.
[01:26:56]
JUANCHO CONT’D
There are other Mexicans here, but they're in different places.
PRODUCER
[01:27:19]
“September” Graphic Card
[01:27:24 ]
EXT. DIRT ROAD - DAY
RED
Oh, man! The foot. I was in a motorcycle accident. I went down on some gravel. The bike got under me and tore my foot up pretty good. There is a puncture wound that has to be disinfected four times a day.
RED CONT’D
Talk about bad timing huh? (Laughing)
GREEN
Jesus Christ! I don’t think you’re walking back up.
[01:27:55]
RED
Well, when you guys were up here last time you got all the problems we had with the water lines and just having the late start and all that bullshit, but since then basically we've been hit by the bear.
[01:28:05]
CUT TO:
INT. TRAILER - DAY
RED
Yeah, the fuckin' bear that fucked my shit up, um, we don't know what happened. I think, fuck, there was a couple of things. I used the peanut butter on the rat traps and then I think possibly he sniffed that, got in there. Probably hit him on the nose, the toes...I don't know. I can only imagine. I just saw the claw marks and it just looked like he was boxing with those bags. Took out 25 of our plants, which set us back a month. And having the late start like we did, ya know, that just put us that much more behind.
[01:28:35]
CUT TO:
INT. TRAILER – CONT’D
RED
We thought he was gone, but we went up to the top location and I'd been leaving my food there. Well, he got into all my food. Ya know, it's better if he just keeps to himself and we keep to ourselves because to be honest with you I don't want to have to shoot the bear. There's not enough of them out there.
[01:28:55]
EXT. FIELD – DAY
YELLOW
Along the fence lines, we try to build up a barrier. Number one, there’s a lot of wildlife here. Deer, bear, pig, rats, jack rabbits.. So we try to secure the area. 4 to 5 jack rabbits can wipe you out in a day, a deer can wipe you out.
[01:29:20]
EXT. FIELD – DAY
RED
Is that red and white? Yeah, I think that's CDF.
[01:29:30]
“California Department of Forestry (CDF)” Graphic Card
RED
There's a lot of tension, but I think you're gonna notice it in a month. When it's really close to harvest. Everyone is gonna be on edge...and this is both sides. This is the growers, ya know, the law, CAMP's gonna be flying a lot harder. Can we make it? It's gonna be one of those type o' deals, ya know? We got a little bit of action going on here boys. What the fuck? Hey, what are those? Where is he?
[01:29:58]
“Courtesy KCAL 9 News – Los Angeles” Graphic Card
REPORTER
The longer Orange County Narcotics Deputies spend in the pot fields, the bigger this seizure gets. Authorities are saying today that there are hundreds of more plants than were originally counted. Perhaps as many as three thousand and it could take into tomorrow to confiscate all of the marijuana.
[01:30:15]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
RED
You here of people harvesting 500, 1000 pounds, all the time. You also here about people who had five thousand plant that got busted. To put 5,000 plants into perspective, it would probably be like a vineyard. A couple of city blocks, of marijuana plants and if you got a pound per plant, that would be five thousand pounds. Anywhere from three, to let’s say four thousand dollars, you’re talking about some serious money.
[01:30:45]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
What do I think about people who come up here and try to grow two and three thousand plants gardens and wanna get in and out in one year? We don’t care for it, it just brings an enormous amount of heat, a lot of feds and it’s disrespectful. This is our home, this is our life, we don’t come up here and try to make ten million dollars in six months and go and destroy someone else’s land. We’re very proud of our land. This is where we’re from, I’ve been here my whole adult life.. and this is where I wanna continue to be from.
[01:31:18]
INT. ORANGE COUNTY COURTHOUSE
JUDGE JAMES P. GRAY
You look at Mexico today and they’re having these real gang wars. With regard to not drugs, it has almost nothing to do with drugs, it’s all drug money that’s causing it.
[01:31:31]
JUDGE JAMES P. GRAY CONT’D
Try this, we could bulldoze the country of Colombia. Obliterate it from the face of the earth. In fact, you could take Ecuador and Peru with it if you wanted to, and it wouldn’t make the slightest bit of difference with regard to our drug problems here in the United States? Why? Because if the demand is here, the demand will be met. And if it’s not met by Colombia, Ecuador and Peru it will be met by Nigeria, or Thailand or California!
[01:31:54]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
RED
What they do,is they get gree
dy. They’re doing a little bit more than they should be doing, they’re not using cards, they’re growing on government land. They’re out there for that money and that flash, they wanna make the quick, easy buck. At some point, the government’s gonna come down on them. Either they’re gonna catch them on their land or the IRS is gonna come after them for taxes.
[01:32:16]
“Courtesy KTVX News” Graphic Card
REPORTER
The two men deputies arrested, were hiding in the hills near their marijuana field, for several days. Investigators say the men admit to having at least two more partners, but given the size and sophistication of this operation, they likely had even more help.
[01:32:33]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
RED
You can look at it two ways. You can get in, if you’re successful for two years and doing it big and don’t get caught, hey more power to ya. They pulled it off. If you get caught, you’re going in, you’re in trouble. Versus, you do this legally for say five years. In the end it probably all equals out.
[01:32:55 ]
YELLOW
They're leaving the Mom and Pops alone now. They're going after the mafia gardens, which nobody here likes. And we don't like 'em, but we don't have anything to do with it. The cops have to find 'em. We don't know where they're at. We know where...we know where they're..we know the areas they're in, but we don't go there because it's dangerous. Even for local people, you can't go for certain walks in certain woods because there's armed men out there that will do you harm. We had 2 murders here not even 2 months ago over... an altercation over a 3,000 plant garden between some indians and some spanish people. And we don't like it. It brings in a vibe that we don't need.
[01:33:33]
YELLOW
It brings in a lot of other different drugs to younger people around here. There’s a lot of crank in these areas, because of the availablilty of the people who grow big grows and then go back into another racket. We don’t go from marijuana to crank to cocaine, this is what we do.
[01:33:54]
EXT. FIELD – DAY
RED
They're starting to get their resin dude. It's time. They're loving this food...loving it! You see these little crystals starting to come up the leave, it's on the hair. Rub your fingers. It's a little greasy feel on the fingers. That's just it going into heavy bloom.
GREEN
Yeah, now it's exciting when you walk in here, ya know?
RED
Yeah, we're pretty much kinda moving into the home stretch. What I have to do is start to prepare for the human factor, the thieves. Within the next 2 weeks this place will be fully guarded.
[01:34:28]
RED CONT’D
More than likely, ya know, under this brush, we'll set up tents at each location. And they can't leave.
[01:34:36]
CUT TO:
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
BLUE
I don't know. This is a fairly remote piece of property. It's private. I know the neighbors all around me. Um, I don't give anybody any reason to come up here. I suppose it could happen. It's happened in the past. I mean the Sheriff's office takes a real dim view of that. In fact, a couple of weeks ago there was a call not far from here where there was, uh, what was called in as a home invasion. And 60 law enforcement officers showed up, and subdued at gunpoint, five thieves with rifles, as well. And what they were doing is, they were relieving somebody of a medical marijuana garden. So they're backing us up in that respect.
[01:35:12]
BLUE CONT’D
I mean this is private, personal property. There is a mandate, Senate Bill 420. And they are bound to uphold the law. My attitude further is if somebody figures they need it more than I do, have at it. It's not gonna kill me.
[01:35:38]
EXT. FIELD DAY
RED
We think people are walking around the land, type of deal. And we just wanted to let everybody know that we’re back on the land, so we came up, shot some skeet and just made a bunch of ruckus.
GREEN
There’s a fastball right down the center.
[01:36:00]
RED
Pull! (Laughing) Fuck. Before I did it, I talked to the local neighbors to let them know. I wanna respect their territory also.
[01:36:08]
GREEN
Pull! (Whooa) This was just a little message. You know? Stay away from our shit. This is our land, we have every right to be here and no one else does.
RED
And that’s how we look at it.
[01:36:28]
EXT. WOODS - DAY
TREVOR
I’m about 23 years old, I was pretty much born and raised in California.
[01:36:33]
“Trevor” Graphic Card
TREVOR
I’m pretty much guarding the plants. Making sure that nobody’s coming in and messing with what we have, with what we’ve accomplished. I’m making sure no wildlife is coming through, we already had a bear come once and now we’re actually up there guarding it, sleeping in the tents. The tent is my opportunity to live very simply, and it’s my opportunity to make some money and go back to, I like to call it civilization of back to where everyone’s living at and have my chunk of change, but not be doing the nine to five like everybody else.
[01:37:02]
TREVOR
There’s a lot of time to sit around and luckily for me, I have a dog up here, so we play a lot of stick and I mean, I know just about every tree in the garden that surrounds it real well and you know, you get to listen real well to what’s going on around you. I mean there’s not a lot of distraction like there is in the city. I like that out here. Good boy Todd!
[01:37:44]
EXT. GREEN’S TENT - NIGHT
GREEN
Home sweet home. (Grunting) Good Night Guys..
[01:38:02]
PRODUCER
DO you have trouble sleeping at night?
JUANCHO
Sometimes at night I hear voices or see what looks like a flashlight. Maybe it’s a burglar or someone else..
TREVOR
Oh every day I’m up here I feel like I’m at risk.
[01:38:20]
BLUE
People posing as law enforcement, you know rolling up on people with badges and guns. In fact my ex father in law had it happen to him. Three guys rolled up in a truck, showed badges, they had the right uniforms and they instructed everybody to get in the house. Where upon they handcuffed them, beat them up a little bit, ransacked the house, found the money, took the money. Found the processed pot, took that and then harvested the rest. And bounced them on down the hill, left them handcuffed.
[01:38:57]
“Harvest (October)” Graphic Card
GREEN
Some friends of mine used to live here, no one’s lived here for about 8 years but, we’re gonna gut this fucking thing and that’s where we’re gonna fuckin’ dry our ganja.
[01:39:10]
GREEN CONT’D
And basically we’re just gonna take fuckin’ all this shit out of here. Get it all nice and clean you know? And hopefully this will all be full of fuckin’ hanging weed. Uh, fuck it’s pretty gnarly back here, I mean shit like that dude . . is just shit that I’m gonna have to take care of. That’s kinda cool actually, the tail is all fuckin’ bones. I mean who knows what kinda fuckin’ diseases that has.
[01:39:40]
EXT. FIELKD - DAY
PINK
First of all there’s just something about the temperature of the day that changes in the end of their life cycle. The color of the leaves, the resin, it’s hard, it’s sticky.. and it smells, it has a certain fragrance that says it’s ready.
[01:40:05]
PINK CONT’D
They are so colorful and leafy and then they look a little . . they look like they’re getting older, so they lose a couple leaves, their stems are getting a little bald. Sometimes it’s very hard to tell when it’s ready, I know when the rose is ready to pick and I know when the dallias are ready and cut the cannas, but with marijuana, it’s different. They’re very subtle to me.
[01:40:40]
EXT. FIELD - DAY
We see Red walking across the field with his dog following him.
RED
I had to cut a little bit earlier because of the thieves. Worried of the thieves and weather. Things like that, but the resin content was good...there was chunk. Now, I've got to get this whole area cleaned up. Ya know, get all the roots out, get 'em burned. Tear everything down so it just goes back to nature.
[01:41:08]
RED (CONT'D)
The feel of the garden is definitely different now, ya know? It looks like a bomb came in and just blew this thing apart, but ya know, that's the reality. This is the ending process. Now, what my job is, is to clean this whole thing up and get it ready for next year so we go through that whole growth cycle again. Ya know, we'll have that, we'll be excited...it'll be time. Ok, we have to haul the dirt and pound the posts and do the transplanting and nurture these babies throughout the whole, the whole season. And then we'll have to cut 'em again. And that's just, ya know, you appreciate every stage of what you're doing and you look forward to it.
[01:41:46]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“Red and Green harvest 74 plants,
giving them a total of
47 pounds of processed Marijuana.”
[01:41:53]
INT. DRYING ROOM - DAY
Red is checking on his plants.
RED
It's time to cure it after we cut. What you're doing is letting the plant get rid of all the moisture into the bud. Um, and how you check on that, how you can check is just if there's stem moisture, it won't crack, it'll bend. At this point, the yield is what it is. Ya know, any mistakes we've made we can't dwell on. Could we have done things different? Yeah, I think so, but that's with anything in life. Ya know, you kinda gain the knowledge afterwards. Will we make the mistakes next year, probably not.
[01:42:31]
CUT TO:
EXT. BASE CAMP – DAY
RED CONT’D
No I didn’t take into factor the cost of having to pay the security. To have them help wait, while it’s curing to get it ready to trim. They wuit jobs in the city that were well-paying you know? So I don’t want them to come up and because I wasn’t successful, you know, they’re not successful. They took a chance in me and I appreciate that and I wanna reward them.
[01:43:00]
RED (CONT'D)
Right there. Then you cut that. Get rid of all that. That, cause that's not marketable. Then just a couple little, ya know, and that's pretty good. We’re not out of the woods by any means, we have a lot of quality product that we have to cure and trim properly and bag up.
[01:43:15]
PRODUCER
What do you do with it when you got it all bagged up?
RED
No.
GREEN
I don’t wanna talk about that.
PRODUCER
It’s like you’re a victim too ..
[01:43:29]
CUT TO:
INT. BLUES’S HOUSE
BLUE
I know he did it, okay? That’s the bottom line.
[01:43:32]
“”Blue” leaves the room to take a phone call from a friend.” Graphic Card
BLUE CONT’D
Well he should be really careful man, because the fucking cops are looking for him. (silence) Well that’s his problem man, you know what? He was here, it happened on his watch, he was here, he did it, that’s all I know.
[01:43:48]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“During the harvest, “Juancho” steals
a large quantity of Blue’s marijuana.
…and leaves town.”
[01:43:55]
EXT. BLUES’S HOUSE
BLUE
I think he just got a little bit greedy and decided to help himself to a substantial amount of my product while I was away for a couple days and I haven’t seen him since, and I suspect he’s probably long gone. I think this little guy probably got to me for maybe, I don’t know .. around 70-80 thousand dollars? That’s a lot of money to anybody, I don’t care who you are, it’s a lot of fucking money and I worked hard for it! And he was paid for it!
[01:44:27]
BLUE CONT’D
So that kinda hurts, it set’s a guy back and it’s discouraging, you know? I welcomed him into my home and made things available to him, he wouldn’t have normally had, I bought him a car. I gave him big tips you know? Gave him points, whatever and the guy just, you know . . just greedy. Bottom line, so yeah it affects me, I feel personally, you know, I feel violated. What I do about it is my own business, but he’ll get his, I won’t have to do a dang thing, he’ll get his, thieves don’t prosper.
[01:45:11]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
Well, last time we talked you guys took some videos of us outside in our beautiful outdoor gardens. And um, we got ripped off this year and you know what, we're madder than hell.
EXT. EMPTY GARDEN - DAY
PINK
They probably had maybe 3 or 4 more days. And all that was there at 9 o'clock in the morning were 22 empty pots.
[01:45:34]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
We are so pissed that ya'll wouldn't believe it because you know what, somebody come and took something from me and they took something from my ole' lady. I get emotional...
EXT. EMPTY GARDEN - DAY
PINK
Ya know, I've been through a range of emotions. My first was like shock and weepy, but the tears didn't come and now I am pissed.
[01:45:59]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
These are cheap thieves man, you know what, I been around thieves my whole life. These are cheap thieves man. They took me to the dirt. A good thief will come in and top everything you got and leave you something on the bottom and just let you get by.
EXT. WOODS - DAY
PINK
I don't know what to do about it. Do I call the Sheriff? I don't know if I wanna tell him my story.
[01:46:18]
YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
You know what, do they need it more than me? What's my karma? What's...I've already paid my karma. I've been in prison. I've been this, I've been that. When a man does something wrong, he's creating karma for his whole family, not just him. His whole klan. You know what, they're all dirty. You know what, a fucking thief is dirty. You know what, if they were on the side of the road on fire, I wouldn't stop to piss on 'em.
[01:46:42]
EXT. WOODS - DAY
PINK
It's a loss. Um, I don't like it at all. I don't think or live my life like that. I just have to get through this and know that somebody, maybe somewhere is gonna smoke some of that weed and maybe that'll make them feel better and wanna be a better person. I don't know where to take it.
[01:47:08]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
We almost killed that garden with bad water and we nursed it, my ole lady nursed it. It was really personal. They took...2 people get up in the morning and go out there and just like a fuckin farmer. Ya know what, just like fuckin corn. Just like fuckin tomatoes. Ya go out there, ya know, and they took it. And they left me a trail to my 80 year old neighbor's house. And I thought, this is not, this is not, this is not the way it's supposed to be. You're not supposed to work this hard. You're not supposed to...I don't wanna watch my ole lady suffer.
[01:47:56}
EXT. PINK'S GARDEN - DAY
PINK
I would prefer to give you something than have you take it from me. And I would want to know if you knew me. I would want to ask you, did you wanna see my medical marijuana from my doctor? Did you wanna see that I had, legal permission to do that?
[01:48:17]
PINK CONT’D
I would want you to know that the depth of my pain is not just about me, that spreads a little bit. Because I’m not just a solo person and my life is affected and has a lot of people in it.. So, I would like to know what you did with it and why you chose to, to steal from me.
[01:48:44]
BLUE
To hear that that happens to your friends, it doesn’t make it any better but, you know it’s prevalent, it’s happening. It’s not just the way it was not even two years ago. I can’t depend on growing pot to sustain me, I can’t do it anymore.
[01:49:01]
YELLOW
That was March, April and May money and they took it in October. So at the time, you’re in shock but you don’t feel the full impact for another four or five or six months. A lot of times, when we don’t pay a bill on time or if we can’t get something special. That’s always your reminder of, oh yeah, if we’d have had that other fifty pounds or.. it’s something that, it’s a pain that carries on for the next year. It’s not just a one-day shot, you feel it over, and over and over.
[01:49:42]
PRODUCER
Any idea who it was?
PINK
Huh uh, I don’t, well..
YELLOW
NO, we can’t put that on film..
[01:49:52]
PINK
You don’t, unless you were there and watched them do it, how can you ever say who did it? Nobody’s ever come up the driveway and said, oh by the way, I helped myself to your garden. That’ll never happen.
[01:50:09]
RED
I mean I think hiring guards is definitely the best method to keeping thieves out of your garden. But the fact that we’re so secluded? That obviously has something to do with it, because thieves are lazy, they’re pieces of shit. So they’re gonna go look for the easiest way to make some money and to get to out place, it’s just too much work for them.
[01:50:38]
GREEN
Yeah, it’s like when you got a bike. You put a lock on it, well that’s just a little extra little thing. You don’t put a lock on it, then sure.. somebody’s gonna fuckin’ take it. Same kind of thing you know? Hopefully. (Laughing)
[01:50:54]
RED
Oh no, that’s a fact dude. We didn’t get robbed.
GREEN
Fuck an A.
[01:51:01]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“The following year Red and Green’s
entire crop was seized by the DEA.
No arrests were made.”
[01:51:10]
Fade Out CREDITS:
Written by
[Casey Casseday]
-
[Bunch Casseday Productions]
FIRST DRAFT
[2315 28th St. #210]
April 20, 2009
[Santa Monica, CA 90405]
[310-399-2448]
TART VIDEO
[01:00:00]
FADE IN:
EXT. FIELD - DAY
We open on a shot of a marijuana garden in an undisclosed location.
[01:00:13]
RED
We don't really want to use guns as a weapon, to try to harm anybody. That's not what we're about, but we are about protecting our hard work.
[01:00:22]
GREEN
I'm hoping it’s what, 75 pounds?
RED
I'd be happy with that.
GREEN
I'd be happy with 75 pounds..
RED
Hopefully, my partner would be happy with that? Otherwise we're looking for new jobs next year buddy....back to framing...slinging asphalt.
[01:00:39]
We faintly hear a helicopter in the distance. The sound grows stronger and louder as we feel it moving closer.
[01:00:53]
RED (CONT'D)
It sounds like this thing is coming directly over us.
GREEN
It's probably CDF.
RED
More than likely. Can you see it?
[01:01:04]
GREEN
Oh, there it is, up on the left.
RED
It's right over here.
GREEN
What is that?
RED
It's coming across that other ridge. I don't know. Let me get to a better...I can't really...
CUT TO: BLACK
[01:01:15]
OPENING "THE GREEN RUSH" TITLE HERE
[01:00:18]
INT. TRAILER - DAY
RED
I grow marijuana for a couple of reasons. One for the medicinal reason. I think that it probably does ease pain, you know? It creates a little bit of an appetite for people that can't eat. Helps them sleep. I also so it because it's a way to make some money, you know? A way to survive. Something that I know how to do and I feel I do a pretty good job at it.
[01:01:42]
EXT. TRAILER - DAY
GREEN
I guess the main reason would be for the love of it, man. It's a great lifestyle. You get up here in the woods, you live off the land and you got your plant, which makes you money. You're basically like a farmer....instead of corn, we got dope.
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
We see Blue and his helper walking through the garden checking on their plants.
[01:02:00]
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
BLUE
Well, I'm providing a service like any other merchant...supply and demand. You know, people derive happiness from this. I've never seen anybody smoke weed and do anything real stupid
CUT TO:
Beauty shot of the clouds nestled into the mountain tops of Northern California.
[01:02:12]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
When I first moved to the woods in 1974, I didn't come here to grow marijuana. I came here to be at peace with the land...fresh out of Vietnam. I didn't know then how crazy I was. We just started growing a few marijuana plants for personal consumption. One day you figure out that you can grow marijuana for personal consumption. You can make enough money to buy, like you once said, christmas presents, send the kids to school, school clothes. We're not rich, but we're not on welfare, either. And we don't steal.
FADE TO: BLACK
[01:02:53]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“Marijuana growers from three Northern California
operations have agreed to let filmmakers document
them over the course of one grow season. Their locations and identities have been concealed.”
[01:03:07]
CUT TO:
“Red & Green” Title Card Graphic
EXT. BASE CAMP - DAY
RED
My name's Red. I been up here, approximately on and off, for the last 10-15 years.
[01:03:14]
GREEN
This is basically my first grow season up here. I'm the greenhorn around here.
CUT TO:
Truck backing up. Green and Red start to unload supplies.
EXT. BASE CAMP – DAY
[01:03:25]
RED
Right now, this is my livelihood. This is what I'm doing. I'm giving it 110% and just hoping for the best.
[01:03:33]
GREEN
Been in the business for years as far as doing my own thing, little small-time shit...growing indoor. Got an opportunity to come up here, get an outdoor grow season in and I said, "Fuck it! Let's go for it!"
Red and Green load truck up and close tailgate.
GREEN (CONT'D)
Big bags of dirt!
[01:03:50]
RED
What I was doing was I owned a construction company and it just wasn't profitable. I almost had to go through bankruptcy and just made the decision that I needed to change something in my life...and decided to come up here and give it a shot.
[01:04:05]
CUT TO:
“Yellow” Title Card Graphic
[01:04:08]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
I had 225 medical marijuana plants, and I wound up getting in trouble in federal prison. I did 6 years in federal prison for 225 plants. They took everything I had, everything. Even things I was inherited, things that they don’t care. Once they get on you, you’re history and it’s a terrible, terrible mistake because it hurt my younger children. I had to leave my six year old son and he needed me there.
[01:04:34]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
PHILLIP
Um, I think it probably affected it greatly, not having my dad around for awhile.
[01:04:40]
“Phillip” Graphic Card
PHILLIP CONT’D
I was in school, I remember the night before dad was there, and then the next day and, he wasn’t there.
[01:04:48]
INT.YELLOW’S KITCHEN – DAY CONT’D
“Pink” Graphic Card
PINK
That was a big surprise because I felt like there was a lot of protection and safety up here.
YELLOW
A lot of times that type of situation can make couples, friends or whatever. It can put a (sigh) a really damaging effect on a relationship, but it seemed to..
PINK
We got through it..
YELLOW
It made us stronger.
[01:05:14]
INT. ORANGE COUNTY COURTHOUSE
JUDGE JAMES P. GRAY
My name is James P. Gray and I’m a judge of the Superior Court here in Orange County, California. Have been for about 23 years now.
[01:05:20]
INT. ORANGE COUNTY COURTHOUSE
JUDGE JAMES P. GRAY CONT’D
It is legal, it is constitutional in the state of California now, to be involved with medical marijuana. The federal government does trump state law. People ask, how can we do it right? I tell them go talk to the chief of police in your city, but understand that this is, no matter what you do, a violation of federal law. And if the DEA decides that they’re going to prosecute you, they can, and they will.
[01:05:48]
“Blue” Title Card Graphic
EXT. BLUE’S SPRING GARDEN
BLUE
The year I bought this place, I was rolling pretty hard, living large, you know? Thinking you know, complacent like fuck everything’s cool, I’m bad, whatever . . Fucking CAMP’d on, big time. They came, DEA came looking for me specifically
[01:06:04]
“Campaign Against Marijuana Planting (CAMP)” Graphic Card
BLUE
They didn’t know who I was, but they photographs, aerials, they had the whole fucking thing, had warrants sworn out and I was scared. So I took that money and I bought this place, and I chilled for a year.
[01:06:20]
EXT. BLUE DRIVES TRACTOR
BLUE CONT’D
Myself, I know I’ve done various things in the past..
PRODUCER
Such as?
BLUE
Such as, oh I was a firefighter for years, I was a general contractor, building contractor. I did have a travel agency, come to think of it (laughing), you know, various things. But it’s good to maintain a straight sort of an image so people don’t just mark you for what you really are right off the bat.
[01:06:52]
INT. BLUE’S INDOOR GROW
BLUE CONT’D
You know, you’re like running a constant like laboratory-type experiment. And you want everything to be as close to perfect as possible. Ultimately the water has to be a good PH and the dirt has to be PH seven.
[01:07:05]
INT. BLUE’S INDOOR GROW
“April” Graphic Card
BLUE CONT’D
So, we got the mother plants here, these are about . . oh four months old. We just keep them alive in the light, the 600 watt, metal halide light. Just enough to keep them in a vegetative state. They’re not going to every bud until they go . . And these are on 24 hours, so they won’t bud until they go into a 12 hour cycle.
[01:07:28]
BLUE CONT’D
So when we snip a clone out of here, which we’ll find a likely candidate . . and we just snip this baby down here. I just snip it with the scissors. Then I look for a couple of nodes here, these little nodes here. So what we’ll do is, we’ll snip that off and then we’ll snip this off. Then we’ll just take a leaf up here so that it doesn’t burden the plant too much.
[01:07:50]
BLUE CONT’D
And then what I do, in earnest here, is I cut this this at a 45 degree angle like that. (Cut) And then this thing gets dipped in a cloning solution, that’s a growth hormone and then sits into the “Easy Clone.” In about 10 days time, you’ll see root coming out looking like.. well, here’s the beginning stages of root there.
[01:08:20]
BLUE CONT”D
It’s like a little fish bone right? It just starts to throw-out from that Callus there. And then we put them in dirt after that.
[01:08:33]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN – DAY
“May” Graphic Card
YELLOW
This is the beginning. The difference between an indoor clone is seven weeks and it’s in the bag and we’re gonna enjoy it. This is six months, this will be in here for six straight months.
[01:08:55]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN – DAY
YELLOW CONT’D
Wow! This is my world, I’m showing my private world to the world, I must be getting close to retirement. Little “Chamba..” this is where “Chamba” will live for six months. Chamba will be as tall as the trees. “Chamba,” we love you.
[01:09:35]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN – DAY
YELLOW CONT’D
This is your classic, four-pound plant. She’s been transplanted for two minutes and she’s looking for the sun. CUT TO BLACK
[01:09:45]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
““Yellow” is planting 99 marijuana plants this season.
He’s hoping to average one pound per plant.
A pound sells for between $2,500 and $4,000 US DOLLARS”
[01:09:55]
“June” Graphic Card
EXT. WOODS - WATER PUMP SHED - DAY
Red and Green are working on a waterline, trying to get it going.
RED
We got up here about two weeks ago and hiked down, and a pump like this was gone. We think it was an inside job because not many people know, this location. And it was about a $2,700 hit. And that's money that can be used towards soil, garden supplies, food. This is basically our source. If we don't have this water, there's no need for us to attempt to put those gardens in up there.
[01:10:28]
EXT. BASE CAMP - DAY
GREEN
I known Mr. Red for 15 years, maybe 20? Always been honest, all we know. We've had good fuckin', good work together in the past. So he gave me this opportunity and you've gotta earn your shit to get up here. You can't just walk on up here and think you're gonna do it.
[01:10:55]
EXT. BASE CAMP - DAY
RED
Up to date, you know I’ve probably put around ten grand into it. By the time, we’re done setting everything up, it’s probably gonna be on the upper side of 18 grand, around there.
[01:11:20]
EXT. RED AND GREEN DAY
GREEN
This is where we’re trying to get our water to, right here. (Banging)
RED
Tomorrow we have to clean that thing because there’s dead rats in the bottom of it, from over the winter time. Someone left the lid open.
[01:11:41]
EXT. RED AND GREEN DAY CONT’D
GREEN
I love the land and I know in the end if we’re successful, these guys are gonna hook me up. You never know where opportunities can lead once you start getting into this business. And it is kind of a business, you know? We’re here to make money. Let’s hope we’re successful.
[01:12:05]
EXT. RED AND GREEN DAY
RED
We scouted it out earlier and kind of had an idea of where we were gonna put them, our gardens. And what you want, is we wanted the full sun and well, the sun rises right here. This is a south-side slope, sun rises to the east here, goes directly over us and sets over here. You know, that’s your optimal sun.
GREEN
That’s what we want..
RED
You don’t wanna be on the North side with all the big trees and all the shade. Especially us being kinda late into the year.
[01:12:42]
EXT. RED AND GREEN DAY CONT’D
GREEN
Here are the snips, alright this is where the fun begins!
[01:12:53]
RED
As a job, I mean this, uh, this isn't easy work at all. I mean I did asphalt and concrete before and I would say that this is just as physically demanding as that was. It's not easy by any means. Ya know, you have to be self-motivated. If you're lazy, it's not gonna happen. You have to make yourself get up every morning, hike the hills, hike the soil, get the water going and take care of it. And if you don't, it's gonna, you're gonna fail. You're gonna see it in your product. So this goes back to all the people that, you know, think they're just gonna get a free ride up here...growing some marijuana. They have no idea about the long days and hours that we put in to make this successful.
[01:13:38]
CUT TO:
EXT. WOODS - WATER PUMP SHED - DAY
RED.
We're running out of time and this, this has been giving us problems for the last two days. And we figure if it doesn't work today we're going to have to come up with a new configuration.
GREEN
If we don't get water to this tank, we don't get water to our plants.
[01:13:54]
RED.
This crop to me, this is my livelihood right now. I have everything invested in this, if I don’t pull this off I have no idea where I’m headed or what I’m gonna do. I’m banking on this. You know this is my baby right now.
[01:14:10]
RED
Hey Tripper, do you copy?
GREEN
Yeah, I copy.
RED.
Do we have flow?
GREEN
Sounds like a goddamn waterfall up here.
[01:14:20]
RED
So he said it sounded like a waterfall. This is good news guys.
The natural spring is right here. And basically what we've done is ran some plastic down from the spring with the springbox and the screen. Filters the water and goes down into this box with another filter..."Come back with that?"
GREEN
Water flow has stopped.
[01:14:50]
RED
Alright, hold on. I gotta run down.
Red scurries down the hill back to the shed.
RED. (CONT'D)
It’s pretty scary sometimes. I try not to dwell on it, I try to just go out there and put a hard day of work in, do the best I can to try and cover all those issues and then we just have to see at the end, you know?
CUT TO:
EXT. BASE CAMP - DUSK
Red and Green sit in a couple of chairs at base camp and give us a wrap up of the day.
[01:15:15]
RED
We just got back to base camp and it was a pretty good day today. We um, got to the pump and got the pump working.
GREEN
Getting water up there today is freaking huge. We're done with the day's work. Drink a few beers, have some fucking fun.
RED
And get ready for tomorrow.
GREEN
Get ready for tomorrow, do it all again.
[01:15:15]
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. CITY COUNCIL MEETING
“CITY COUNCIL MEETING
PALM DESERT, CA” GRAPHIC CARD
ATTORNEY THOMAS O’BRIEN
The term you use, “medical marijuana,” I’ve been asked to address what the federal government’s position is on this . . I will use that term, though it is not a term that the US government uses . .
[01:15:45]
ATTORNEY THOMAS O’BRIEN CONT’D
Marijuana is considered to be a category one, controlled substance. It is against the federal law to possess it, it is against the federal law to distribute it . . it is against the federal law to cultivate or manufacture or possess for distribution, marijuana.
[01:16:00]
INT. ORANGE COUNTY COURTHOUSE
JAMES P. GRAY
One thing California has done is back in 1996, is passed Proposition 215, which is a medical marijuana program.
[01:16:12]
INT. UCSF MEDICAL CENTER
DR. DONALD ABRAMS
I’m doctor Donald Abrams and I’m a professor of clinical medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. I’m the only one who can prescribe marijuana, because I have a Schedule One license for doing my research. But physicians can’t prescribe a prescription for marijuana, because where would a patient take that? There’s no pharmacy that dispenses marijuana.
[01:16:30]
INT. UCSF MEDICAL CENTER
DR. DONALD ABR
AMS CONT’D
So, in California, we can facilitate patients getting an identification card, so that they can access marijuana from the dispensaries. So that if they’re found with marijuana on their person, or their caregiver is, that they have legitimate reason to be using cannabis.
[01:16:53]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“With a California Caregivers Card, growers
are permitted up to 50 plants, depending
on the county in which the card is issued.”
[01:16:55]
INT. TRAILER - DAY
RED
We couldn’t do this without the cards. We need these cards to keep it legal. I don’t think I would do it without the cards. There’s too much to risk. It would be setting myself up to possibly end-up in prison . .
[01:17:10]
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
BLUE
I’ve got a couple prescriptions. I try to stay as legal as a guy can be, ya know?
PINK
There are so many wonderful things, as we all know about smoking marijuana and . . a lot of people went through a lot of changes in their lives to keep, feeling, good. It didn’t matter, it was like, fuck the laws! Fuck it, ya know? We are just going to do what we think is the right thing to do. Lots of terrible things happened to people growing marijuana.
[01:17:43]
PINK CONT’D
Having a doctor’s permission to smoke marijuana that allows you to grow your own, or go to some little cannabis club and buy your own, takes away that fear!
[01:18:00]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
Well, we have some “Green Urkel” that's going to be purple one of these days. And we have a couple of sliders, and we have a couple uh, Grandaddy Blueberry...all nice strains. We've had a lot of trouble in this garden this year because we had some water problems, some bad water. And we just about lost everything and it was, it was a tragedy. They weren't accepting nutrients.
[01:18:27]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
To a farmer, watching your stuff die is...it's real, real hard on everybody and everybody involved. And I take this real emotional. I love it. And we're real happy. We're glad we got 'em back and they're gonna be really nice this year. When we see you guys again you'll be quite surprised with the change. They change daily. When you look at them everyday you don't always see it, and then one day you walk in here and you go, "Wow!" Heaven and nature is right here. If you look out this way you can see why we do it. That's our city right there. And those are all our people, those trees.
[01:19:00]
EXT. BASE CAMP
Green works on trailer.
[01:19:20]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
GREEN
Ya know, it's your basic trailer, dude. You got what you need. We got fuckin' some books that we read up here. This is my sleeping area. It's cool. You gotta a little bed. I got my little fuckin' closet, I guess you'd call it? When you get bored, I got my little fuckin' harmonica. (Harmonica)
[01:19:40]
GREEN (CONT'D)
We can cook, ya know, mac and cheese, top ramen, grilled cheese. It's basically like camping living, just easy things that are quick and easy to make. How we live up here? It’s the forest, so I mean, you’re living in the forest. I don’t have a toilet, I don’t have TV, I don’t have cable.
[01:20:00]
GREEN (CONT'D)
You read books, play guitar. There’s sacrifices you make up here but in the end they’re such like, small sacrifices that like . . it’s not even a sacrifice man. You know it’s so nice up here, it’s beautiful, it’s living!
[01:20:20]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
RED
As you can see, money’s tight, so sometimes breakfast turns into lunch. Extra hot sauce takes a lot of the . . adds a lot of flavor, let’s just put it that way. There’s lunch.
[01:20:37]
EXT. RED’S GARDEN
RED
I like living outside of the city. Being up here in the land, being able to do what I want to do. Gives me a sense of freedom, you know? Where as when I was tied-up with my job down south, it was just the rat race. I didn’t feel like I was living for me.
[01:21:00]
EXT. GREEN’S GARDEN CONT’D
GREEN
The crop to me, like this year personally . . it means a lot of things. It means if I’m gonna be living and like, paying my bills. Or I could be out on the streets looking for another carpentry job. If we don’t get this, then it’s gonna be devastating.
[01:21:25]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
This garden's done quite well. It's been in the ground about six weeks. We're real proud of it. This is purple urkle. She's not purple yet, but she will be. This is called a hindu kush. You can see the difference in the bud structure. As you can see in here these are really accpetable to leaf mold, which we have to control. And it won't hurt you now, but it'll hurt you later when they're in full bud so we have to keep 'em cleaned up. We spray 'em with an organic organicide, which you can spray up until the day you harv so you don't have to worry about it hurting people's lungs or anything like that.
[01:21:56]
YELLOW CONT’D
We're into dirt, we're into PH. We're as respectful to the land as it is to us and I think everybody should be that way...and it's a terrible thing. As a farmer, and I hear on the news everyday 30,000 plants, 40,000 plants busted by this and that mafia. And then they show the creeks and they're all full of bags of chemicals that are poisoning my land, not their land. And I think it's very irritating and I don't like and I don't stand for it. And I don't associate with those people, nor does my family.
[01:22:28]
YELLOW CONT’D
We don't have chemicals running on the ground. We don't have overrunning reservoirs. We don't have buckets of hard chemicals laying around. It's all organic, nothing will eat nothing. You don't see anything yellowing, dying because when this pot garden is done and I'm done, these woods will still be alive for my grandkids. And I mean that in here, not in here (wallet).
[01:23:00]
“August” Graphic Card
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
BLUE
Huh? Si, cual planta? Mucho? Yesterday he encountered some mold on this kola right here. It's been cut and disposed of, but this is just one more thing that a person's gotta be on their toes. I mean, ya know, you can ignore and walk away and not notice it, but in two days time this plant could be totally infected and you might as well throw it away.
[01:23:40]
JUANCHO
Es un ratto.
BLUE
A ratto?
JUANCHO
Si.
BLUE
Hoy? Oh, si? This is what happens here. I don't know if you can get in on it, ya know? This is not a total loss, but you really never know the extent of the damage until you get into it. And it's really unfortunate. It's very sad to work for eight months and see this happen. It's very disheartening. I mean this on the street is a potential $50 bill. Ya know?
[01:24:14]
BLUE CONT’
So that's really not the biggest thing. It's just all the time and effort that goes into it and then it's like Mother Nature is saying, "Hey, pay attention!" Cause this could do you in overnight.
CUT TO:
[01:24:35]
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
Blue examines some of his plants very closely.
BLUE
Well, we're at various stages here. Some of these strains, the more Afghani strains are going to go, uh, the sativa I should say are gonna go a little bit longer before they get to bolting. Bolting means that when there's a sustained period of moisture and no sun that the plant will actually go back into a vegetative cycle. And it will air out this bud. I could show you this is right here.
[01:25:05]
BLUE CONT’D
This is a pretty good example right here where this, the terminal koli here has actually started to go into a growth cycle again. And usually it goes this way around this time of the year. You get 2 or 3 days of rain and people freak and think oh shit, this is it. The sun's never coming back out. Might as well take it and be done with it. Now, if I knew that an imminent storm was coming in and we were going to have sustained rain, I would take these plants. I just prefer not to cause it's a lot of work all at once, too.
[01:25:36]
BLUE (CONT'D)
So this is my compadre. He's been helping me since the early part of the year. I guess it would probably be what, March?
[01:25:43]
“Juancho” Graphic Card
BLUE CONT’D
And he's been right by my side every minute. I trust him implicitly. He knows the business. This business he was involved in old Mexico with his family, years ago. He's like my little brother. I trust him with my life. And there's no arguments. He knows whose in charge. He does what he's asked to do. And as you can see, these are the fruits of our labor.
[01:26:13]
INT. BLUE'S HANGING SHOP - DAY
JUANCHO
I'm 22 years old. I have a girlfriend, but not a wife. My family lives in Oaxaca, Mexico. When they're like this I have to trim the leaves so the plant can get some sun. With the cold weather, they can get a little color.
[01:26:30]
PRODUCER
In Mexico, how long did you work in marijuana fields?
JUANCHO
About five years.
PRODUCER
Five years, five years that you worked in the marijuana fields. So you understand a everything about growing weed, right?
JUANCHO
Si, si!
PRODUCER
So how long have you been here in the United States?
JUANCHO
About two years. I like this work and that's why I do it.
[01:26:56]
JUANCHO CONT’D
There are other Mexicans here, but they're in different places.
PRODUCER
[01:27:19]
“September” Graphic Card
[01:27:24 ]
EXT. DIRT ROAD - DAY
RED
Oh, man! The foot. I was in a motorcycle accident. I went down on some gravel. The bike got under me and tore my foot up pretty good. There is a puncture wound that has to be disinfected four times a day.
RED CONT’D
Talk about bad timing huh? (Laughing)
GREEN
Jesus Christ! I don’t think you’re walking back up.
[01:27:55]
RED
Well, when you guys were up here last time you got all the problems we had with the water lines and just having the late start and all that bullshit, but since then basically we've been hit by the bear.
[01:28:05]
CUT TO:
INT. TRAILER - DAY
RED
Yeah, the fuckin' bear that fucked my shit up, um, we don't know what happened. I think, fuck, there was a couple of things. I used the peanut butter on the rat traps and then I think possibly he sniffed that, got in there. Probably hit him on the nose, the toes...I don't know. I can only imagine. I just saw the claw marks and it just looked like he was boxing with those bags. Took out 25 of our plants, which set us back a month. And having the late start like we did, ya know, that just put us that much more behind.
[01:28:35]
CUT TO:
INT. TRAILER – CONT’D
RED
We thought he was gone, but we went up to the top location and I'd been leaving my food there. Well, he got into all my food. Ya know, it's better if he just keeps to himself and we keep to ourselves because to be honest with you I don't want to have to shoot the bear. There's not enough of them out there.
[01:28:55]
EXT. FIELD – DAY
YELLOW
Along the fence lines, we try to build up a barrier. Number one, there’s a lot of wildlife here. Deer, bear, pig, rats, jack rabbits.. So we try to secure the area. 4 to 5 jack rabbits can wipe you out in a day, a deer can wipe you out.
[01:29:20]
EXT. FIELD – DAY
RED
Is that red and white? Yeah, I think that's CDF.
[01:29:30]
“California Department of Forestry (CDF)” Graphic Card
RED
There's a lot of tension, but I think you're gonna notice it in a month. When it's really close to harvest. Everyone is gonna be on edge...and this is both sides. This is the growers, ya know, the law, CAMP's gonna be flying a lot harder. Can we make it? It's gonna be one of those type o' deals, ya know? We got a little bit of action going on here boys. What the fuck? Hey, what are those? Where is he?
[01:29:58]
“Courtesy KCAL 9 News – Los Angeles” Graphic Card
REPORTER
The longer Orange County Narcotics Deputies spend in the pot fields, the bigger this seizure gets. Authorities are saying today that there are hundreds of more plants than were originally counted. Perhaps as many as three thousand and it could take into tomorrow to confiscate all of the marijuana.
[01:30:15]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
RED
You here of people harvesting 500, 1000 pounds, all the time. You also here about people who had five thousand plant that got busted. To put 5,000 plants into perspective, it would probably be like a vineyard. A couple of city blocks, of marijuana plants and if you got a pound per plant, that would be five thousand pounds. Anywhere from three, to let’s say four thousand dollars, you’re talking about some serious money.
[01:30:45]
EXT. YELLOW'S GARDEN - DAY
YELLOW
What do I think about people who come up here and try to grow two and three thousand plants gardens and wanna get in and out in one year? We don’t care for it, it just brings an enormous amount of heat, a lot of feds and it’s disrespectful. This is our home, this is our life, we don’t come up here and try to make ten million dollars in six months and go and destroy someone else’s land. We’re very proud of our land. This is where we’re from, I’ve been here my whole adult life.. and this is where I wanna continue to be from.
[01:31:18]
INT. ORANGE COUNTY COURTHOUSE
JUDGE JAMES P. GRAY
You look at Mexico today and they’re having these real gang wars. With regard to not drugs, it has almost nothing to do with drugs, it’s all drug money that’s causing it.
[01:31:31]
JUDGE JAMES P. GRAY CONT’D
Try this, we could bulldoze the country of Colombia. Obliterate it from the face of the earth. In fact, you could take Ecuador and Peru with it if you wanted to, and it wouldn’t make the slightest bit of difference with regard to our drug problems here in the United States? Why? Because if the demand is here, the demand will be met. And if it’s not met by Colombia, Ecuador and Peru it will be met by Nigeria, or Thailand or California!
[01:31:54]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
RED
What they do,is they get gree
dy. They’re doing a little bit more than they should be doing, they’re not using cards, they’re growing on government land. They’re out there for that money and that flash, they wanna make the quick, easy buck. At some point, the government’s gonna come down on them. Either they’re gonna catch them on their land or the IRS is gonna come after them for taxes.
[01:32:16]
“Courtesy KTVX News” Graphic Card
REPORTER
The two men deputies arrested, were hiding in the hills near their marijuana field, for several days. Investigators say the men admit to having at least two more partners, but given the size and sophistication of this operation, they likely had even more help.
[01:32:33]
INT. RED AND GREEN TRAILER
RED
You can look at it two ways. You can get in, if you’re successful for two years and doing it big and don’t get caught, hey more power to ya. They pulled it off. If you get caught, you’re going in, you’re in trouble. Versus, you do this legally for say five years. In the end it probably all equals out.
[01:32:55 ]
YELLOW
They're leaving the Mom and Pops alone now. They're going after the mafia gardens, which nobody here likes. And we don't like 'em, but we don't have anything to do with it. The cops have to find 'em. We don't know where they're at. We know where...we know where they're..we know the areas they're in, but we don't go there because it's dangerous. Even for local people, you can't go for certain walks in certain woods because there's armed men out there that will do you harm. We had 2 murders here not even 2 months ago over... an altercation over a 3,000 plant garden between some indians and some spanish people. And we don't like it. It brings in a vibe that we don't need.
[01:33:33]
YELLOW
It brings in a lot of other different drugs to younger people around here. There’s a lot of crank in these areas, because of the availablilty of the people who grow big grows and then go back into another racket. We don’t go from marijuana to crank to cocaine, this is what we do.
[01:33:54]
EXT. FIELD – DAY
RED
They're starting to get their resin dude. It's time. They're loving this food...loving it! You see these little crystals starting to come up the leave, it's on the hair. Rub your fingers. It's a little greasy feel on the fingers. That's just it going into heavy bloom.
GREEN
Yeah, now it's exciting when you walk in here, ya know?
RED
Yeah, we're pretty much kinda moving into the home stretch. What I have to do is start to prepare for the human factor, the thieves. Within the next 2 weeks this place will be fully guarded.
[01:34:28]
RED CONT’D
More than likely, ya know, under this brush, we'll set up tents at each location. And they can't leave.
[01:34:36]
CUT TO:
EXT. BLUE'S GARDEN - DAY
BLUE
I don't know. This is a fairly remote piece of property. It's private. I know the neighbors all around me. Um, I don't give anybody any reason to come up here. I suppose it could happen. It's happened in the past. I mean the Sheriff's office takes a real dim view of that. In fact, a couple of weeks ago there was a call not far from here where there was, uh, what was called in as a home invasion. And 60 law enforcement officers showed up, and subdued at gunpoint, five thieves with rifles, as well. And what they were doing is, they were relieving somebody of a medical marijuana garden. So they're backing us up in that respect.
[01:35:12]
BLUE CONT’D
I mean this is private, personal property. There is a mandate, Senate Bill 420. And they are bound to uphold the law. My attitude further is if somebody figures they need it more than I do, have at it. It's not gonna kill me.
[01:35:38]
EXT. FIELD DAY
RED
We think people are walking around the land, type of deal. And we just wanted to let everybody know that we’re back on the land, so we came up, shot some skeet and just made a bunch of ruckus.
GREEN
There’s a fastball right down the center.
[01:36:00]
RED
Pull! (Laughing) Fuck. Before I did it, I talked to the local neighbors to let them know. I wanna respect their territory also.
[01:36:08]
GREEN
Pull! (Whooa) This was just a little message. You know? Stay away from our shit. This is our land, we have every right to be here and no one else does.
RED
And that’s how we look at it.
[01:36:28]
EXT. WOODS - DAY
TREVOR
I’m about 23 years old, I was pretty much born and raised in California.
[01:36:33]
“Trevor” Graphic Card
TREVOR
I’m pretty much guarding the plants. Making sure that nobody’s coming in and messing with what we have, with what we’ve accomplished. I’m making sure no wildlife is coming through, we already had a bear come once and now we’re actually up there guarding it, sleeping in the tents. The tent is my opportunity to live very simply, and it’s my opportunity to make some money and go back to, I like to call it civilization of back to where everyone’s living at and have my chunk of change, but not be doing the nine to five like everybody else.
[01:37:02]
TREVOR
There’s a lot of time to sit around and luckily for me, I have a dog up here, so we play a lot of stick and I mean, I know just about every tree in the garden that surrounds it real well and you know, you get to listen real well to what’s going on around you. I mean there’s not a lot of distraction like there is in the city. I like that out here. Good boy Todd!
[01:37:44]
EXT. GREEN’S TENT - NIGHT
GREEN
Home sweet home. (Grunting) Good Night Guys..
[01:38:02]
PRODUCER
DO you have trouble sleeping at night?
JUANCHO
Sometimes at night I hear voices or see what looks like a flashlight. Maybe it’s a burglar or someone else..
TREVOR
Oh every day I’m up here I feel like I’m at risk.
[01:38:20]
BLUE
People posing as law enforcement, you know rolling up on people with badges and guns. In fact my ex father in law had it happen to him. Three guys rolled up in a truck, showed badges, they had the right uniforms and they instructed everybody to get in the house. Where upon they handcuffed them, beat them up a little bit, ransacked the house, found the money, took the money. Found the processed pot, took that and then harvested the rest. And bounced them on down the hill, left them handcuffed.
[01:38:57]
“Harvest (October)” Graphic Card
GREEN
Some friends of mine used to live here, no one’s lived here for about 8 years but, we’re gonna gut this fucking thing and that’s where we’re gonna fuckin’ dry our ganja.
[01:39:10]
GREEN CONT’D
And basically we’re just gonna take fuckin’ all this shit out of here. Get it all nice and clean you know? And hopefully this will all be full of fuckin’ hanging weed. Uh, fuck it’s pretty gnarly back here, I mean shit like that dude . . is just shit that I’m gonna have to take care of. That’s kinda cool actually, the tail is all fuckin’ bones. I mean who knows what kinda fuckin’ diseases that has.
[01:39:40]
EXT. FIELKD - DAY
PINK
First of all there’s just something about the temperature of the day that changes in the end of their life cycle. The color of the leaves, the resin, it’s hard, it’s sticky.. and it smells, it has a certain fragrance that says it’s ready.
[01:40:05]
PINK CONT’D
They are so colorful and leafy and then they look a little . . they look like they’re getting older, so they lose a couple leaves, their stems are getting a little bald. Sometimes it’s very hard to tell when it’s ready, I know when the rose is ready to pick and I know when the dallias are ready and cut the cannas, but with marijuana, it’s different. They’re very subtle to me.
[01:40:40]
EXT. FIELD - DAY
We see Red walking across the field with his dog following him.
RED
I had to cut a little bit earlier because of the thieves. Worried of the thieves and weather. Things like that, but the resin content was good...there was chunk. Now, I've got to get this whole area cleaned up. Ya know, get all the roots out, get 'em burned. Tear everything down so it just goes back to nature.
[01:41:08]
RED (CONT'D)
The feel of the garden is definitely different now, ya know? It looks like a bomb came in and just blew this thing apart, but ya know, that's the reality. This is the ending process. Now, what my job is, is to clean this whole thing up and get it ready for next year so we go through that whole growth cycle again. Ya know, we'll have that, we'll be excited...it'll be time. Ok, we have to haul the dirt and pound the posts and do the transplanting and nurture these babies throughout the whole, the whole season. And then we'll have to cut 'em again. And that's just, ya know, you appreciate every stage of what you're doing and you look forward to it.
[01:41:46]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“Red and Green harvest 74 plants,
giving them a total of
47 pounds of processed Marijuana.”
[01:41:53]
INT. DRYING ROOM - DAY
Red is checking on his plants.
RED
It's time to cure it after we cut. What you're doing is letting the plant get rid of all the moisture into the bud. Um, and how you check on that, how you can check is just if there's stem moisture, it won't crack, it'll bend. At this point, the yield is what it is. Ya know, any mistakes we've made we can't dwell on. Could we have done things different? Yeah, I think so, but that's with anything in life. Ya know, you kinda gain the knowledge afterwards. Will we make the mistakes next year, probably not.
[01:42:31]
CUT TO:
EXT. BASE CAMP – DAY
RED CONT’D
No I didn’t take into factor the cost of having to pay the security. To have them help wait, while it’s curing to get it ready to trim. They wuit jobs in the city that were well-paying you know? So I don’t want them to come up and because I wasn’t successful, you know, they’re not successful. They took a chance in me and I appreciate that and I wanna reward them.
[01:43:00]
RED (CONT'D)
Right there. Then you cut that. Get rid of all that. That, cause that's not marketable. Then just a couple little, ya know, and that's pretty good. We’re not out of the woods by any means, we have a lot of quality product that we have to cure and trim properly and bag up.
[01:43:15]
PRODUCER
What do you do with it when you got it all bagged up?
RED
No.
GREEN
I don’t wanna talk about that.
PRODUCER
It’s like you’re a victim too ..
[01:43:29]
CUT TO:
INT. BLUES’S HOUSE
BLUE
I know he did it, okay? That’s the bottom line.
[01:43:32]
“”Blue” leaves the room to take a phone call from a friend.” Graphic Card
BLUE CONT’D
Well he should be really careful man, because the fucking cops are looking for him. (silence) Well that’s his problem man, you know what? He was here, it happened on his watch, he was here, he did it, that’s all I know.
[01:43:48]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“During the harvest, “Juancho” steals
a large quantity of Blue’s marijuana.
…and leaves town.”
[01:43:55]
EXT. BLUES’S HOUSE
BLUE
I think he just got a little bit greedy and decided to help himself to a substantial amount of my product while I was away for a couple days and I haven’t seen him since, and I suspect he’s probably long gone. I think this little guy probably got to me for maybe, I don’t know .. around 70-80 thousand dollars? That’s a lot of money to anybody, I don’t care who you are, it’s a lot of fucking money and I worked hard for it! And he was paid for it!
[01:44:27]
BLUE CONT’D
So that kinda hurts, it set’s a guy back and it’s discouraging, you know? I welcomed him into my home and made things available to him, he wouldn’t have normally had, I bought him a car. I gave him big tips you know? Gave him points, whatever and the guy just, you know . . just greedy. Bottom line, so yeah it affects me, I feel personally, you know, I feel violated. What I do about it is my own business, but he’ll get his, I won’t have to do a dang thing, he’ll get his, thieves don’t prosper.
[01:45:11]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
Well, last time we talked you guys took some videos of us outside in our beautiful outdoor gardens. And um, we got ripped off this year and you know what, we're madder than hell.
EXT. EMPTY GARDEN - DAY
PINK
They probably had maybe 3 or 4 more days. And all that was there at 9 o'clock in the morning were 22 empty pots.
[01:45:34]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
We are so pissed that ya'll wouldn't believe it because you know what, somebody come and took something from me and they took something from my ole' lady. I get emotional...
EXT. EMPTY GARDEN - DAY
PINK
Ya know, I've been through a range of emotions. My first was like shock and weepy, but the tears didn't come and now I am pissed.
[01:45:59]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
These are cheap thieves man, you know what, I been around thieves my whole life. These are cheap thieves man. They took me to the dirt. A good thief will come in and top everything you got and leave you something on the bottom and just let you get by.
EXT. WOODS - DAY
PINK
I don't know what to do about it. Do I call the Sheriff? I don't know if I wanna tell him my story.
[01:46:18]
YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
You know what, do they need it more than me? What's my karma? What's...I've already paid my karma. I've been in prison. I've been this, I've been that. When a man does something wrong, he's creating karma for his whole family, not just him. His whole klan. You know what, they're all dirty. You know what, a fucking thief is dirty. You know what, if they were on the side of the road on fire, I wouldn't stop to piss on 'em.
[01:46:42]
EXT. WOODS - DAY
PINK
It's a loss. Um, I don't like it at all. I don't think or live my life like that. I just have to get through this and know that somebody, maybe somewhere is gonna smoke some of that weed and maybe that'll make them feel better and wanna be a better person. I don't know where to take it.
[01:47:08]
INT. YELLOW'S INDOOR SET UP - DAY
YELLOW
We almost killed that garden with bad water and we nursed it, my ole lady nursed it. It was really personal. They took...2 people get up in the morning and go out there and just like a fuckin farmer. Ya know what, just like fuckin corn. Just like fuckin tomatoes. Ya go out there, ya know, and they took it. And they left me a trail to my 80 year old neighbor's house. And I thought, this is not, this is not, this is not the way it's supposed to be. You're not supposed to work this hard. You're not supposed to...I don't wanna watch my ole lady suffer.
[01:47:56}
EXT. PINK'S GARDEN - DAY
PINK
I would prefer to give you something than have you take it from me. And I would want to know if you knew me. I would want to ask you, did you wanna see my medical marijuana from my doctor? Did you wanna see that I had, legal permission to do that?
[01:48:17]
PINK CONT’D
I would want you to know that the depth of my pain is not just about me, that spreads a little bit. Because I’m not just a solo person and my life is affected and has a lot of people in it.. So, I would like to know what you did with it and why you chose to, to steal from me.
[01:48:44]
BLUE
To hear that that happens to your friends, it doesn’t make it any better but, you know it’s prevalent, it’s happening. It’s not just the way it was not even two years ago. I can’t depend on growing pot to sustain me, I can’t do it anymore.
[01:49:01]
YELLOW
That was March, April and May money and they took it in October. So at the time, you’re in shock but you don’t feel the full impact for another four or five or six months. A lot of times, when we don’t pay a bill on time or if we can’t get something special. That’s always your reminder of, oh yeah, if we’d have had that other fifty pounds or.. it’s something that, it’s a pain that carries on for the next year. It’s not just a one-day shot, you feel it over, and over and over.
[01:49:42]
PRODUCER
Any idea who it was?
PINK
Huh uh, I don’t, well..
YELLOW
NO, we can’t put that on film..
[01:49:52]
PINK
You don’t, unless you were there and watched them do it, how can you ever say who did it? Nobody’s ever come up the driveway and said, oh by the way, I helped myself to your garden. That’ll never happen.
[01:50:09]
RED
I mean I think hiring guards is definitely the best method to keeping thieves out of your garden. But the fact that we’re so secluded? That obviously has something to do with it, because thieves are lazy, they’re pieces of shit. So they’re gonna go look for the easiest way to make some money and to get to out place, it’s just too much work for them.
[01:50:38]
GREEN
Yeah, it’s like when you got a bike. You put a lock on it, well that’s just a little extra little thing. You don’t put a lock on it, then sure.. somebody’s gonna fuckin’ take it. Same kind of thing you know? Hopefully. (Laughing)
[01:50:54]
RED
Oh no, that’s a fact dude. We didn’t get robbed.
GREEN
Fuck an A.
[01:51:01]
SCREEN TEXT HERE:
“The following year Red and Green’s
entire crop was seized by the DEA.
No arrests were made.”
[01:51:10]
Fade Out CREDITS: