The Problematique of Film Music

(don't know what problematique means but jeeze - doesn't it look good?)

Martin Armiger, head of the Screen Composition Department at AFTRS posed the question - What is Wrong with Film Music? 1

While I sat in the back row, trying to play some film scores in my head and listen for their possible flaws, other people (and not all EMUers - who were these other people?) gave intelligent answers. The big one seemed to be that when films try to emulate and present a believable reality to their audience, music tracks don't fit. Real life doesn't incorporate a sound track (except for all the music people play to themselves in their lives - via ipods, cd players and so on).

It's not the same though is it? Out here in the real world, we are aware of our music. Film characters don't get to share with us the beautiful music composers write for them - they don't hear it. Is it just getting too silly to say, that the film score actually exists in our world, and not the world of the film characters because we hear it and they don't - so it is actually the film characters who populate a world without film music, and not us?

Martin discussed how film making is a clash of creative modalities (different modalities from aural class). Lots of creative people all within their own paradigmatic languages try to collaborate - with varying degrees of success. This can be disastrous for poor film composers trying to incorporate director's requirements into their musical creation. Martin reeled off a dismaying list of film composers sacked for this reason.1

Martin talked about some interesting theories on the classical and contemporary function of music in film as well as some explanations of the relationship between music and emotion. This was teasingly brief and I would love to read the book he referred to on this - Claudia Gorbman's Unheard Melodies.1

When the films rolled, Martin changed gear, he couldn't contain his love for film music. It was interesting to have his commentary on the relationship between the music and the other elements of the films. It was inspiring to see someone love music, and delight in how music works in films.

I don't know why the gruesome scene of Reservoir Dogs (which I was too chicken to actually watch after the gaffa taping) had cheesy music. Someone suggested it lightened the mood just enough so that the scene was lifted from unbearable to bearable. My theory is that the wrongness of the fit between the music and the action accentuated the wrongness of the action.

1. Martin Armiger. The Trouble With Film Music Lecture at University of Adelaide 27 August 2006