Sunday, September 15, 2013

How do film-makers manipulate our emotions with music?

In 1939, queen of Hollywood melodrama Bette Davis starred in Dark Victory - the tragic story of a wealthy party girl dying of a brain tumour.
 The audience knows that death will follow quickly after blindness. In the finale, her character's vision begins to falter and she moves slowly up a grand staircase. Davis knew this moment would secure her chance of a third Academy Award.
 She asked the director, "Who's scoring this film?" and was told it was the supremely talented Max Steiner. Steiner had composed the revolutionary score to King Kong in 1933. It was the first full Hollywood soundtrack, and one that allowed its fans to empathise with the fate of a plasticine gorilla.  Davis was a clever woman. She understood the value of a soaring musical score, but feared its ability to outshine a performance.
"Well," she declared, "either I am going up those stairs or Max Steiner is going up those stairs, but not the two of us together."
 Davis' opinion was ignored and two Oscar nominations were created in that scene.
 One for her and one for Steiner. It demonstrates the importance of music in film, and the power a soundtrack can have over audiences.

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1 comment:

parlance said...

Slavenka, thanks for this interesting link. I followed it and read the article. This might explain to me why I am so susceptible to scary movies and just can't watch them.