Product Description

The only comprehensive book on film sound, this anthology makes available for the first time and in a single volume major essays by the most respected film historians, aestheticians, and theorists of the past sixty years. In addition, it provides useful models for the analysis of sound stylistics in the form of case studies of a number of the most important sound films ever made. It is a compact primer/handbook which reviews in a coherent, rigorous, yet eminently accessible way the techniques and practices of sound filmmaking from initial recording to final playback in the theater. The book contains essays by Douglas Gomery, Barry Salt, Rick Altman, Mary Ann Doane, S. M. Eisenstein, V. I. Pudovkin, Rene´ Clair, Rudolf Arnheim, Bela Balazs, Siegfried Kracauer, Christian Metz, David Bordwell, Kristin Thompson, Noe¨l Burch, Arthur Knight, Lucy Fischer, Noe¨l Carroll, Alan Williams, Fred Camper, and others. Essays deal in detail with such filmmakers as Lubitsch, Clair, Mamoulian, Vertov, Lang, Pabst, Stahl, Welles, Hitchcock, Renoir, Bresson, Godard, Altman, and Coppola.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #463746 in Books
• Published on: 1985-04-15
• Released on: 1985-08-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 462 pages

Review
An extremely useful and wide-ranging collection of essays devoted to a topic often ignored or taken for granted by visually-dominated studies of the moving picture... -- Review

Review

"An extremely useful and wide-ranging collection of essays devoted to a topic often ignored or taken for granted by visually-dominated studies of the moving picture..." -- Gerald Mast, University of Chicago

About the Author

Elizabeth Weis is associate professor of Film at Brooklyn College, City University of New York.

John Belton is assistant professor of Film at Columbia University.

Customer Reviews

Table of Contents
Part I. History, Technology, and Aesthetics

Introduction
The Coming of Sound: Technological Change in the American Film Industry, by Douglas Gomery
Economic Struggle and Hollywood Imperialism: Europe Converts to Sound, by Douglas Gomery
Film Style and Technology in the Thirties: Sound, by Barry Salt
The Evolution of Sound Technology, by Rick Altman
Ideology and the Practice of Sound Editing and Mixing, by Mary Ann Doane
Technology and Aesthetics of Film Sound, by John Belton

Part II: Theory

Section 1: Classical Sound Theory
A Statement, by S. M. Eisenstein, V. I. Pudovkin, and G. V. Alexandrov
Asynchronism as a Principle of Sound Film, by V. I. Pudovkin
The Art of Sound, by René Clair
Manifesto: Dialogue on Sound, by Basil Wright and B. Vivian Braun
Sound in Films, by Alberto Cavalcanti
A New Laocoön: Artistic Composites and the Talking Film, by Rudolph Arnheim
Theory of Film: Sound, by Bela Balazs
Dialogue and Sound, by Siegfried Kracauer
Slow-Motion Sound, by Jean Epstein

Section 2: Modern Sound Theory
Notes on Sound, by Robert Bresson
Direct Sound: An Interview with, by Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet
Aural Objects, by Christian Metz
The Voice in the Cinema: The Articulation of Body and Space, by Mary Ann Doane

Part III: Practice

Section I: Practice and Methodology
Fundamental Aesthetics of Sound in the Cinema, by David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson
On the Structural Use of Sound, by Noël Burch

Section 2: Pioneers
The Movies Learn to Talk: Ernst Lubitsch, René Clair, and Rouben Mamoulian, by Arthur Knight
American Sound Films, 1926-1930,, by Ron Mottram
Applause: The Visual and Acoustic Landscape, by Lucy Fischer
Enthusiasm: From Kino-Eye to Radio Eye, by Lucy Fischer
Lang and Pabst: Paradigms for Early Sound Practice, by Noël Carroll
The Voice of Silence: Sound Style in John Stahl's Back Street, by Martin Rubin

Section 3: Stylists
Orson Welles' Use of Sound, by Penny Mintz
The Evolution of Hitchcock's Aural Style and Sound in The Birds, by Elisabeth Weis
The Sound Track of The Rules of the Game, by Michael Litle
Sound in Bresson's Mouchette, by Lindley Hanlon
Godard's Use of Sound, by Alan Williams
Section 4: Contemporary Innovators
Altman, Dolby, and the Second Sound Revolution, by Charles Schreger
Sound Mixing and Apocalypse Now: An Interview with Walter Murch, by Frank Paine
The Sound Designer, by Marc Mancini
Sound and Silence in Narrative and Nonnarrative Cinema, by Fred Camper