Hollywood Spectator (1937-39)

Page Sixteen July 17, 1937 WARREN LOW 1 Film Editor “The Li£e of Emile Zola11 “The Life of Emile Zola1' Story by HEINZ HERALD AND GEZA HERGZEG Screenplay by GEZA HERCZEG AND HEINZ HERALD* in Collaboration SC 96 UT why haven’t we yet delved into the realm of imaginative sound? Simply because we have straightjacketed ourselves to one standard formula which the whole industry has accepted as final: That everything visible on the screen must be heard, and that when a character speaks all background noises must drop in volume so that it may not drown the dialogue. In the days, when silent pictures were changing from knee-pants to long ones, photography had also been reduced to a simple formula: intense light for comedies and less light for dramas. Everybody connected with production knew by heart that it took so many domes, so many spot-lights and so many broadsides for a set of such and s,uch dimensions. There was not such a thing as imaginative photography with its various tricks of lights and shadows to convey any mood desired. It was raw, unretouched photography, just as our sound is today raw, unretouched sound lacking in nuances to convey the various moods in conformity with the action. Visual moods can be intensified by means of imaginative sounds; for example: An excursion train is about to start with a load of happy mirthful children. At the station, bidding them good-bye, are the parents as delighted as their offspring. To convey this mood, the locomotive’s tooting should be as melodiously gay as the mirth within the coaches. Later, the excursion meets with disaster, and the parents, with heavy hearts, await the train’s return. If before, the train’s whistle was gay, now that the mood has, changed to sadness, it should be as mournful as the atmosphere which permeates the scene. T M HE nature of another story demands that the audience should share the inner feelings of a crippled, sweet old lady who passes the time rocking herself in a chair; thus when she reads a letter that animates her with joy, the creaking of the chair should be as melodious as the gigglings of the frollicsome angels; if an injustice arouses her anger, the chair’s creacking should be dry and harsh, but at no time nerve-jarring; if sad in her loneliness, it should suggest murmurs of doleful weeping. If, in the first example, a raw, life-like, every-day locomotive’s tooting were to do service for both — the gay and the sad scene — the whistle would be meaningless as far as the mood is concerned. So would be the same monotonous creaking of a rocker as background for three distinct phases of feeling. It surprised me that, when I discussed the idea of imaginative sounds with some one identified with production, although this person saw its possibilities and agreed with me on every point, he argued that it was not altogether feasible of accomplishment. The mike, he explained, picks up all noises within its range, and if some of these noises are of the unwanted kind, how then could they be erased so as to leave only the pleasant ones? Apparently he forgot that most background noises are added days after the scenes have been filmed, since the mike, which is trained principally upon the actors, registers background noises very faintly or none at all, and these sounds have to be added afterwards; also that many scenes in which there is no dialogue are shot silent, and footsteps, doors banging, brake-screechings, etc., are dubbed afterwards.