The text of Audio-Vision is in two
sections.
First, `The
audio-visual contract', lays the foundations for a theory of film sound
function based in introspective rationalization of the perceptions of the
filmgoer.
Second, the
discursive "beyond sounds and images", delineates an analytical
method for scholarly analysis of sound in film.
The first section is concerned with
elucidating how sound and image transform one another in the filmgoer's
perception. According to Chion, this transformation occurs not because of any
"natural harmony" between image and sound, but owing to the
"audio-visual contract", wherein, "the two perceptions mutually
influence each other...lending each other their respective properties by
contamination and projection." Chion's notion is that sound, for example,
music, "adds value" to the image. The nature of the synchronous sound
causes the filmgoer to construe the image differently, and hence the
relationship of sound and image in film should not be described simply as
"associationist", but as "synergetic"; they enter into a
"contract" in the filmgoer's perception.
Chion's work presents a regrettably
superficial discussion of how music specifically, as distinct from other
sources of sound in film, may impact upon perception of filmic meaning, and how
filmic context may impact upon perception and cognition of music. "Value
added by music" is characterised simply as generation of
"empathetic" or "anempathetic" effects. In this section,
Chion reverts to the traditional "associationist" folk-theoretic view
of the psychological function of music in film, wherein, "music can
directly express its participation in the feeling of the scene, by taking on
the scene's rhythm, tone, and phrasing; obviously such music
participates in cultural codes for things like sadness, happiness,
and movement."
Choin, M (1994). Audio
Vision Sounds on screen. New York: Colombia University Press.
University of Cambridge (no date) Available at:
http://www.mus.cam.ac.uk/ESCOM/E/NL9E/PhillipsE.html (Accessed: 5 May 2016).
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