HIGHLANDER - The Novelization ============================= Compiled by Brian Haden (HADEN@OKSTATE.EDU) on June 15, 1996 The novelization of the original Highlander film was published back in 1986 in London, England and written by Garry Douglas (AKA Garry Kilworth). It was mainly based on the film's final screenplay, but it also contained a few different scenes and tidbits of info that weren't in the film or any drafts of the screenplay. The novel was published in hardcover by Severn House Publishing, Ltd. (ISBN# 0-7278-1396-X) and in paperback by Grafton Books (ISBN# 0-586-07136-9), and was released in the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and some parts of Canada. Unfortunately, it is no longer in print and cannot be ordered from the publishers. The only likely place to find this book now would be in a used book store in one of the above mentioned countries. There are also some college libraries which have the book available to check out, two of which are the University of Texas at Austin and Oxford University in London. Here now is a complete listing of all the differences in the novelization as compared to the film (US and Euro versions). It also notes any additional information that was not mentioned in the film... Page 7 - In the early 1500s, shortly before the battle between the MacLeods and the Frasers, the Kurgan and a Mongol Immortal fight on horseback in the Steppes of Russia. After beheading the Mongol, the Kurgan proceeds to find Connor MacLeod in the Scottish Highlands. Page 15 - (1536) After an attempt by the MacLeod clan to settle thru their differences with the Fraser clan, Connor, Dugal, Page 17 and Angus ride back to their village. On the way, they are ambushed by five Frasers in the forest. The MacLeods manage to kill some of them while the rest flee into the woods. The MacLeods gather their enemies' fallen weapons and continue onward to their village. Page 23 - Iman Fasil's swordfighting technique was learned from the Saracens during the Crusades. Page 25 - (1985) In the Madison Square Garden parking garage fight, Fasil strikes a fuse box with his sword and is electrocuted temporarily. Page 36 - (1536) Connor's mother is still alive. His father was hung thru by the Frasers sometime ago. Page 37 Page 54 - (1985) Until recently, Brenda Wyatt had lived with her father, owner of a watch repair business. He's now retired in Florida and follows his interests in antique weaponry. He's also attempting to trace his ancestry back to the 16th century English poet whose name he shares. Page 56 - (1985) Brenda sort of had a thing with Detective Walter Bedsoe awhile back. Page 66 - (1985) "Russell Nash" is released from the cops the morning after his arrest. He then goes to get his sword from the place where he hid it in the Garden's parking garage. There is no scene of the Kurgan driving into New York from Jersey. When Connor sees Brenda in the parking garage, he tails her back to her apartment and then goes home. That evening, he returns to her apartment building and sees her in the lobby. Connor follows her in a cab to P.J. Clarke's bar. In the bar, he talks to her (same dialogue as in the film) and then she leaves. He walks outside for a moment and then goes back in. Connor asks the bartender about Brenda and learns that she's a "lab assistant" working for the cops. Page 67 - (1985) It is on this night (Day 2) that the Kurgan enters New York. As he slowly cruises down a city street, an old hooker tries to solicit him. Page 71 - (1985) The Kurgan drives by a drug pusher, making like he's interested in buying. When the pusher shows him the drugs the Kurgan peels off, causing the pusher to spill his bag on the street and shout obscenties at the Kurgan as he speeds away, laughing. Page 74 - A genius swordmaker forged the Kurgan's blade three centuries ago. He did not have this particular sword when confronting Connor in 1536 (like in the film). Page 76 - (1985) Unsatisfied with his sex with the hooker Candy, the Kurgan recalls a whore in Florence, Italy during the time of the Borgias that he found quite pleasing. Page 77 - (1985) The Kurgan later goes to Nash's apartment and waits for him to show up. Eventually he gives up waiting and leaves. Page 78 - (1985) Brenda hides outside the bar and follows Nash after he leaves (like in the film). Connor doesn't have his sword with him right now. He left it at home earlier. Page 82 - (1985) After Connor and the Kurgan fight in the alley, Brenda tells Connor to walk her home. Instead, he gets her a cab. Page 84 - (1536) After the battle with the Frasers, Connor is thru lying in the village hut, dying. His wound heals Page 85 quickly and he sits up in front of Kate. Kate runs to the tavern in fear. Connor dresses and follows her. Page 89 - (1536) Kate fears that she may become pregnant with a devil child since she slept with Connor awhile back before the battle. Page 89 - (1536) Angus MacLeod is the Chief of the Clan MacLeod. Page 92 - (1536) After Connor is banished from his village, he travels the countryside and breaks the oxe yoke against a tree. By nightfall, he finds a cave and sleeps inside it. The next day, he travels south very far until he finds a woman milking a cow. She is Heather McDonald, who lives with her father on a small farm. Connor asks her father for work. Page 95 - (1539-41) Heather's father dies three years after Connor arrived. He had taught Connor the skills of a blacksmith. Connor starts working as a blacksmith in the nearby village to help earn money for him and Heather. Page 99 - (1541) Ramirez takes Connor up a hill and introduces the thru "Quickening". Page 102 *** Note: This scene was filmed, but majorly cut and re-edited. You'll notice that when Connor hunches over in front of Ramirez when he feels the Quickening, it then cuts to a wide-angle scene of him up on a hill recieving a bolt of Quickening energy in his hand as Ramirez stands nearby in the rain. Page 106 - (1985) Connor researches information on Brenda Wyatt. He finds her book in the library (not his own personal collection) and learns of her father Peter Wyatt's interest in ancient weapons. Page 111 - (1541) After Connor comes out of the loch, Ramirez thru explains the rule of beheading and tells him about the Page 112 Kurgan. Page 113 - (1541) Ramirez reads a book called "The Book of the Sword" by Cesare Lorenzo de Orazio of Florence, Italy. Page 115 - (1541) Ramirez lives with Connor and Heather for a few months (from when he arrived in the summer to the fall season). Page 120 - (1541) Connor and Heather's forge is located near the village of Jedburgh at the crossroads to the Southern Uplands just north of the Chariot Hills. Page 126 - (1541) Late fall/early winter: Connor goes off hunting while Ramirez and Heather stay at the croft. Page 128 - (1541) Ramirez tells Heather about his and Connor's Immortality and what exactly happened to Connor in Glenfinnan. Page 130 - (1541) Ramirez tells Heather the same rescue story as in the film, but it is expanded in the book. He says that he was rescuing his love from another Immortal. Page 137 - (1541) After the Kurgan kills Ramirez, he rapes Heather. Connor later returns to find Heather crouching beside Ramirez' body. She had placed the severed head back against the neck, but Connor could see that Ramirez had been decapitated. Heather lies to him, saying that the Kurgan did not hurt her. She says that when the Kurgan and Ramirez began fighting, she ran and hid in the woods and the Kurgan couldn't find her. Connor later buries Ramirez in an unmarked grave in the floor of the ruined forge. Page 140 - (1587) He later put Heather there next to Ramirez after she died. Page 141 - (1589) Connor stayed at the croft for two years after Heather's death, then travelled to Edinburgh where he learned to read and write and gather general knowledge. (1599) After ten years in Edinburgh, he went to London. Page 158 - (1985) Connor tells Brenda he's Rachel's son. Page 158 - (1985) Brenda asks Bedsoe to keep watch outside her building during her evening with Nash in case anything happens. Page 159 - (1985) Brenda's hidden pistol is a .38, not a .45 (like in in the movie). Page 162 - (1985) After Nash leaves Brenda's apartment, Bedsoe comes up there to see how it went. Since Connor left before they could have dinner, Brenda lets Bedsoe stay awhile to eat the food she had prepared so it would not go to waste. Page 164 - (1985) After leaving Brenda's place, Connor heads to the thru subway. Kastagir boards the subway at the next stop after Page 167 Connor's and sits at the far end of the car without saying a word to Connor. Then some gang members board it and start hassling MacLeod. Kastagir eventually comes over and sits across from MacLeod. The gang members draw knives and are ready to cut them both up, but MacLeod and Kastagir both draw their swords from their coats and scare the gang off. Afterward, Connor asks Kastagir to meet him in Central Park the next day so that they can talk. Page 168 - Connor remembers the last time he saw Kastagir... thru (1879) During the Zulu Wars, he fought along with the Page 176 17th Lancers as a private soldier. His regiment was trapped by Cetewayo's troops and everyone in MacLeod's unit was killed. After the battle, the Africans discovered that one single man had survived (MacLeod). They put him in a cage and take him back to the village. After several days of feeding Connor to fatten him up, the tribe was going to make him fight in single combat with their best warrior. Kastagir shows up dressed in tribal garb and speaks with Connor. Kastagir warns him that the warrior is also Immortal and will use a broadaxe, while Connor will only be given a spear. Connor spends the rest of the day and night before the battle trying to figure out how to get out of there. He breaks out of his cage, but is captured and put back in it. In the next day's battle, Connor tries with great effort to behead the warrior with his spear. Finally he just thrusts it into the man's chest and kills him. MacLeod is surprised and learns that Kastagir lied to him about the warrior being Immortal. Connor is taken back to the cage, and that night Kastagir helps him escape and return to the English troops in the north. During the conversation they have when Kastagir first appears to Connor in the village, they discuss what they've been doing in the last century or so (Kastagir was in the West Indies; Connor was in London most of the time, except for a holiday with Wellington on the Continent). Kastagir also mentions that he was born in Ethiopia. Page 178 - (1985) In Central Park, Connor and Kastagir discuss the irony that neither of them want to continue to live their Immortal lives, and yet they will still fight their hardest to keep it. Page 179 - Kastagir points out the fact that they have seen each other just about once every century (here now in 1985, the Zulu Wars in 1879, and then back in Boston in 1783). Page 180 - (1783) Kastagir had posed as some Eastern prince when he thru went with Connor to a party hosted by a Bostonian judge. Page 183 He and Kastagir soon got drunk from the brandy. Connor found himself being chased by the ugly wife of a wealthy shipowner named Bassett. Attempting to escape her by hiding in a bedroom, Connor was found and the woman began undressing while she had him trapped in there. He finally called her a name ("Bloated Warthog") and she got upset, saying that he was no gentleman. She ran and told her husband of the insult and he came into the bedroom and challenged MacLeod to a duel on Boston Common. The rest you saw in the film. Page 184 - (1985) After recalling that story, Connor and Kastagir shake hands and go their seperate ways at the entrance to the park. Page 195 - (1985) After the Kurgan kills Kastagir and steals the old thru man's car with his wife still in it, he zooms around the Page 198 city for a couple of miles and then stops, throwing the screaming woman off the hood. He later abandons the car and returns to his hotel. He dismantled his sword and placed each part into several pockets concealed inside a leather jacket. Then the Kurgan goes to a bar and orders a vodka. He and the bartender both listen to the news report about the new beheading on TV and the reporter gives the witness description of the killer. The bartender realizes that the Kurgan is that man, but he is intimidated and decides to not say anything. He serves the drink to Kurgy. Kurgan recalls a wine seller he once strangled in Athens because the man had shown too much interest in his face. Page 199 - During the crime scene investigation, the police check Kastagir's body and find his passport, which gives his real name and says he is from Chad. Page 200 - Det. Frank Moran is married to a woman named Sally and has kids. Page 206 - Brenda goes to Miami to see her father for the weekend and tells him about the man she's recently met, how strange he is, and that she feels attracted to him. Page 219 - When Connor takes Brenda into his trophy room to reveal his Immortality to her, he says that the knife he offers her to stab him with was his father's dirk. Page 227 - During the chicken race, the Kurgan slows down to turn a corner and at this moment, Brenda jumps out of the car. She runs across the street to some guys and begs them to help. Kurgan runs after her and when the guys get in his way, he easily knocks them out cold. Brenda continues running down the street as the Kurgan chases after her. She screams for help, but nobody helps her. The Kurgan pushes his way through the crowds of people. Brenda runs up to a police officer on the corner and tells him she's being chased. The Kurgan smashes a garbage can into the cop as Brenda runs off again into a sleazy hotel. The Kurgan eventually finds her hiding inside one of the rooms and takes her back to the car. They continue the chicken race, and the Kurgan starts singing "New York, New York". Page 229 - The Kurgan calls Connor and talks to him (instead of the answering machine message in the film) and gives him directions for the Silver Cup bakery (actually Silvercup Studios in the film). Page 232 - Connor gets Ramirez' sword before he leaves. The novel says that the sword's blade has a set of Japanese characters etched on it which translate to "No one lives forever". Page 236 - Some of the Kurgan's background is given: He was born the son of a peasant farmer on the shores of the Caspian Sea, over 3,000 years ago. He is the oldest of the Immortals, just a little older than Ramirez. He had fought with Tartars, Cossacks, Huns, Vandals, Goths, and Visigoths. He'd always fought on the side of the barbarian, preferring the barbaric hordes over civilized armies. He hated treating war like a drawing-room activity. Page 237 - The Kurgan remembers his earliest times, from when he was thru 5 years old and his father bashed his head in against a Page 238 stone because he no longer wanted to feed the boy. The Kurgan recovered within hours and secretly followed his father's tracks back to camp. When his father was asleep that night, the Kurgan took a hot stone from the fire and put it into his father's mouth, choking the man to death. He then went back to his family's farm and told his mother that his father was killed by a bear. At age 12, the Kurgan left home and joined a group of bandits who attacked caravans that travelled across the steppes between India and the Mediterranean. He became skilled in using a slingshot to attack them. By age 25, he stopped aging and realized that he could not grow old or be killed by mortal wounds. He finally learned of his potential when he met another Immortal, a Bedouin Arab magician who taught him the same things that Ramirez has taught Connor. The Arab foretold the Gathering and prophesied that the Kurgan would be one of the final Immortals present. When the Kurgan had learned all the Arab knew, he beheaded him and took the Arab's scimitar as his own. He would later replace it with his current broadsword. Page 240 - Also on the hilt of Connor's sword is a sanskrit phrase which translates to "I cannot cross another river". Connor says the phrase over and over to himself during the final battle to give him spiritual strength. It's meaning is that he has one single task to accomplish (killing the Kurgan) and could not worry about anything else at the moment (Brenda) until his job was done. Page 249 - After the battle and the Prize (which are pretty much the same as in the film) Connor returns to his apartment and Rachel, giving her his instructions and saying goodbye (similar to the film when he left to fight the Kurgan). He tells her he and Brenda are going away. Page 250 - Connor takes a cab to the airport and meets Brenda there. They fly to Glasgow and rent a car to drive up into the Glenfinnan hills. He shows her where he grew up. They drink 1976 champagne and Brenda does a toast similar to his 1783 brandy earlier. Page 252 - They spend two months in Scotland before going to London, where they open an antique shop in Camden Alley. On one occasion, Connor goes back to Scotland on business and stops by the remains of the croft and forge where Ramirez and Heather were buried. He talks to her spirit briefly, telling of Brenda. Then he constructs a cross from wood and places it atop the grave. He spends the night there in the company of distant loved ones. THE END ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Special thanks to Rene Gibson and Monique Turner for their contributions.