The Pilot
The Man Stealers
An East African Village in 1863.
The world that the Ancestors walked is disappearing. Warriors are being stolen, child soldiers are burning villages. The tribal traditions are no longer protective. The Chief Headman implores the Ancestors for help, but their answers only lead him to a child. The boy Chuma.
Punished for spying on this Ancestor ceremony, twelve year old Chuma is sent out of the village to look for a lost baby goat. He is saved from pack of vicious hyenas by an ancient healer named Umi and her beautiful young apprentice Entika. Umi is struck by a ghastly vision and she urges Chuma to return to the village. Entika guides him back to the main trail. Chuma continues on by himself with the baby goat on his shoulders.
He smells smoke. Worried he picks up his pace. He rounds a corner and stops: His village is completely destroyed. Huts and fields still burn. Bodies and broken loot lie everywhere. He stumbles through the wreckage. With his last breath the dying headman tells Chuma that an evil half-breed named Shetani attacked the village and many villagers were carried off in chains including Chuma’s father and brother. Chuma runs to his house. It smolders, burnt to the ground. He finds his mother in the weeds. She is dead. She has been raped. Her throat cut open. In shock, Chuma closes his eyes and holds the baby goat tight. Demons loom out of the smoke: Dambala, Shetani’s evil captain and a squad of child soldiers. They surround Chuma.
Pilot script highlights: Umi's Vision