Beck focuses on the late sixties and early seventies, a period often overlooked in film histories, when there was a break in the homogeneous output of the film industry as studio styles, genres, and narrative centrality weakened along with the industry, which gave filmmakers the freedom to explore new forms of representation in their chosen images and sounds. He examines a number of films and filmmakers who actively sought to change the landscape of American film during this period, reflecting a unique approach to film sound use and the possibility for either adapting previous techniques to new uses or the development of entirely new procedures. Nearly every example combines an awareness of the role of sound technicians and the enhanced recording and mixing technology that allowed sound practitioners to advance the syntax of film sound in their pictures. He offers a compendium of advances in the use of sound in American pictures, commensurate changes in sound practices, and the resultant aesthetics that emerged during the decade. Annotation ©2016 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR (protoview.com)
Designing Sound demonstrates how Francis Ford Coppola, Robert Altman, and other groundbreaking American directors of the 1970s possessed not only visionary eyes, but also keen ears that enabled them to take cinematic sound design in innovative directions. Offering detailed case studies of key films and filmmakers, Jay Beck explores how sound design was central to the eras experimentation with new modes of cinematic storytelling and aesthetic sensibilities, from the lyricism of Terrence Malick to the gritty realism of Martin Scorsese.
The late 1960s and 1970s are widely recognized as a golden age for American film, as directors like Francis Ford Coppola, George Lucas, and Martin Scorsese expanded the Hollywood model with aesthetically innovative works. As this groundbreaking new study reveals, those filmmakers were blessed with more than just visionary eyes; Designing Sound focuses on how those filmmakers also had keen ears that enabled them to perceive new possibilities for cinematic sound design.
Offering detailed case studies of key films and filmmakers, Jay Beck explores how sound design was central to the eras experimentation with new modes of cinematic storytelling. He demonstrates how sound was key to many directors signature aesthetics, from the overlapping dialogue that contributes to Robert Altmans naturalism to the wordless interludes at the heart of Terrence Malicks lyricism. Yet the book also examines sound design as a collaborative process, one where certain key directors ceded authority to sound technicians who offered significant creative input.
Designing Sound provides readers with a fresh take on a much-studied era in American film, giving a new appreciation of how artistry emerged from a period of rapid industrial and technological change. Filled with rich behind-the-scenes details, the book vividly conveys how sound practices developed by 1970s filmmakers changed the course of American cinema.
