Unnecessary, but expected, sounds

Cafe Society
1

There are certain sounds that don’t exist in Real Life, but they’ve become expected in the movies, so they dub them in.
The classic example is The Spaceship Swoosh, made famous by the opening of Star Trek. SF fans have been bemoaning this for ages (I know – I are one). We know that it’s done for drama, but it’s unscientific, which is particularly annoying in a…yadda yadda … Kubrick didn’t use it in 2001 and look how…yadda yadda.

we’ve come to see it as another aspect of how people treat SF with disdain.
But it’s not, really. There are plenty of other totally unnecessary but “traditional” noises that they use in the movies and TV as a sort of “signature theme” or as expected counterpoint to the observed action.

Case in point – Squealing Tires. Squealing Tires on asphalt are expected and dramatic, but people have tires squeal on surfaces wher you have no right to expect it – gravel, sand, grass. It’s a cheap way of generating excitement and suggesting a chase or danger. They used to make fun of it on MST3K, and you’d think “well, they do that in cheaop movies”. But I’ve since noticed it a lot, in what you woul think were classy flicks.
I think the idea is that the foley artists and sounmd guys figure these sorts of sounds aren’t really consciously noticed by people, but they convey the right sense, so you can put them in even if they’re inappropriate. It’s the Tod Browning Transylvanian Armadillo School of Sound Design.

Other examples:

The Jungle Kookaburra – Africa has very few Kookaburras outside of zoos (none), but they use its laughing call to suggest the noise of the African jungle. I think somebody thinks they sound like monkeys, or something.

The Desert Loon – loons are even less likely to be in the Sahara than Kookaburras are to be in Africa, but they use its call to suggest the loneliness and emptiness of the desert. Why? I Dont’s Know. He’s on Third.

Jet Plane with a Propellor – I only know of one example, but I’ll bet there are others. In the 1940s Superman cartoon “The Bulleteers” a gang of crooks uses what is essentially a high-tech jet plane for crime. When it’s cruising at altitude, the jet sounds like a prop plane. Only when it dives dioes it sound like a jet. Audiences associated prop plane noises with flying, is my theory. They weren’t as familiar with jets, so the sound of a jet wouldn’t connote flying. It’s the Pre-Spaceship Swoosh theory.

The Spider Rattle – Spiders don’t make much noise, which is unfortunate for movie makers, because they loook so ooky. So they jazz up the appearance of a spider – especially a really big one – by playing a rattlesnake-like rattle noise when it appears. I’ve sween/heard this countless times.

Any others?

2

Knives and swords zinging and dinging and swooshing when all they’re doing is moving through the air. Sure, if they strike something or stick up in something or cut into something, there will be a noise. But they don’t zing in the air. At least mine don’t.

Ricocheting bullets whining off soft objects. If one hits a rock or a brick wall or something metallic and sturdy, it may make a zinging sound, but they don’t zinnnnnnnnnng for several seconds, especially if they haven’t struck something solid.

3

In real life, when people do something dangerous and thrilling, there isn’t music playing in the background to heighten the drama.

4

whenever there’s a bunch of random objects, like someone’s emptying out a bag they have or looking through a pile of junk, there’s got to be a cat angry-meow.

(and I was actually wondering the other day what kind of animal the kookaburra noise was. Now I know!)

5

I’ve often wondered if a subtle motivation to go around with earphones (or headphones) producing music from an iPod or a Walkman or even from a Ghetto Blaster or a Boom Box, might be to simulate the thing that movies and TV shows do with the soundtrack. Like, does it feel unreal if there’s not music in the background of your life?

Just asking.

6

Gee, you people don’t have a soundtrack in your life? I’ll have to loan you my private orchestra.

Salieri: Yes, we were servants, but special servants. …We gave them fanfares for their entrances, horns for their hunting,dances fro their strutting, strings for their rutting, and drums for their wars. We made their banal lives extraordinary… and who, in your time, will glorify you?

– Paraphrased from Peter Shaffer’s play Amadeus

7

Tape recorders/VCRs producing audio at high speed while rewinding. Real tape machines haven’t done this in decades, but it’s an effective audio cue to tell the audience the tape is being rewound.

Any scene of freeway gridlock will feature lots of incessant honking. I’ve spent my share of time in southern CA traffic jams and never heard a single honk.

8

…used to comedic effect in Airplane! where everytime there was an establishing shot of the outside of the jet, you hear a prop plane. Pretty subtle joke for a movie of that type. Correction…THE movie of that type.

9

Says you.

There’s a scene in Spiderman 2 where a character draws an elaborate dagger from its equally elaborate sheath, and it makes that sound. What made me laugh when I saw that was that I own that exact weapon (decorative weapon; it’s not real). It was a Christmas gift given well before the movie came out. So of course, I had to check to see if mine made the same sound. I was quite disappointed when it didn’t.

10

The Record Scratch when something unexpected happens - this is more of a TV (specifically commercial) effect:

Overworked housewife: I love the way our clothes come out when using Cleano brand detergent.
Goofy looking husband: But honey, you weren’t using Cleano.
[cut to suprised housewife, record scratch]
GLH: You were using new improved Cleano with oxygen!
[cut to OH looking relieved, OH and GLH laughing.]

I hate that damn record scratch.

11

Here’s one people on this Board have frequently complained about – Computer Sounds. Computers on TV and in the movies seem to respond to every keystroke, and frequently make improper noises. I expect to hear the “ding” from the carriage return in a non-comedy one of these days.

12

The sound of Metal on Metal when a sword or knife is removed from a leather scabbard.

13

A side thought – given the changes in technology, how much longer will Propellor Jet Plane, record Scratch, and Computer Sound be around, given that kids won’t know what the original thing sounded like? Or will these sounds become auditory fossils, used as cinematic audio shorthand by peope who no longer remember why they use them?

14

How about the opposite effect?

I love when someone is using a machine gun with no ear plugs and the machine gun is loud, but not deafening. Even hand guns are loud!

15

I loved all the silent drills and power tools in the old Mission Impossible TV show that let them pull off jobs under the criminals’ noses. an, I wanted a set like that!

16

The sort of squelchy rumble-crash that happens when a person hits the ground after being thrown bodily out of a door; very common on The A-Team. And the loud ‘click’ that happens every time someone punches someone else.

17

Oddly enough, my cooking knives do make a bit of that “Shhhing!” noise when I pull them from the wooden block. Especially the long chef knives. Not very loud, though.

You’re right though - none of my daggers or swords make much noise at all when drawn from a leather sheath/scabbard.

I’m still holding my breath for a realistic depiction of computers. All of the clicking and beeping made by terminals and desktop computers has been beat to death here, but everyone overlooks the servers and mainframes. Yes, a rack of servers is noisy, (they can be amazingly loud, actually) but it’s the white noise of cooling fans - no clicks or beeps.

Every dark alley in movies has a rolling trash can lid and a cat. Even if nothing’s happening - it’s the inner-city equivalent to the kookaburra.

Every wide-open expanse of land has the eagle cry.

Every dark wooded area at night has a hoot owl.

18

In the early days of lasers, nobody knew what sounds they’d make. In Goldfinger it turns on with a whipcrack, then generates a high-pitched whine. In the TV show The Avengers episode “From Venus with Love” the laser makes a winding-up increasing frequency whine. And of course Star Trek’s phasers (which started off, in Roddenbery’s scripts and in the pilot as “lasers” before he wisely changed it.) make a trilling sound.

I was so disappointed when I started working with lasers and they made no noises (or else sounded like vacuum pumps, water chillers, and fans).

19

Interestingly enough, it makes that same sound when he picks it up, still in its scabbard from the stand it was resting on.

I nominate the ping-pong paddle striking a wet naugahyde couch sound of somebody getting punched or kicked. It really doesn’t make that much noise.

20

This may be my only chance to mention a sound effect my brother and I appropriated from old westerns where the Indians shot bows and arrows from some great distance toward the cabin.

The arrow in flight:

Whiii-tiii-kaaaa

And when it sticks up in the post beside the hero’s head, two feet away:

SKOOOOON

I use this a lot in casual conversation to dramatize a point I may have just made that the other person may not catch.

I also use it in scary movies when things are quiet for any length of time. I’m not good to go to the movies with.