I noticed that in Bride and Prejudice there is a similar scene of Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett coming together in rain. Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and Martin Henderson play it in Bride and Prejudice while Kiera Knightley and Matt Mcfadyen play it in Pride and Prejudice. The bollywood version uses the rain scene to show her change and her new love for Darcy. She realizes she likes him and not the other guy who ends up being a bad guy. She sings in the rain but it is a quick clip. It being so short makes this scene less drama filled and romantic. It is interesting that the filmmaker made this scene so short because it is an important moment for character development and moving the plot along.

Unlike the bollywood version, the film Pride and Prejudice (Wright, 2005), the rain scene is longer making it more intense and emotional. It is in England ands shows the beautiful landscape behind and the characters which is more relatable to the Jane Austin novel. In the Bride and Prejudice, there is a different adaptation and the setting is in India and California, much different than the book.

Going back to the scene in Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth ran away and see’s Darcy, it is a long moment and intense moment. They fight and make up. This scene is more dramatic because of the rain and how it is cut showing Darcy and Elizabeth back and forth. There is much more romance and feeling to it. It brings the audience in the moment. I liked this adaptation of the moment better than in Bride and Prejudice because it is more romantic and drawn out.

The use of color in Gurinder Chadha’s film Bride and Prejudice was beautifully done. This specific element of mise-en-scène gave greater meanings to certain scenes in the movie.

The first example is how every time we were in India everyone was always dressed in very bright colors and the sun was always shinning. While in America, people were dressed in duller attire. I think the purpose of these color contrasts was to show that when in America the main characters, who are from India originally, saw it as a foreign place that was not their home and one that they did not wish to move to like Lalita’s friend.

The color worn by the characters were also used to express their moods. For example, Lalita wore a white gown to her friends wedding in America. In America, white is seen as a color of purity where in India it is seen as a color of mourning. Lalita wears the color white to show that she is sad after William appears to have a girlfriend.

It is amazing how something as simple as colors can give a different meaning to a movie.

http://nofilmschool.com/2012/09/reinventing-the-movie-musical-recording-live-performances-with-les-miserables

I found this article about how sound was recorded for Les Miserables, the 2012 musical starring Hugh Jackman, Anne Hathaway, and Russell Crowe (the best part of the article is the video that it features interviews with the cast discussing what the process of singing live was).

I think that it is interesting to compare a musical film like Les Miserables to Bride and Prejudice, not only to compare style and production values, but also to see how the songs were recorded and featured in the film. In Bride and Prejudice, all of the songs were pre-recorded and laid over the visual footage of the film, so the actors had to mime what they were “singing” on film while shooting. Even though that makes the sound a little more polished, the visuals can get a little funky when the lyrics don’t always sync up perfectly with the actor’s lips (it can occasionally look a little cheesy).

On the other hand, Les Miserables goes for somewhat of a more natural, Broadway-style approach by having the actor’s sing live, and while this is pretty interesting, it also sets up enormous risks and imperfections in the performances. The voices and music may not sound as impeccable as they would in a recording studio, but maybe that is what the film was going for. Either way, their decision to use live-footage of the singers was hit-or-miss with audience members, some who found it a fantastic divergence from traditional musical styles, while others found it too distracting. It is an interesting take on making a musical regardless and it would be interesting to see if more movies will take this approach in the future.

I thought it was really interesting how they talked about how the music in musicals play a vital role to help the viewer bring the two characters together. In musicals, it almost seems like the actual music plays a character. It unifies and brings two very different characters together. I don’t typically watch musicals, but in the few that I have watched I have noticed that it can start off with two different characters and shows them individually, but the music these two characters sing bring them together. It makes to seemingly opposites seem similar. I think music plays a very key role in movies and loved the explanation and examples in this article.

In Bride and Prejudice, I noticed that there were some signs referring to Hinduism. In the scene where all the girls are singing in the streets about how happy they are that their friends is getting married and moving to Britain, I noticed they showed a store that was named Vishnu. Vishnu is a Hindu god who is known as the preserver and is commonly seen with a halo around his finger. I thought it was interesting the director decided to show this. Vishnu is the preserver of the religion and it almost like the director was trying to say that the girl getting married to a nice European boy is preserving the Indian culture by marrying a nice, wealthy man, but she is also still staying faithful to her indigenous culture.

I thought the video we watched in class a few day ago about the foley artists was awesome. I learned a lot about how much sound really can add to a movie/ cartoon. I thought it was very cool how the sounds from these cartoons came from objects that had nothing to do with the sounds in which they were producing. When I used to watch cartoons, I never perceived the sound of the wind, footsteps, and other subtle sounds to be anything other than what they were in the cartoon. The fact that elaborate objects were created to imitate these sounds is truly amazing. Sometimes when I heard the sound from the object, it was hard for me to picture what sound it was supposed to be representing. When the sound was synchronized to the image however, it became clear and really helped emphasize the actions of the characters. I also couldn’t believe that someone ever was able to come up with the idea of hanging a slinky from a ladder to create the Star Wars laser gun sound.

As Birdman has just won best picture, I think it is appropriate to comment on an interesting aspect of the movie; its use of the long take. After watching the behind the scenes of Children of Men, it is obvious the amount of preparation and precision that is needed to pull a scene like this off. This scene however was only 4 minutes. Birdman was filmed over 90 minutes with what seemed to be one long take.  According to an article, however, while there were very long takes used, the director was able to use tricks to make it seem like there were no cuts throughout the entirety of the movie. For example, they would cut in the middle of a pan, which made the scene look seamless to the viewer. I thought this was a very cool and unique aspect that really added to the movie. http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/movies/a30653/birdman-movie-tracking-shot/

After reading the sound article by Steven Johnson, I am amazed about how sound transformed into what it is today. Something I found interesting is how many inventors imagined how their inventions would be used in the future of society. For example, Leon Scott de Martinsville invented the phonautograph, which would etch out waves according to what was said into the hornlike apparatus. Scott thought that in the future, we would learn how to read these waves, almost like a second language. This was a good idea in the sense that it could transcribe what a person was saying; however, it had a shortfall in that no one was going to learn a new language to read it.

Another interesting example was the thought Edison and Bell had for their invention’s future usage. Edison had invented the phonograph as a way of sending audio letters through the postal system. Bell had envisioned the telephone as a way of listening to music, with an orchestra on one side of the line and the person on the other. These two inventions were actually used for reversed reasons. The telephone was used for communication, while the phonograph was used to listen to music.

Steven Johnson’s article on sound helps to demonstrate the importance of sound in film and media. Johnson’s writing explores the history of sound technology and the role that different advancements have played in shaping society. Through this holistic approach, we can more thoroughly understand why sound is such a paramount aspect of film. It was interesting to read that when sound was initially introduced to film, it was seen as a sort of corrupting influence that devalued the experience. This sharply contrasts with the usage of sound in today’s media, where the viewer’s relationship with a film is forcefully guided by the sound tracks that accompany the film’s visual elements. Johnson describes the history of the first radio devices and how they were ill-suited for transmitting opera music, but were able to play jazz music with considerable efficacy. His explanation of the radio’s influence on making jazz music more readily available is quite striking. The idea that the radio allowed for the injection of jazz music into US households, which resulted in an increased appreciation for the black community from white citizens, is quite noteworthy. The article goes on to explain how jazz was instrumental in dissolving racial barriers between whites and blacks by allowing them to bond over their mutual appreciation of jazz music. This example illustrates human’s inherent attraction to sound, as well as their primal inclination to be affected by sounds which they find to be moving.

These examples can be applied back to sound in the context of film. As a class, we watched some of the many ways that sounds can be generated for a film with various household items. It was surprising to see that many of the sounds in the advanced animated film Wall-E were not generated by computers, but were made using common items like springs and other noise making devices. The fact that these sounds are still generated by analogue means speaks to the importance of having a realistic and relatable soundtrack. Wall-E’s directors explained that the importance of sound was central to their film, as there was no spoken dialogue. Each of the character’s squeaks and bodily adjustments had to convey some sort of emotion that would normally be accomplished with dialogue. When studying film and media, its easy to focus on cinematography, themes, and acting techniques. However, sound is such a central aspect of human perception that a well-orchestrated soundtrack almost accomplished more by being not noticed. Realistic sounds are taken for granted in that they align effectively with a film’s visuals to realistically portray what is occurring on screen.

Despite extraordinary advances in film and audio technology, many aspects of film soundtracks are added in during the editing process. Sometimes a microphone’s recording of a car driving off is less favorable than a sound that is added in post-production. This is very interesting, as many of the sounds we experience in films are not accurate. An example of this would be the prevalence of tire screeching whenever a character gets in a car and drives off in a hurry. Its noteworthy that sound engineers play such an interesting role in mediating our perceptions of a film through their tactful application of sound effects.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBgghnQF6E4

Mickey-Mousing–overillustrating the action through the musical score, drawn from the conventions of composing for cartoons. An example of mickey-mousing is accompanying a character walking on tiptoe with music played by plucked strings.

Since we watched The Sandman the other day in class to see how music and sound editing play a key role in animation (particularly in terms of setting the scene or story), I thought it would be cool to show Steamboat Willie, which was the very first animated short to feature sound, paving the way for future animated works.

Most of you have probably either seen or heard of Steamboat Willie, because this was one of the very first Mickey Mouse cartoons and is considered one of the best pieces of animation. Debuting in 1928, the film was an enormous hit, not only because of its achievements in animation (for the time, the quality was considered “fluid”), but its in contributions to sound editing. Walt Disney was a firm believer that sound was important in telling a story, and even though buying the sound equipment and working with composers was incredibly expensive for an animation studio at the time, it was a worthwhile and groundbreaking investment.

While the animation itself is humorous, all of the actions are heightened and dramatized by the sounds that accompany them. Sure, in the real world bodies can’t stretch like Mr. Fantastic and then return to normal, so there wouldn’t be a sound that really corresponds with that. But in animation, the sound of a stretching rubber band can do a a great job of making this impossible action seem believable and understandable to an audience. Disney Studios combined an actual score with musical instruments, minor voice acting (provided by Walt Disney himself), and a variety of random household objects in order to make a convincing and entertaining story through sound. Each action would be entertaining on its own, but without the sounds they would be far less convincing. Some of the sounds are a little over the top, but they help to solidify this fake world.

Disney Animation Studios continued perfecting this technique for a few years, experimenting in a couple of shorts and eventually making Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1937), which was the first fully-animated feature film, that also contained sound. Since then, Disney has been well-known for their ability to combine music and imagery to tell a powerful story. When they eventually branched into musicals (which includes all of our favorite 90s movies like The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Lion King, Aladdin), they knew that not only could they make the songs catchy and relatable, but they could be used to tell the story of the film more effectively. They’ve come a long way since Steamboat Willie (the sound effects are a little more realistic and less “cartoonish”), but looking back, we can still appreciate this short film for introducing a new way to look at sound in film.