Goodfellas (1990), directed by Martin Scorsese, is a representative of a masterpiece of the fusion of sound and vision. This is achieved through various features of the soundtrack, from the blending of gunshots with traffic to the lyrical pairing of songs with cinematic action. The unconventional sound design begins with the opening credits as titles zoom onto and off of the screen along with the sounds of speeding cars.
It soon becomes clear that these car sounds are coming from the opening sequence in which Ray Liotta, Joe Pesci, and Robert DeNiro are driving to bury a dead body that turns out to still be alive. When this is discovered, Pesci's character stabs the body and DeNiro shoots him. The sounds of the gunshots fade away into the sound of distant traffic. This dissolve between sounds is just the tip of the iceberg as the Liotta's voiceover begins.
"As far back as I can remember I'd always wanted to be a gangster." This line is punctuated as it cuts off to the beginning of "Rags to Riches" by Tony Bennet. This song is a classic 40's style swing song that is, to me, quintessential and emblematic of gangsters and gangster films. Liotta's monologue continues in the style of a radio announcer, not is his pacing or voicing, but in the way that it goes right up until the lyrics of the song begin. He comes back in later as the song gets quieter again, but there is always a respect between the volume of the dialogue and the music and the soundtrack.
Later in the film this pattern continues and the songs continue their poignancy. The "Case Study on Goodfellas" from the book Short Cuts identifies a key scene in which this type of laying takes place. "Jerry Vale's 'Pretend You Don't See Her' plays at the beginning of Henry's [Liotta's character] affair with Janice. Henry's voiceover announces that Friday nights are for the wives and Saturday nights are for girlfriends, as the song plays diegetically, with Vale performing in the club" (52). This study also notes that the music switches to being non-diegetic sound as it continues into cuts to Henry and Janice in the apartment he rents for her and also his wife Karen and their daughters.
The soundtrack in the film also communicates the general mood of any given scene. When Jimmy (Robert DeNiro) commits his murder spree, wacking the robbers who worked the Lufthansa job with him, the music is cheerful. "Layla", by Derek and the Dominos has a purely instrumental part during the second half of the film. The voiceover confirms this connection saying that Jimmy was happy. The viewer finds out that this good mood and music are due to the Tommy (Joe Pesci) getting made. Jimmy and Henry cannot be made into full members of the mob because they are not completely Italian. The music cuts out as tommy is being brought into where he will be made. The music is completely gone when he, and we, realize that he is instead going to be killed.
The music in this sequence is somewhat devastating, building up hope and good cheer before cutting out and leaving the death of a main character. This is indicative of the greater purpose of the soundtrack in this film. The music and sound in Goodfellas does not simply give backing for the action on the film. It masterfully provides context, support, and structure to the action taking place on screen.
Saturday, October 24, 2015
Friday, October 16, 2015
Once Upon a Time in the West
Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) by Sergio Leone is a powerful western with a powerful soundtrack by Ennio Morricone. It center Jill McBain, former prostitute turned frontier wife, Cheyenne, a wild west outlaw, and Harmonica, a man who plays music when he should talk and talks when he should play music. Jill has just moved to Sweetwater to find that her husband and his children have been recently gunned down. The people of the nearby town of flagstone initially believe the crime to have been committed by Cheyenne, but it is soon revealed that he was framed by Frank and the railroad tycoon, Morton. Harmonica enters the plot as a man tracking Frank, and teams up with Cheyenne and Jill to bring him to justice.
This conflict, however, is not what this film is about. It has been suggested (specifically to me by Filmmaker and professor Phil Solomon) that this film is about "the end of the west" as a product of feminizing or civilizing. I do not entirely disagree with this idea, and can certainly see some aspects of the film that demonstrate this. A new train to the pacific ocean is a central part of this film, with the land that is Sweetwater set to become a rich town right alongside it. Prior to this town and during the film, the land is overrun with outlaws and bandits. Once the town is built, there will be some semblance of authority in this land, i.e. it will become civilized. This process is also coupled with feminizing due to the correlation with Jill's arrival and her presence during the building of the town. She is there to give water to the men building; we understand from Cheyenne that it would not be distributed without a woman present.
These examples are compelling and I believe are definitely themes of the film. However, I think that Once Upon a Time in the Old West is about the evils of corporate capitalism and the defense of small business enterprise. John Fawell writes about this in his book The Art of Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in the West. One major indicator of this theme, according to Fawell, is the characterization of and the relationship between Morton and Frank. He specifically cites the parallel between money and guns in the scene in which the viewer first meets Morton while he and Frank discuss the McBain job in Morton's Private car. As Frank sits behind Morton's elegant desk he muses. "it's almost like holding a gun...only much more powerful"(Fawell 104). Later in the scene Morton holds up a wad of cash (you know, big 19th century hundred dollar bills) to Frank's gun saying "There are many kinds of weapons, and the only one that can stop that is this"(104).
The connection between money and guns and violence is further strengthened in another scene in Morton's train car later in the film. Morton is being guarded by Frank's guns while Frank is in town hoping to put an end to the McBain business once and for all. Frank has these men their to protect the man that he views as a both a mentor and, less kindly, an avenue for his own success. Morton has begun to grow tired of Frank as he sees him as too rough and reckless to ever take over for him or be seen as a legitimate businessman. Accordingly, Morton buys Frank's guns by paying them to leave him and instead kill Frank. "But money, in the form of bribes, had easily dispatched the guns" (105).
Fawell also has discussed the idea of the film as a defense of small business, although not as explicitly. He discusses the difference between Morton's capitalist enterprise and McBain's, saying "Morton's dream is of his own glory...McBain's dream grows out of love for others" (110). Although this is still capitalist enterprise, McBain is not a railroad tycoon expanding for the sake of money and itself. He is a widower and a father and a newlywed trying to build some security and a legacy for his growing family.
While I can acknowledge it is not a perfect analogy, I believe there is sufficient evidence within the film to paint it as a commentary on the dark sides of capitalism. I have to think that it is not just a product of the Bernie Sanders campaign or my own personal lens. Perhaps Fawell puts it best when he says "Here the disillusioned Socialist seems to transpose the dream of twentieth century socialism on to the terrain of the old West. The final image o the film depicts a world in which the destructive machinery of capitalism has given way to a respect for workers and their comforts" (110).
This conflict, however, is not what this film is about. It has been suggested (specifically to me by Filmmaker and professor Phil Solomon) that this film is about "the end of the west" as a product of feminizing or civilizing. I do not entirely disagree with this idea, and can certainly see some aspects of the film that demonstrate this. A new train to the pacific ocean is a central part of this film, with the land that is Sweetwater set to become a rich town right alongside it. Prior to this town and during the film, the land is overrun with outlaws and bandits. Once the town is built, there will be some semblance of authority in this land, i.e. it will become civilized. This process is also coupled with feminizing due to the correlation with Jill's arrival and her presence during the building of the town. She is there to give water to the men building; we understand from Cheyenne that it would not be distributed without a woman present.
These examples are compelling and I believe are definitely themes of the film. However, I think that Once Upon a Time in the Old West is about the evils of corporate capitalism and the defense of small business enterprise. John Fawell writes about this in his book The Art of Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in the West. One major indicator of this theme, according to Fawell, is the characterization of and the relationship between Morton and Frank. He specifically cites the parallel between money and guns in the scene in which the viewer first meets Morton while he and Frank discuss the McBain job in Morton's Private car. As Frank sits behind Morton's elegant desk he muses. "it's almost like holding a gun...only much more powerful"(Fawell 104). Later in the scene Morton holds up a wad of cash (you know, big 19th century hundred dollar bills) to Frank's gun saying "There are many kinds of weapons, and the only one that can stop that is this"(104).
The connection between money and guns and violence is further strengthened in another scene in Morton's train car later in the film. Morton is being guarded by Frank's guns while Frank is in town hoping to put an end to the McBain business once and for all. Frank has these men their to protect the man that he views as a both a mentor and, less kindly, an avenue for his own success. Morton has begun to grow tired of Frank as he sees him as too rough and reckless to ever take over for him or be seen as a legitimate businessman. Accordingly, Morton buys Frank's guns by paying them to leave him and instead kill Frank. "But money, in the form of bribes, had easily dispatched the guns" (105).
Fawell also has discussed the idea of the film as a defense of small business, although not as explicitly. He discusses the difference between Morton's capitalist enterprise and McBain's, saying "Morton's dream is of his own glory...McBain's dream grows out of love for others" (110). Although this is still capitalist enterprise, McBain is not a railroad tycoon expanding for the sake of money and itself. He is a widower and a father and a newlywed trying to build some security and a legacy for his growing family.
While I can acknowledge it is not a perfect analogy, I believe there is sufficient evidence within the film to paint it as a commentary on the dark sides of capitalism. I have to think that it is not just a product of the Bernie Sanders campaign or my own personal lens. Perhaps Fawell puts it best when he says "Here the disillusioned Socialist seems to transpose the dream of twentieth century socialism on to the terrain of the old West. The final image o the film depicts a world in which the destructive machinery of capitalism has given way to a respect for workers and their comforts" (110).
Thursday, October 1, 2015
What was that!?
Playtime, by Jacques Tati, is a film unlike any other I have ever seen, and likely unlike any other film, period. Some have likened the action onscreen to a dance, including Bruce Bennet, who said of Tati's work: "Choreographed, repetitive movement is very important in his films and the result here is almost an urban ballet" (Introduction to Playtime, 2013). In addition to its visual spectacle, Playtime can also be appreciated for its unconventional sound design. This can be especially appreciated when considering the time of the sound production, preferences towards small details, and the progression of sound throughout the film.
The sound in Tati's fourth film were all produced after-the-fact. Although actors would say the lines during shooting, they were not recorded live. This results in some lines of dialogue being more or less in sync than others. The scene the beginning of the film in which a woman behind a counter is announcing the arrival of a flight from Germany, her mouth looks slightly out of sync to the words she is supposed to be saying. Rather than breaking the illusion of the film, this bending (not quite breaking) of the sync event serves to heighten the viewer's sense of sound. Tati's ability to capture the audiences aural attention was enhanced by the process of post-dubbing.
Post-dubbing also gave Tati the ability to highlight our attention to small details. Originally shot on 70mm film, Playtime is essentially a "Where's Waldo" book on screen for two hours. The small details can help the viewer find "Waldo," or rather where the sound is coming from and thus where he or she should look. In his article, Bennet explains that rather than privileging dialogue "the sound effects are just as prominent on the soundtrack as speech and there is also very little scaling so that sounds coming from the background are often as loud on the soundtrack as sounds coming from action in the foreground" (2013). Examples of this include the main(-ish) character Monsieur Hulot as he walks across squeaky floors and hears a business man obsessively brushing off himself and his papers.
The isolated sounds, however, seem to give way to a more involved soundtrack as the film progresses. In the opening scene of the film we hear a hushed conversation accented by the sound of men walking along the floor and doors opening and closing, among other "small" sounds. Later, once we have passed the halfway point of the film, we are presented with a soundtrack of constant overlapping dialogue and what could be one of the longest free jazz jams of all time. This scene in the Royal Garden night club transitions through a small cafe to the conclusion of the film, which is accompanied by a carnival soundtrack and a visually represented merry-go-round. This grand crescendo of sound is subtle and made up of the subtle at first, yet it manages at its climax to be a raucous disarray.
The fact that the sound grew throughout Playtime is just one part of why the sound in this film is so fascinating. The post-dubbing process and emphasis on subtlety give the film an additional texture and depth. Tati's film is truly a marvelous spectacle to be seen and heard.
Also, it would not be fair (I don't think) to write about this film without at least mentioning that it is also a critical work taking on ultra-modern architecture, globalism, and perhaps the postmodern nomos that was developing in the director's time. It is actually so well done it's crazy.
The sound in Tati's fourth film were all produced after-the-fact. Although actors would say the lines during shooting, they were not recorded live. This results in some lines of dialogue being more or less in sync than others. The scene the beginning of the film in which a woman behind a counter is announcing the arrival of a flight from Germany, her mouth looks slightly out of sync to the words she is supposed to be saying. Rather than breaking the illusion of the film, this bending (not quite breaking) of the sync event serves to heighten the viewer's sense of sound. Tati's ability to capture the audiences aural attention was enhanced by the process of post-dubbing.
Post-dubbing also gave Tati the ability to highlight our attention to small details. Originally shot on 70mm film, Playtime is essentially a "Where's Waldo" book on screen for two hours. The small details can help the viewer find "Waldo," or rather where the sound is coming from and thus where he or she should look. In his article, Bennet explains that rather than privileging dialogue "the sound effects are just as prominent on the soundtrack as speech and there is also very little scaling so that sounds coming from the background are often as loud on the soundtrack as sounds coming from action in the foreground" (2013). Examples of this include the main(-ish) character Monsieur Hulot as he walks across squeaky floors and hears a business man obsessively brushing off himself and his papers.
The isolated sounds, however, seem to give way to a more involved soundtrack as the film progresses. In the opening scene of the film we hear a hushed conversation accented by the sound of men walking along the floor and doors opening and closing, among other "small" sounds. Later, once we have passed the halfway point of the film, we are presented with a soundtrack of constant overlapping dialogue and what could be one of the longest free jazz jams of all time. This scene in the Royal Garden night club transitions through a small cafe to the conclusion of the film, which is accompanied by a carnival soundtrack and a visually represented merry-go-round. This grand crescendo of sound is subtle and made up of the subtle at first, yet it manages at its climax to be a raucous disarray.
The fact that the sound grew throughout Playtime is just one part of why the sound in this film is so fascinating. The post-dubbing process and emphasis on subtlety give the film an additional texture and depth. Tati's film is truly a marvelous spectacle to be seen and heard.
Also, it would not be fair (I don't think) to write about this film without at least mentioning that it is also a critical work taking on ultra-modern architecture, globalism, and perhaps the postmodern nomos that was developing in the director's time. It is actually so well done it's crazy.
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