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Homework 3: Sound

09:00:00
How is sound used in the opening scenes of Mad Max Furry Road in order to characterise Max and help to set the scene.

600 words

Due 26th September

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3 comments:

  1. Unknown2 October 2016 at 22:56

    At the start of the film there is just a black screen with narration over it to get the view attached in the story meaning that it starts with a non diegetic sound. You also hear the sound of gun shots and a man saying “why are you hurting these people?” making it parallel to the story. The sound is coming from different sides making it sound like voices in your hear whispering to you making it seem discordant and unsettling. The voice over is a strong deep voice that gives the sense that the voice is you thinking out loud. The child saying “hello” has a slight echo to it making it seem ghost like and discordant. Unnatural. You hear the baron wasteland in the background with the wind blowing and the sand scattering across the screen making it a dietetic sound however, it also includes non diegetic sound as the narration is still going on. It moves on to the lizard, you can hear it scatter across the ground quickly, it give the feeling that since the lizard is being heard of then something might happen to it getting a slight vibe of danger. You then hear an over powering voice coming form him but still hear the faint scattering of the lizard as it get closer to him. When the lizard gets to him her crushes it and all of the sounds stop for a second and everything is still giving it quite a discordant feel to it however, the sounds are parallel to it. You can hear the crunch of the dead lizard as he stars eating it leaving the viewer wondering why he would eat a disgusting lizard raw. It jumps to a close up of his face and as he turns it make a contrapuntal sound, it has a mix of of car engines and wind (I think). The contrapuntal sound is over powering the sounds of him trying to pack all of his gear in to his bag meaning that the cars are getting close making the situation tense and unnerving. It then moves on to the roar of the engine, this is a diegetic sound that is loud because there is no other sound going on in the background. When there is silence it creates an impact of curiosity in the audience because they can't tell what happened and why he suddenly drove away in a rush. The sound of cars flying by gives the sense of an action sequence might occur and with the sound of people shouting/cheering in a abrupt manner makes the audience see that the man is being chased creating a sense of panic and danger.

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  2. Unknown8 October 2016 at 20:09

    By using a black screen with a non-diegetic voice over narration the audience doesn’t get to see a main protagonist but we are introduced to them by being given a name from a first person narrator. Having this quickly followed by the voice over narration of news broadcasts gives the audience context to the plot line of the story. With a mixture of different voices, some louder than others in a chaotic and discordant fashion, it gives the audience a sense of the chaos happening within this introduction. When an anonymous voice says “our bones are poisoned.” We hear in their voice the pain that the people are in. The voice of Max is seemingly strong and deep, giving a sense of a strong character, but when he says “each of us in our own way was broken” his voice seems to weaken emphasising this broken and weak feeling that’s evoked from the back-story. When we hear the child say “hello” it sounds ghostly and uncomfortable, creating a parallel to this unnaturally empty setting. This unsettling and unnatural feel is enhanced when we hear the heightened sounds of the lizard scurrying away from an unknown danger. The unsettling whispers of the child and the woman are parallel with the movement of the lizard. As the lizard gets closer to the character who is assumed to be max, the whispers become louder and more frequent until the lizard is killed. Diegetic sound itself is used less frequently than non-diegetic. The diegetic sounds of the car engines and the shouts of the antagonists contrast to the emptiness of the desert in which they are driving. The non-diegetic voice over ends with the simple word “survive” which is parallel to the scene as the audience witness max being dragged away, also foreshadowing how the rest of the film will follow Max’s survival. The addition of a non-diegetic soundtrack begins to add tension in the opening scene. With low pitched strings and a subtle, continuous drum beat there is a build-up of expectance for something to happen as the drum beat progressively gets faster. The sounds of the fire and the hot brand are heightened as the sound of strings starts to come back in, preparing tension within the audience. The sound of the brand sizzling from the heat is heightened and almost sounds like screaming. The high pitched ‘squeal’ of the brand, is very discordant and makes the audience uncomfortable and brings forward the tension in the audience of waiting for something to happen. As Max breaks away from the antagonists, the drum beat once again gets faster and heavy non-diegetic piece of soundtrack to emphasise the tension of Max running away. Mixed with the diegetic shouts of the antagonists chasing Max a lot of tension is built within this opening scene just through sound alone.

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  3. Ben Davies10 October 2016 at 19:54

    At the start we begin with a black screen and we here the voice of the narrator say his name "Max" this is a non-diegetic sound, quickly after we can hear what seems to be television broadcasts which tell us about what is happening so we get a better understanding of what has happened to the world, we then hear voices from different people telling us that "Mankind has gone rogue" and how there isn't anymore water, it gives us an idea of how bad the situation is. Max's voice is very deep and croaked, it is as if he sounds upset or depressed from past experiences. We then get to see the wasteland and a child saying "Hello, Where are you", it sounds like Max is hearing things in his head also the voice is very ghostly so maybe he remembers the voice of a child who was killed, after we hear a lot more voices which appear to be in his head haunting him. We see a lizard start running towards Max, its as if the lizard has heard something frightening and is running away from it, this is where the whispers begin and they get louder as the lizard approaches max but they instantly stop when the lizard is crushed. This is a diegetic sound because we can hear Max stomp on the lizard and when he eats it we here the crunching of the bones, this is also a diegetic sound. We then get a sense of danger because Max then begins to pack his things and throw them into his car, these are more diegetic sounds. We then hear the roar of the car once it starts up and the wheel spinning in the sand, we can hear the car race off of a slope. This starts to build up a lot of tension in the audience because we are wondering what has got Max in a rush, we can hear the wind in the wasteland and then all of a sudden load engine noises race past and people cheering too. This sets the scene into action because now there is a chase, we are then shown an extreme long shot and we can hear the cars racing in the background and it gets louder as they get closer, we then hear a loud explosion and Max's car tossing and turning once he has crashed. This part is very action packed and it sends a sense of panic into the audience. After we can hear the camera go through the sand and Max trying to crawl through the sand to get away, instantly we hear non-diegetic sounds of Max narrating over what his situation is, we then hear a diegetic sound of the person loading his rifle.

    -Ben Davies

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