What is sound and why is it an important micro-element?
Sound, one the most crucial aspects in a movie but the most important to a thriller. It's sound that can make or break a scene and turn normal everyday things into something cringe, gripping and intese one example that shows this is scenes from insidious. The film isnt best known for its narrative or it's execution but the gripping ear covering music that make its horror scene twice as scary.
Sound definition with thriller examples.
Diegetic Sound: Sound, which is not part of the film world (things that the charcters can hear) for example music from the radio, juke box ect. In esscence is sound that can be on or off screen.
Non-Diegetic: Sound, which is not part of the film world so the characters can hear it this goes usually for film narration, the soundtrack, the voice overs and the special effects a clear example of this is the big daddy scene in the film 'kick-ass' (video provided below).
On screen sound: The meaning to on screen is is pretty straight foward considering its in the name for it, it's sound that you can see where its coming from within the film, at the beginning of the second film clip 'Scream 2' the most obvious on screen sound we see is the phone call the voice isn't coming from on scene but we can see it's coming from the phone on the victim's ear, this is On screen sound.
Off screen sound: Off screen sound is the opposite to on screen sound, however the only thing they have in common is that they both make sense to the the flim world so the characters can also hear it but its not present on the scene it has to make sense to the settings and environment. (for example traffic sounds and beeping on the street and coughing in a hospital, drilling at a construction sight. There must be a link with the sound and setting).
Parallel Sound: Is when the sound you hear in a film is what is expected in the scenary so a given example of this is kids playing in a playground so you would expect to hear kids laughing and maybe the sound of swings. or if the scene is a basketall game you would hear screeching sneakers, the ball bouncing and the horn when people score baskets and also people in the stands talking.
Contrapuntal Sound: A contrapuntal sound is the exact opposite to this it is when a scene and the sound do not make sense because it doesn't suit/ matchup to the environment. The best given example in thriller for this is the classic 'JAWS'. I choose this over the 'SE7EN' opening because this set the benchmark for contrapuntal sound in thriller and was the first to perfecty excute it the other films just took the idea because it creates a sense of cringe and sickeningness which is essential to a genre such as thriller.
Thriller scene analysis. Analyse a scene identifying three effective uses of sound use PEER.
Conclusion: What types of sounds are you planning to use in your 2 minute video and why?
In my two minute video, I am planning to use sounds with a lot of base in them if it's an action thriller or even classical high pitched screeching if it's a horror thriller, because I know that these two have the best effect on the audience after an intensive build up to a scary scene. These are the two best known types of sounds to have an affect on the audience because it's a quick sound that can come out of the blue and make people jump or scream even when expected and especially when unexpected.
This is a good post - lots of detail and I really like your examples, good use of different genres to show your understanding.
ReplyDeleteCouple of small mistakes:
- Low sounds in music are 'BASS' not 'BASE'
- Is the clip from Insidious meant to be in the blog?