Marco
Bellano (Università degli Studi di Padova)
Abstract
Studies
on film music have often overlooked the difference between the
audiovisual
strategies of sound cinema and the ones of silent cinema. However,
there
are at least two audiovisual strategies which are peculiar to silent cinema: a
›bridge‹
function born from the improvisational nature of silent film music
practice,
and a ›interdiegetic‹ function, which takes advantage of the impossibility
to
hear the sounds of the world seemingly positioned beyond the silver screen.
This
paper
comments upon these two strategies. A succinct review of the literature that
already
acknowledged the existence of these strategies, mostly in an indirect way
(from
Ricciotto Canudo to Sebastiano Arturo Luciani, Edith Lang and George
West)
leads to the discussion of examples from historical musical illustrations of
silents
(e.g. one by Hugo Riesenfeld for Cecil B. DeMille’s CARMEN, USA 1915)
as
well as from contemporary ones (e. g. Neil Brand’s 2004 music for THE CAT
AND
THE CANARY, USA 1927, Paul Leni). The change in reception conditions of
silent
films between the early 20th century and the present days is certainly
relevant;
however, this paper does not aim to offer an insight into cultural-historical
context
and reception, but to point out how the silent film language invited
composers
in different periods to develop a set of audiovisual strategies that are
identical
on a theoretical level.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 46
The
renaissance of silent film studies that started more than thirty years ago1
had
only a minor impact on film music theory. Silent film music has often
been
regarded just as a vehicle of a ›primitive‹ audiovisual aesthetic,
waiting
for the ›evolution‹ into sound film music (Lissa 1965, 98). As Tom
Gunning
wrote this is »a biological and teleological logic« (Gunning 1996,
71)
that conceives the later styles of cinema as »a sort of natural norm that
early
cinema envisioned but was not yet capable of realizing because of
technological
and economic immaturity and a natural need for a period of
development
guided by a method of trial and error« (Gunning, 1996, 71-72).
However,
whereas contemporary studies about the visual aspects of cinema
consistently
dismiss such a logic, following the work of theorists such as
Gunning,
André Gaudreault, Richard Abel, Noël Burch and Charles Musser,
the
field of film music studies is still indulging in this old perspective. At
least,
Rick Altman said in 2004 that »[i]t is time to include sound in silent
cinema’s
historiographical revival« (Altman 2004, 9); however, no one
spoke
about such a revival in the studies about theory and aesthetics of
silent
film music.
1
The main events that marked the beginning of this renaissance were the 1978
FIAF
international
conference Cinema 1900-1906 and the presentation of Kevin
Brownlow’s
reconstruction of Abel Gance’s NAPOLÉON (France, 1927), in two
versions.
The first one, produced by the British Film Institute and by the Images
Film
Archives in association with Thames Television, had a projection speed of 20
frames
per second (fps) and a new original score by Carl Davis; it had its debut at
the
Telluride Film Festival in September 1979, and it was then reprised on
November
30, 1980 at the London Film Festival. The second version had a
projection
speed of 24 fps and music by Carmine Coppola; it debuted at the Radio
City
Music Hall in New York in January 1981. See Brownlow 1981;
Holman/Gaudreault
1982; Carl Davis in Brand 1998, p. 93.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 47
1.
Historical descriptions of audiovisual strategies
specific
to silent films
The
present instruments of film music theory surely allow to delve deeper
into
the field of the music for silent films. It is true that many audiovisual
strategies
are shared between silent and sound cinema. However, the
different
nature of the two kinds of audiovisual entertainment gives
profoundly
different meanings to strategies which seem to be identical only
on
a superficial level.
Two
peculiar audiovisual strategies will be discussed here: a ›bridge‹
function,
born from the improvisational roots of silent film music practice
(which
in its maturity relied more on compilation, though, while
improvisation
itself was based on a sort of extemporary ›compilation‹ of a
known
musical repertoire), and an ›interdiegetic‹ function, which takes
advantage
of the impossibility to hear the sounds of the world seemingly
positioned
beyond the silver screen. Both these strategies have a common
purpose:
to create unity in the discourse of the images. They seem to
respond
to a necessity to counterbalance the ›fragmentary‹ aspect of the
spectacle
which, even before the advent of the classic style of montage, was
a
primary concern for filmmakers and audiences. Cinema was fragmentary
even
in the age of the ›single-shot‹ films (approximately 1895-1903),
because
it selected a portion of the visual space. The various and notorious
accounts
of peasants scared to death by the vision of heads floating in the
dark
of the cinema hall could be remembered as funny yet meaningful
evidence
of this problem.
My
exploration starts from a succinct review of the historical literature that
already
acknowledged the existence of these strategies, mostly in an indirect
way.
Examples of these strategies will be given by quoting historical
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 48
musical
illustrations of silents as well as contemporary ones, which,
notwithstanding
the relevant differences in the way silent cinema is today
received
and understood by audiences, still invite composers to develop
audiovisual
devices which seem identical to the ones used by historical
composers,
on a theoretical level.
It
is true that, especially during the early period (1895 – ca. 1907), film
music
did not spoil the audience with refined examples of audiovisual
interactions.
Even if the popular story of the birth of film music2 − because
of
the necessity to hide the noise coming from the Geneva drive mechanism
and
the sprockets of the projector − is today regarded just as a legend
(Simeon
1995, 18-19), many accounts report how often music stayed in the
cinema
hall just to entertain the ear, without paying much attention to the
moving
images. In a 1913 editorial of the monthly magazine The
Metronome,
a cinema pianist from London admitted that some of his
colleagues
would »simply strum a waltz or rag-time through, and go on to
the
end of it, whether people in the pictures are dying or marrying […]«
(Anderson
2004, 175).3 Actually, many of the venues where cinema was
screened
during the silent age could not afford high-level professionals at
the
piano or holding the baton (Simeon, 1995, 117), even during the
›maturity‹
of the silents, when big cities in Europe and, especially, in
America,
hosted deluxe musical presentations in extravagantly baroque
movie
palaces (Beynon 1921, 13; Hampton 1970 [1931], 172; Herzog 1981,
15;
Anderson 1988, xv-xxvi). While these expensive presentations often
relied
upon original compositions or lush and eccentric compilations of
2
The work that is at the origin of the diffusion of this legend is London, 1970
[1936],
28.
3
Development of the Picture-Pianist. In: The Metronome 29:7 (July 1913).
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 49
staples
from the symphonic repertory (Cavalcanti 1939, 100; Anderson
1988,
xxiv-xxv), as was the case at the Regent, Strand and Capitol theatres
in
New York, the routine in the smaller centers consisted of compilations of
piano
pieces (on the basis of repertoires or cue sheets), or of free
improvisation,
which did not mean free extemporary creation of music but,
more
likely an extemporary assemblage of pieces from a certain musician’s
repertoire.
When the word ›improvisation‹ is used to speak about the silent
film
music practice, it should always be understood with the meaning
explained
by Sergio Miceli (as it is in this article):
Everyone
relied upon their own repertoire, reading the
music
or playing by heart, with little and more or less
questionable
adjustments to the film. So it should not be
excluded
that the definition [of improvisation], especially
when
used by a musician, was used as a reference more
to
the etymological root than to the musical practice,
identifying
thus a performance staged with an
improvisational
mindset, that is to say without
preliminary
preparation. (Miceli, 2009, 40)
Witnessing
the prevalence of this kind of ›improvisational‹ practices, which
did
not possess the ability to relate to the images in a precise way, several
early
theorists were induced to underline how film music did not really have
any
further function beyond the creation of a distraction from the otherwise
unreal
silence of the spectacle. In 1913, Ernst Bloch argued that the blackand-
white
world shown by cinema had the »lugubrious appearance of a
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 50
solar
eclipse«4 (quoted after Simeon 1995, 19): it was a mute reality,
deprived
of many sensorial perceptions. The music, in his opinion, was there
just
to »provide a substitution of all the missing senses« (ibid.). Later, Béla
Balázs
indirectly agreed with Bloch, when he said that
a
great part of the audience, in the cinema hall, is not
aware
of the music; its existence is acknowledged just
when
it stops. From a psychological point of view, this
phenomenon
can be explained as follows: the human
being
does not normally perceive the reality with a single
sense.
The things we only see, we only hear, etc., do not
have
the aspect of a three-dimensional reality (Balázs,
1975
[1948], 328; my translation).
So,
for the sake of these basic purposes a continuous improvisation, even if
not
conceived carefully to match or illustrate the images, would have been
enough.
However, improvisation in the literal sense might not be the only
factor
responsible for comments such as the ones by Bloch and Balázs. In
fact,
the influence of improvisational practices also on the other musical
routines
of silent cinema was a relevant one: so, it was possible to perceive a
certain
›detachment‹ between music and images also in, for example,
written
compilations. Even the original scores that started to be composed
since
1905-19085 and flourished during the 1920s retained some traits of
4
Bloch, Ernst (1913) Über die Melodie im Kino. In: Die Argonauten (my
translation).
5
Among the first films to be paired with original scores were LA MALIA DELL’ORO
(Italy
1905, Gaston Velle), NOZZE TRAGICHE (Italy 1906, Gaston Velle) and
ROMANZO
DI UN PIERROT (Italy 1906, Mario Caserini, Filoteo Alberini, Dante
Santoni),
with music by Romolo Bacchini, that preceded Camille Saint-Saëns’ work
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 51
improvisation.
The fact that silent film music was prevalently a matter of
live
performances reinforced the connection with improvisation. As Philip
Alperson
argued,
musical
improvisation can be appreciated for some of the
same
values as can the action of musical performances in
the
conventional musical situation. In particular, one can
appreciate
the improviser’s sensitivity, lyricism and
general
virtuosity as an instrumentalist or vocalist which
we
associate with the narrower sense of musical
performance
(Alperson 1984, 23).
This
means that a performance always offers the musician a certain degree
of
freedom, freedom that could be used to add something to the information
contained
in the written score which is being played. However, this is just
the
weaker bond between written silent film music and the practice of
improvisation.
In fact, to improvise for the silents, as mentioned before,
usually
involved a creative assemblage of pieces, generated from the
memory
and sensibility of the player while the film was screened. The use
of
fragments from a repertory is absolutely not in contrast with the idea of
improvisation:
as Alperson noticed, »learning to improvise is often, in large
part,
learning to master that tradition. Jazz musicians, for example,
frequently
begin to learn to improvise by listening to and copying […] other
players’
musical phrases […] many of which have long ago attained the
status
of formulae […]« (Alperson 1984, 22). The key feature of this basic
for
L’ASSASSINAT DU DUC DE GUISE (France 1908, André Calmettes, Charles Le
Bargy).
See Redi 1999, 54.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 52
aspect
of the improvisation is thus repetition: of a phrase, of a melody or of
a
longer formula within a piece, or in different pieces referring to similar
situations.
It
is possible to ascertain how − even in the most sophisticated scores for the
silents
− repetitions and formulas remain relevant features: This is the
stronger
link between the written practice of silent film music and
improvisation,
a link that involves the musical material at a deeper level.
This
independence of silent film music from the on-screen action due to live
performance
and improvisational features was embedded in the discourse of
other
early silent film music theorists. Many of the discussions reaffirmed
that,
at the core, music for silent films is not something that plays with the
film,
but, in a sense, next to the film. However, together with this largely
diffused
opinion, an acknowledgement that silent film music could play a
more
active part in the cinematographic communication started to spread.
The
Italian critic and theorist Sebastiano Arturo Luciani wrote in 1919:
The
music that was played during silent film screenings
was
of two kinds: it included suites of marches and
dances,
or pieces with a dramatic lyricism, usually taken
from
famous operas. The first kind had a rhythmic
function,
the second one was expressive. The two kinds
were
alternatively used, whether the action had a
dynamic
or pathetic character, that is to say whether the
music
should unify a group of scenes or should express a
particular
feeling in a certain scene. (Luciani 1980
[1919],
356; my translation)
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 53
Luciani
recognized at least two active relations between music and moving
images.
However, he added:
All
the compositions especially written for cinema
screening
still have not had any success and their role
was
not different from the one of the music improvised
by
the anonymous pianist we usually listen to: to fill the
void
that the silent vision would produce. (Luciani 1980
[1919],
357)
This
idea is reflected in Luciani’s definition of the so-called ›rhythmic‹
function:
He does not say that the music follows the visual rhythms of the
film,
but rather that it unifies a group of scenes. He was probably imagining
audiovisual
situations in which a series of similarly paced actions share
common
musical ideas conveying a similar pace, without precise
connections
with the details of what was happening on screen. However,
even
if Luciani considered this feature as a hindrance to cinema, it is evident
that
he implicitly admits how music could enhance the perception of a film,
at
least by underlining a relevant visual characteristic (the rhythm) and
creating
a stronger sense of unification for a section of the spectacle. The
result
is already an active audiovisual relationship, one in which music is
not
just an adjunct to the image, but a contributive element.
Other
voices in the early debates about film music agreed with Luciani in
testifying
how even the most generic musical choices could benefit silent
film
presentations, often by aiding the unity of the visual discourse. That
happened
also in respect to the other audiovisual function identified by
Luciani,
the ›expressive one‹. The way in which the music conveyed
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 54
consistent
moods and emotions through different situations on screen could
also
serve as a means of expressive unification. The 1920 manual Musical
Accompaniment
of Moving Pictures by Edith Lang and George West
observed
how the nature of the spectacle (based on performance and with
improvised
features) would not allow constant close correspondence
between
image and sound. The music was required to be ›generic‹, and to
use
this necessity to become a unifier of different visual elements. Even if
the
authors recommended a »close and minute following of every phase of
the
photo play« (Lang/West 1920, 5), they had to admit that »[m]usic, it
may
as well be stated, cannot always shift as quickly as will the facial play
of
the actor in some scene or other. It will then behoove the player to give
the
keynote of the situation with illustrative strains« (Lang/West 1920, 5).
This
quotation introduced a key word in silent film music practice:
illustration.
As it was used in one of the most authoritative historical texts
about
silent film music theory and practice, the 1927 Allgemeines
Handbuch
der Filmmusik by Hans Erdmann, Giuseppe Becce and Ludwig
Brav,
it perfectly identified the two conflicting sides of this art. To illustrate
a
film with music meant a dependence of the music on the meanings of the
images.
However, it also meant that, within this dependence, the music was
asked
just to draw an overall sketch of the rhythmic or expressive content of
the
images. This is demonstrated by the structure of the Allgemeines
Handbuch
der Filmmusik itself, which subdivides its repertoire into
categories
marked by generic labels alluding to moods or situations, which
could
occur in any film. This choice guaranteed a maximum of versatility to
the
Handbuch. However, it also allowed musicians to stick with generic
image-sound
relationships, with no urge to introduce more detailed and
specific
interactions. It might be possible to describe the musical illustration
in
this way: If the precision of some audiovisual relationships in sound
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 55
cinema
can be compared to the accurateness of a still life or a portrait, the
overall
audiovisual bond in silent cinema has frequently the expressive
freedom
of a drawing done by memory. This is a key distinction between the
aesthetic
of silent film music and the one of music for sound films; however,
this
is also the aspect of silent film music that was most misunderstood. As
Ennio
Simeon remarked, even Erdmann, Becce and Brav were induced to
overlook
the creative potential of the audiovisual setting of silent film
because
of a conception of the musical illustration that was too rigid. They
believed
that because of the unavailability of a mechanical and fixed musicimage
synchronization,
even written scores could just hope for a role as
»author’s
illustration« (Becce/Brav/Erdmann 1927, I, 6). Because of that,
Simeon
commented:
The
limit of Erdmann and Becce’s setting is […] never
going
beyond the basic assumption which says that silent
film
music has always and only to illustrate: the
prohibition,
even at a theoretical level, of an active and
interactive
role of the sound element is the proof of a
belief
in a subordination of music to film and of a
confinement
of it in a role of subsidiary art, a belief
which
would not fail to retain an influence for decades
and
that it is still not completely gone (Simeon, 1987, 76;
my
translation).
Instead,
the ›freedom‹ of the musical element in silent cinema does not
imply
its complete passivity. The fact that the music can relate to the film by
freely
spreading over the images without too strict obligations to the
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 56
rhythms
and the moods is an element of peculiar richness. French critic
Arthur
Hoérée wrote in 1934 a few meaningful considerations about this
topic
and imagined an example:
Music
is based on continuity, on the developments of
themes,
following rules of its own. The film, on the
contrary,
has to continuously break this continuity […]. It
works
by contrast, while the music works by extension.
[…]
Let’s imagine an episode where on one side there is
an
aviator caught in a storm and on another side, as to
underline
the contrast, there is his family happily
preparing
for his return. If the director opposes eight
times
these elements, as to stress the pathetic content of
the
situation, the music should alternatively declaim The
King
of the Elves by Schubert and murmur the Pastoral
Symphony
by Beethoven… It is evident how it is
necessary
to seek a mixed solution […]. It should be
sufficient
to conceive a piece which is generally agitated
[…]
in order to comment upon the struggle between the
aviator
and the raging elements. The violins, however,
could
sing a happy theme combined with the rest of the
polyphony.
Such a music could accompany the two series
of
sights […] and combine them in a sort of synthesis.
The
simultaneity of the sound is here more correct than
the
film, as the two groups of images show simultaneous
situations.
So the music fixes the conventional character
of
the film, it completes it or, better, it explains it
(Hoérée,
1934, 46-47; my translation).
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 57
By
following these suggestions, it is possible to argue that when the lack of
tight
bonds between music and the moving image was used with creative
purpose,
it paved the way for effective audiovisual settings that sound film
could
not exactly replicate because of its different audiovisual nature (e. g.
because
of the creation of an expectation in the audience for diegetic or
nondiegetic
sounds, using Claudia Gorbman’s terminology [Gorbman 1987,
22-26]:
a kind of expectation which was not part of the experience of the
silent
film moviegoer).
2.
The ›bridge‹ function
It
seems suitable to refer to the first audiovisual relationship discussed here
as
›bridge function‹. It is directly related to the capability of silent film
music
to freely expand over different sequences. At the origin of the
›bridge‹
function there surely are musical routines related to improvisation,
and
to improvisation done with a lack of attention or accuracy in particular.
Before
becoming a conscious audiovisual strategy, the ›bridge‹ function
could
often have been the result of the work of a lazy or tired pianist, who
kept
repeating a certain musical mood or episode without concern for the
images
on the screen.
In
fact, evidence of the presence of a ›bridge‹ function in cue sheets,
compilations
or full scores is actually the repetition. The prevalent
dramaturgical
model appears as follows: a certain visual or narrative
element,
with some form of relevance, triggers a musical episode which is
pertinent
to the content of the scene. For instance, if there is a sad scene, a
sad
music starts. At the beginning, the audiovisual setting is quite
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 58
conventional.
It could be identified with one of the two basic functions that
Sergio
Miceli identifies in film music as a whole, that is to say:
accompaniment
and commentary (Miceli 2009, 632-635), which more or
less
coincide with the two options suggested by Luciani, the »rhythmic
function«
and the »expressive function«. As the film continues, however, the
on-screen
action distances itself from the musical element. The music keeps
repeating
the same idea (a theme, or also a little piece with a simple
structure),
with no or little developments or variations. The monotony of the
sound
retains thus a memory of the visual element from which the
repetitions
started, until a new relevant feature of the film requires a change
in
the music.
Many
pertinent examples of that could be quoted from Hugo Riesenfield’s
illustration
for CARMEN (USA 1915, Cecil B. DeMille), reconstructed in
1991
by Gillian B. Anderson and based on music by Georges Bizet
(Anderson
2005).6 One instance is the sequence of the fight between José
and
lieutenant Zuniga, a sequence that culminates in the killing of the latter.
When
José and Carmen enter a tavern, a place where they are going to meet
the
smugglers and Zuniga, the music introduces the Danse bohémienne from
the
Suite La jolie fille de Perth. The apparent function is the one of a
comment
(or an expressive function): the graceful mood of the melody is
connected
with the romantic undertones of the entrance of José and Carmen
together.
These undertones will be the cause of Zuniga’s scorn and of the
6
The musical material of this illustration mainly comes from the two symphonic
suites
from the opera by Georges Bizet. However, there are also some arias
(L’amour
est enfant de Bohème, La fleur que vous m’avez donnée), which Anderson
included
because some documents testify the presence of singers during the first
screenings
of the film. However, there are also quotations from other works by
Bizet,
like the two Suites from L’Arlésienne and the Suite from the opera La jolie
fille
de Perth.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 59
following
fight: notwithstanding this, the violence and the pace of the
events,
let alone the sudden mutation of the mood, do not compel the music
to
change. Instead, the score asks for an almost obsessive repetition of a
long
episode from the Danse, featuring a progressive enrichment of the
orchestration
and a modulation from B minor to F sharp major, two
elements
whose potential connection with the scene (they could vaguely
hint
at the increase of tension during the fight) is negated by the repetition
that
restores the initial aspect of the music. When the action leaves the
tavern,
the music comes to an end: the apparition of a shot of Carmen
approaching
a river is then commented by the famous Habanera from the
original
opera. So, the whole sequence appears ›bridged‹ together by a
music
that constantly reminds the audience of the reason for the fight, more
than
commenting upon the fight itself.
It
is interesting to note how in CARMEN some of the elements that most
frequently
bring a ›bridge‹ function to an end are intertitles with a
descriptive
purpose, signaling a shift from one location to another. In the
principal
document that Anderson used for her reconstruction − the piano
score
from Riesenfeld’s illustration preserved by the Library of Congress −
the
music is often accompanied by cues that explicitly ask for the repetition
of
a certain episode until the apparition of a certain intertitle, using the
formula:
»Play until Title« (Anderson 2005, 30).
Not
every use of the ›bridge‹ function is an effective one. It is in fact easy
for
this function to lose its meaning and return to its origin of passive and
inaccurate
repetition. The reason of that lies in the fact that the ›bridge‹
function
can be recognized only if framed between two other audiovisual
functions.
It is possible to argue that a ›bridge‹ function can only be defined
by
the presence and the relationship with other audiovisual settings. If the
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 60
beginning
and the ending of the ›bridge‹ do not convey a sufficient
audiovisual
meaning, the purpose of the ›bridge‹ itself becomes
inconsistent.
This is what differentiates the ›bridge‹ function of silent
cinema
from the ›continuity‹ function described by Gorbman and others in
their
discussion of sound films (Gorbman 1987, 25-26). The continuity
function
has always an explainable narrative purpose and it can use the
diegetic/nondiegetic
dialectic. It can ›bridge‹ together »two spatially
discontinuous
shots«, or it can serve as a »depth cue« by letting the same
diegetic
music play louder or softer according to the different supposed
distance
between the spectator and the sound source. But those are just two
basic
examples from a wide set of occurrences, where the continuity
function
is always »a nonrepresentational provider of relations, among all
levels
of the narration«. (Gorbman 1987, 26). Instead, the silent film
›bridge‹
function is not related to the narrative. It can sometimes have an
impact
on the narration, thus creating a continuity function, but this is a side
effect.
At its core, the ›bridge‹ function is a connecting tissue between two
other
audiovisual functions, which occur at a relevant temporal distance
from
each other. So, it is a way to fill the gap between two meaningful
associations
between image and music, disregarding the actual narrative
content
of the scenes framed by those functions. More than a function, this
is
a configuration of functions. It is necessary to keep in mind this when
analyzing
silent film music, in order to avoid confusion between this weak
and
relative, yet meaningful configuration, and mere cases of unconsidered
and
accidental repetitions. In sound cinema, the bridge function could
theoretically
be used, but it actually lost its purpose, as it became possible to
stop
the music and continue the audiovisual interactions with other sound
configuration,
or to create a shift between the diegetic and nondiegetic
levels
of sound.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 61
3.
The ›interdiegetic‹ function
A
second instance of an audiovisual strategy that is specific to silent film
can
be identified by considering precisely the relationship that exists
between
the music and the narrative world of the film: the diegesis (Genette
1976
[1972], 75; Genette 1987 [1983], 12). In order to develop this topic, it
is
first of all necessary to recall the system of »levels« of film music, as
explained
by Sergio Miceli.
Miceli
identified three levels of interaction between music and film
narrative.
The first one is the internal level: the music is »produced in the
narrative
context of the scene/sequence« (Miceli 2009, 643). It corresponds
to
an audiovisual setting that is called »diegetic music« by other authors, for
example
Claudia Gorbman (1987, 22-26) or David Bordwell and Kristin
Thompson
(2003 [1979]). Basically, it is possible to say that every
intervention
of the music that can be perceived by both the audience and the
characters
on-screen belongs to the internal level.
The
external level proposes a setting where the music is audible by the
audience,
but not by the characters (Miceli 2009, 649). Miceli argued that
there
could be two occurrences of this level: a non-critical one and a critical
one.
The non-critical external level is identified when »a musical event […]
just
confirms and reinforces the expressive content of the episode« (Miceli,
2009
651). The critical one, instead, »comments upon the episode of the
film
by using contrasting ideas and by generating a semantic short circuit
which
denies the expectations of the spectator and asks for an active role,
that
is to say an interpretative role« (Miceli 2009, 652). Even if it is possible
to
conceive a critical external level in silent film music, it seems that it did
not
belong to the historical practice. The illustrative basis of silent film
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 62
music
usually asked for parallelism and mutual reinforcement of music and
image.
Counter-examples were rather individual incidents than expressive
ideas:
as Stephen Bottomore (1995, 120) recalled, »sometimes [the pianists]
misjudged
the mood badly, and one correspondent complained in 1912: ›I
find
nothing more irritating than to have to listen to variations on Ginger,
you’re
barmy when the operator is showing a serious dramatic film‹«.
Miceli
also talks about a mediate level. This includes all the instances where
the
music is accessible within the diegesis, but is not equally audible by all
the
characters. It includes music perceived through memory of a previous
musical
event on the internal level, that is, so to say, shared with the
audience
(Miceli 2009, 654-657). Miceli uses this classification to speak
about
film music in general; however, it seems difficult to completely adapt
it
to silent film music. In fact, one of these levels cannot be found in silent
cinema:
the internal level.
The
central point of this problem lies within what Zofia Lissa already
observed
in 1965: »In silent film, the music […] was an instrument
connected
with the image itself in a purely external way« (99-100; my
translation).
In sound cinema, the definitive and unchangeable recording of
an
acoustic event in synchrony with a visual event generates the illusion of
the
internal level. The sound ›belongs‹ to the images because of a threefold
bind:
qualitative, temporal and mechanical. In fact, the link between the two
elements
does not depend only on the quality and the intensity of the sound,
which
is consistent with the expectations of the audience in relation to a
certain
visual feature, or by the simultaneous occurrence. The two elements
are
also materially related, because of their respective positions on the
soundtrack
and on the visual track of the film. This threefold bind makes the
audiovisual
relationship an obligatory one. In silent film, instead, the
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 63
mechanical
association is not a rule: usually, the film contains only a visual
track
(the sequence of frames). The qualitative association is moreover used
with
great freedom: a visual event could be associated with sounds with an
expressive
meaning, which can be achieved even if those sound effects or
musical
elements are not perfect simulations of sounds heard in everyday
life.
Finally, the synchrony could be used also in silent cinema, but it is not
compulsory.
For example, the image of a firing cannon could be
accompanied
by absolute silence: If this choice is adequately prepared and it
is
pertinent with the sense of that particular sequence, the audience would
accept
it as an expressive feature and not as if something is ›missing‹. This
could
of course also happen in sound cinema; however, in sound cinema the
silence
would be much more difficult to accept. This is because of the
implicit
agreement between the director and the audience. In sound cinema,
the
audience expects to be able to hear the sounds that come from the
narrative
world; the inaccessibility is an exception. The central reason
behind
this is the fact that in sound cinema, the most important acoustic
element
is the human voice. As Michel Chion said, the cinema after 1927
became
vococentric: the voice of the actor, which comes from the world of
the
film, must be constantly perceivable (Chion 1982, 15). In silent cinema,
the
exact opposite is true: the audience does not expect to be able to hear the
sounds
coming from within the film. While in sound cinema the triple bind
(qualitative,
temporal and mechanical) is usually an obligatory one, in silent
cinema
it is a choice.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 64
On
top of that, in silent cinema there is no fixed hierarchy of importance
between
acoustic events. The human voice, when used, is just a sound
among
the others. It could become extremely relevant in practices of silent
film
accompaniment based on lecturers and readers (Altman 2004, 55-72) or
on
more refined performances of actors, as in the case of the Japanese
benshi.
It was not, however, the dominant sound by rule.
It
is possible to comment upon this by considering a short sequence from the
film
THE CAT AND THE CANARY (USA 1927, Paul Leni) and from its
musical
score written by British composer Neil Brand in 2004. The use of
examples
from contemporary authors is justified here by the purpose of the
present
article, which does not intend to develop a discourse about the
change
in the reception of audiovisual strategies from historical audiences to
the
present day's public. The intent here is instead to point out how both
historical
and contemporary musical illustrations of silents take equally
advantage
of the absence of diegetic sound to propose audiovisual settings
based
upon an apparent diegetic ambiguity.
In
the film by Leni, while the lawyer and the housemaid Mammy Pleasant
are
arguing inside a house, the detail of an unknown hand knocking at the
door
is superimposed to the frame. The two characters react to this, so it is
implied
that they heard the knocking. The audience, on the other hand, is not
supposed
to hear anything. A causal relationship between the events derives
from
the visual superimposition alone. Neil Brand, however, decided to join
the
image of the hand knocking with the rhythmic sound of a kettle drum.
That
was an expressive choice, evidently aimed to reinforce the already
evident
meaning of the images. Even without the synchrony with the kettle
drum,
the sequence would have been perfectly understood by the spectator.
In
sound cinema, instead, the silence or the absence of synchrony would
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 65
have
added a sense of strangeness and unreality to the sequence. On the
contrary,
the presence of this synchrony in a silent film, precisely because it
was
not strictly necessary, becomes a way to emphasize the expressive
meaning
of the image: in this case, the image of the hand becomes
particularly
ominous and unsettling.
Even
with such a short example, it is possible to understand how silent
cinema
learnt to take advantage of the absence of a diegetic level of the
sound.
One of the most interesting results of this premise is a function that
could
be called ›interdiegetic‹, or ›interlevel‹ function. It is a function that
uses
the freedom of association between music and image in silent cinema
to
create situations in which the music is simultaneously extraneous and in
relation
to the diegesis, in a way different from sound cinema because of the
different
basis of its communicative agreement with the audience. The term
›metadiegetic‹
could be used as well; however, it has already come into use
in
film music analysis through Gorbman’s work on narrative film music,
with
the sense of a sound event expressing subjective perceptions (Gorbman
1987,
26). In the present article, the meaning of ›metadiegetic‹ would
instead
be closer to its original sense in Gérard Genette’s theory of
narrativity,
where it identifies a situation in which a character narrates a
story
within the main story, creating a frame where different levels of
diegesis
are convoluted (Genette 1976 [1972], 276). To avoid confusion, the
term
›interdiegetic‹ will be used.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 66
The
basic setting of the interdiegetic function is the following: the music is
pertinent
to more than one of the three levels identified by Miceli at the
same
time. Each one of these levels is equally related with the music: there
is
no predominant level. Also, within each level it could relate
simultaneously
to multiple visual features, without creating distraction or
awkwardness
in the spectator.
As
an example, it could be useful to quote a fragment from Detlev Glanert’s
reconstruction
of Giuseppe Becce’s illustration for DER LETZTE MANN
(Germany
1924, Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau), which was published on DVD
by
Transit Film in 2003. After having lost his job as chief doorman, Emil
Jannings
returns to his house, drunk. While his neighbor, the woman who
will
spread the news of the old man’s misfortune, enters his apartment,
Jannings
takes his whistle, one of the symbols of his former role, and blows
it.
This event is synchronized with a high-pitched trill of a solo piccolo flute.
This
trill is simultaneously part of two levels: it hints to the internal level (it
imitates
the sound of the whistle), but it is also part of a musical discourse
of
external level: a discourse that precedes and follows the trill, and which is
logically
and aesthetically connected with it. The music, before the trill, is
reaffirming
the fifth grade of the tonality of C major and stops on a chord
(G-B-D),
which has a D as its highest note. The trill is, coherently, based on
a
D. After the trill, the music makes a brief cadenza and regularly moves to
C
major. But this sequence is also noteworthy because of the ambivalence of
the
music within the apparent internal level: thanks to the editing, which
alternates
a shot of Jannings with the image of the neighbor laughing, the
trill
feels like a simultaneous allusion to the whistle and to the shrill laughter
of
the woman. Cause and effect of two actions collapse into a single
acoustic
event and join in the grotesque, the one who is laughable and the
one
who laughs, believing to be superior.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 67
The
sequence continues with the sound of the piccolo, imitating the whistle
and
the laughter, mixed with the orchestral accompaniment. Soon after that,
Murnau
introduces a new event with an important musical potential. Two
drunk
men stop under the window of Jannings’ apartment, and one of them
starts
playing a trumpet. The man is interrupted twice by his companion. In
these
instances, Glanert’s reconstruction uses a close synchronization with
the
pace of the action: we can hear the sound of a solo trumpet just when we
see
the character playing it. Also, the way the sound is intonated and the
way
in which it stops are quite consistent with the situation that is being
enacted.
This really seems a simulation of an internal level; however, the
illusion
is negated by the fact that we are not able to hear the voices of the
two
men, which visibly start to speak as soon as the trumpet player stops.
The
partial allusion to the internal level rendered by the music, in the silent
context,
stands out as an expressive choice; in a sound film, instead, it
would
have been the absence of the voices which would have unsettled the
spectator
the most. Moreover, in case of a real silent film screening, the
audience
would be constantly conscious of the presence of a real trumpet
player
in the cinema hall.
When
finally the man with the trumpet manages to start playing a full piece,
the
sound of an orchestra appears as a discreet accompaniment to the main
melody.
The behavior of Jannings at the window clearly communicates that
he
is actually listening to the sound of the trumpet: however, the musical
dramaturgy
also implies that he could not be listening to the same sound the
audience
is hearing, because in the world of the film there could not be an
orchestra
at that moment and in that place. In a sound film, this would have
been
a solution hinting maybe to a mediate level (Jannings hears a trumpet
melody
which the audience hears as well, but his imagination »completes«
it
with the sound of an orchestra). In a silent film, it is not possible to
clearly
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 68
classify
the level of this musical episode, because we cannot know if the
melody
Jannings is hearing is exactly the same melody which is being
played
in the world of the film. So, it could certainly be a music staying in
the
mediate level, but it could also be a music from the external level, at the
same
time.
Another
instance can be found in a musical illustration composed in 1992
by
Richard McLaughlin for Jean Grémillon’s GARDIENS DE PHARE (France
1929).7
The film deals with a lighthouse guardian and his son, who have to
live
isolated on an island for a long time. However, the son has been
infected
with rabies by a dog bite just before their isolation begins. He
slowly
slips into a feverish state which leads him to bursts of violence and
hallucinations.
A
sequence of the film shows the old guardian remembering a country
festival.
The audience can see a scene where young men and women dance
while
some musicians play violins and drums. McLaughlin coherently
decided
to use the instruments suggested by the images to illustrate the
situation.
However, it is not possible to say that this music is part of the
internal
level. Even if the timbres of the instruments are correct, in fact,
there
is no synchrony between the music and the image: the blows from the
drums
do not follow the movements on screen, as well as it is clear how the
violins
in the film are not playing what the audience can hear. So, the music
is
separated from the diegesis, but it is related with it at the same time.
However,
the music also belongs to the mediate level. In fact, it appears
inside
a memory of the old guardian, and it appropriately continues when
7
This illustration was presented at the International Silent Film Festival Le
Giornate
del
Cinema Muto on October 18, 1992. It was recorded on a videotape which is
property
of the Cineteca del Friuli in Gemona, Italy.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 69
the
film reintroduces the character in his present situation, at the lighthouse.
So,
the music can pass simultaneously through the various levels,
›embracing‹
them from a privileged position. It becomes in a sense, an
ubiquitous
entity.
This
ubiquity of the music is different from the kind that can be found in
sound
cinema, because of the already cited ›agreement‹ between the director
and
the audience: the inner acoustic world of the film must always be
accessible.
An example of an attempt of ›ubiquity‹ in sound cinema
mentioned
by Miceli (2009, 662-663) involves a sequence from Milos
Forman’s
AMADEUS (1984): as Mozart dictates his Requiem to Antonio
Salieri,
we hear the materialization of his creative thoughts in the form of a
full
orchestral rendering. This appears as a mediate level, which, however,
seems
to suddenly shift to an external level as the director cuts to the coach
who
is bringing back Mozart’s wife to his dying husband. But actually, the
music
is always positioned in a mediate level by the constant presence of an
element
from the internal level. The feeble singing of the ill Mozart, which
the
orchestra transforms into the finished Requiem, clarifies the role of the
music
proposed by soundtrack, making it a projection of the composer’s
mind.
In a silent film, there would not have been such a reference. The
music
would always have belonged to more than one level simultaneously:
in
this case possibly the mediate and the external one.
4.
Conclusion
The
›bridge‹ and the ›interdiegetic‹ functions have been described as to
suggest
an integration to the usual schemes of analysis of film music, in
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 70
order
to provide theoretical devices which would be more fitting to the
necessities
of the audiovisual language of silent cinema. This kind of
suggestion
aims to integrate the already existing theoretical schemes, and
not
to substitute them or to deny their effectiveness. In fact, one of the most
urgent
problems film music theory has to face is surely the absence of a
dialogue
between the many languages of film music analysis, because of a
proliferation
of classifications of functions which often overlap. This is a
problem
that was evidenced as early as 1981 by Hansjörg Pauli, who
criticized
Lissa’s description of eleven audiovisual functions calling it the
consequence
of a »Systematisierungswut« (Pauli 1981, 187), that is to say a
»fury
in systematizing«. The ›bridge‹ and ›interdiegetic‹ functions, however,
should
not be regarded just as two more theoretical categories. Instead, they
are
material indicators of the nature of the audiovisual setting of silent
cinema.
In this regard, and as a final consideration, it could be said that a
description
of the audiovisual functions of silent cinema might lead towards
a
definition of silent cinema as a whole. It seems in fact difficult to find
relevant
differences between silent and sound cinema, if the comparison is
made
just on the basis of the visual language. Early cinema certainly
displayed
some peculiar visual traits (like the fixed camera and the theatrical
setting)
that make it immediately recognizable. The presence of the
intertitles
is as well often considered a typical feature of silent cinema.
However,
these elements are not indispensable. In fact, it is possible to
conceive
a sound film with theatrical setting and fixed camera; also, there
have
been silent films, which used only a few or no intertitles (DER LETZTE
MANN
was among them). On the other hand, it is as well possible to
imagine
a silent film created with the contemporary cinema technologies or
aesthetics:
it might be sufficient to cite Aki Kaurismäki’s JUHA (Finland
1999),
which had a recorded soundtrack, but was nonetheless silent mostly
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 71
because
of his use of the human voice as a sound among sounds, with no
central
role, and because of the presence of a score by Anssi Tikanmäki
which
was prepared to be performed live during the film screening.
Therefore,
it could be suggested here that, more than the images, it was the
presentation
of sound and music, which identified the true nature of silent
cinema
as a communicative device. The performance and improvisation
(which
are the causes behind the ›bridge‹ function) gave a distinct
uniqueness
to each screening. Silent films imposed conditions to the cinema
hall
that were similar to those of a concert hall which, as Tomlinson Holman
argued,
»is a space for production […] [while] a movie theater is a space for
reproduction«
(Lo Brutto 1994, 204). In silent cinema, every new screening
could
be legitimately different from the precedent and the differences could
also
be dramatic, especially in the case of improvisations. Along with that,
the
›interdiegetic‹ function reveals how the music and the sound did not
have
to comply any obligation towards a fixed acoustic hierarchy with the
human
voice at the top, and also how the sound could fulfill the
expectations
of the audience without adhering to a strict division between
the
diegetic levels or to a synchrony mimicking the perception of sound
experiences
in everyday life. Even without trying to propose a final
definition
of silent cinema, which would go beyond the scope of this work,
the
study of the ›bridge‹ and ›interdiegetic‹ function could at least invite to
confirm,
once more, that silent cinema really was not a precursor or a less
developed
ancestor to sound cinema. It was, and still is, a different instance
of
audiovisual entertainment: another cinema.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 72
Bibliography
Alperson,
Philip (1984) On Musical Improvisation. In: The Journal of Aesthetics
and
Art Criticism 43:1, pp. 17-29.
Altman,
Rick (2004) Silent Film Sound, New York & Chichester: Columbia
University
Press.
Anderson,
Gillian (1988), Music for Silent Films 1894-1929: a Guide, Washington:
Library
of Congress.
______________
(2004) Musical Missionaries: ›Suitable‹ Music in the Cinema
1913-1915.
In: Miceli, Sergio (ed.) (2004), La musica nel cinema. Tematiche e
metodi
di ricerca (Civiltà musicale no. 51/52).
______________
(2005) Geraldine Farrar and Cecil B. DeMille: The Effect of
Opera
on Film and Film on Opera. In: Perriam, Christopher; Davis, Ann (eds.)
(2005),
Carmen: From Silent Film to MTV, Amsterdam & New York: Rodopi,
pp.
23-35.
Balázs,
Béla (1948) Der Film. Werden und Wesen einer neuen Kunst, Wien: Glibus
Verlag,
Italian translation by Grazia and Fernaldo Di Giammatteo, Grazia; Di
Giammatteo,
Fernaldo (1975) as Il film. Evoluzione ed essenza di un’arte
nuova,
Torino: Einaudi.
Becce,
Giuseppe; Brav, Ludwig; Erdmann, Hans (1927) Allgemeines Handbuch
der
Filmmusik, 2 vols., Berlin: Schlesinger´sche Buchhandlung.
Beynon,
George (1921) Musical Presentation of Motion Pictures, New York:
Schirmer.
Bordwell,
David; Thompson, Kristin (2003 [1979]) Film Art: An Introduction,
New
York, McGraw-Hill.
Bottomore,
Stephen (1995) I Want to See this Annie Mattygraph/Voglio vedere
quest’Annie
Matografo, Pordenone: Le Giornate del Cinema Muto.
Cavalcanti,
Alberto (1939) Sound in Films. In: Weis, Elisabeth; Welton, John (eds.)
(1985)
Film Sound. Theory and Practice, New York: Columbia University
Press,
pp. 98-111.
Chion,
Michel (1982) La voix au cinema, Paris: Éditions de l'Étoile.
Hampton,
Benjamin (1970 [1931]) History of the American Film Industry, New
York:
Dover.
Herzog,
Charlotte (1981) The Movie Palace and the Theatrical Sources of Its
Architectural
Style. In: Cinema Journal 20: 2, pp. 15-37.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 73
Brand,
Neil (1998) Dramatic Notes. Foregrounding Music in the Dramatic
Experience,
Luton: University of Luton Press.
Brownlow,
Kevin (1981) Abel Gance’s Napoléon Returns from Exile. In:
American
Film 6, pp. 28-32, 68, 70-73.
Genette,
Gérard (1976 [1972]) Figure III. Il discorso del racconto, Italian trans. by
Lina
Zecchi, Torino: Einaudi.
_____________
(1987 [1983]), Nuovo discorso del racconto, Italian trans. by Lina
Zecchi,
Torino: Einaudi.
Gorbman,
Claudia (1987) Unheard Melodies. Narrative Film Music, Bloomington
&
Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Gunning,
Tom (1996) »Now You See It, Now You Don’t«: The Temporality of the
Cinema
of Attractions. In: Abel, Richard (ed.) (1996), Silent Film, London:
Athlone
Press, pp. 71-84.
Hoérée,
Arthur (1934) Essai d’esthétique du sonore. In: La revue musicale 151, pp.
45-62.
Holman,
Roger; Gaudreault, André (eds.) (1982) Cinema 1900-1906: An
Analytical
Study, 2 vols., Brussels: FIAF.
Lang,
Edith; West, George (1920) Musical Accompaniment of Moving Pictures,
New
York: Schirmer.
Lissa,
Zofia (1965) Ästhetik der Filmmusik, Berlin: Henschelverlag.
Lo
Brutto, Vincent (1994) Sound-on-Film: Interviews with Creators of Film Sound,
Westport:
Praeger Publishers.
London,
Kurt (1970 [1936]) Film Music. A Summary of the Characteristic features
of
its History, Aesthetics, Technique; and possible Developments, New York:
Arno
Press.
Luciani,
Sebastiano Arturo (1919) La musica al cinematografo. In: Il Primato
Artistico
Italiano, vol. I, no. 2, reprinted in (1980) Tra una film e l’altra.
Materiali
sul cinema italiano 1907-1920, Venezia: Marsilio, 1980.
Miceli,
Sergio (2000) Musica e cinema nella cultura del Novecento, Milano:
Sansoni.
___________
(2009) Musica per film. Storia, Estetica, Analisi , Tipologie, Milano:
Ricordi.
Pauli,
Hansjörg (1981), Filmmusik: Stummfilm, Stuttgart: Klett Cotta.
Redi,
Riccardo (1999) Cinema muto italiano (1896-1930), Roma: Biblioteca di
Bianco
e Nero.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 74
Simeon,
Ennio (1987) Appunti sulla teoria e prassi musicale nel cinema muto
Tedesco.
In: Trento Cinema. Incontri Internazionali con il film d’autore, Trento:
Servizio
Attività Culturali della Provincia Autonoma di Trento, pp. 74-80.
____________(1995)
Per un pugno di note. Storia, teoria, estetica della musica per
il
cinema, la televisione e il video, Milano: Rugginenti.
Kieler
Beiträge zur Filmmusikforschung, 9, 2013 // 75
Empfohlene
Zitierweise
Source
filmmusik.uni
No comments:
Post a Comment