Film Art: An Introduction (David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson) - Sound In The Cinema - Notes

“Sound as flexible and wide-ranging as other film techniques.”

“We’re strongly inclined to think of sound as simply an accompaniment to the real basis of cinema: the moving images.”

“To study sound, we must learn to listen to films.”

Sound “engages a distinct sense mode.”

“Sound can guide us through the images.”

“Sound gives a new value to silence. A quiet passage in a film can create almost unbearable tension, forcing the viewer to concentrate on the screen. An abrupt silence can jolt us and arrest our attention.”

“Sound bristles with as many creative possibilities as editing. Through editing, one may join shots of any two spaces to create a meaningful reaction. Similarly, the filmmaker can mix any sonic phenomena into a whole. With the introduction of sound cinema, the infinity of visual possibilities was joined by the infinity of acoustic events.”

 

“Several aspects of sound as we perceive it are familiar to us from everyday experiences and are central to films use of sound.”

Loudness: to create atmosphere, perceived distance, extreme shifts in volume, interruptions

Pitch: distinguish music and speech from noises, distinguish among objects, create tension, other more specific purposes

Timbre: voices, articulate portions of soundtracks, humour, other more specific purposes

These all shape our experiences of a film as a whole.

 

Sound in cinema: speech, music and noise.

Use of recycled sounds, samples from sound libraries.

“Sound guides the viewer’s attention.”

Sound effects and music are usually subordinate to dialogue.

 

“In creating a sound track, then, the filmmaker must select sounds that will fulfil a particular function. In order to do this, the filmmaker usually will provide a clearer, simpler sound world than of everyday life.”

“By choosing certain sounds, the filmmaker guides our perception of the image and the action.”

“Guiding the viewer’s attention, then, depends on selecting and re-working particular sounds. It also depends on mixing, or combining them. It is useful to think of the soundtrack not as a set of discrete sound units but as an ongoing stream of auditory information.”

“The rhythm, melody, harmony, and instrumentation of the music can strongly affect the viewer’s emotional reactions. In addition, a melody or musical phrase can be associated with a particular character, setting, situation, or idea.”

 

“Fidelity refers to the extent to which the sound is faithful to the source as we conceive it.”

Space: Digetic and nondigetic sound, sound sources

Time: “Sound also permits the filmmaker to represent time in various ways. This is because the time represented on the sound track may or may not be the same as that represented in the image.”