Week 3 - AA

For this weeks task I chose to analyse a short piece of 'The Mummy'. It was released in 1999, and became a bit of a favourite in the horror scene.

My exerpt goes from 10:40 to 13:18. I chose this part, because it has a really big action scene, and then a kind of creepy part, and then goes to a really innocent simple scene. I thought it showed a lot a variety and so it would be a useful one to analyse.

The first scene is all action, set in the desert with a war of sorts going on. You can hear horses galloping, and lots of them. You can hear two different kinds of shouting, something Arabic and English/American. There's narration by a man with an arabic accent over the top, and dialogue between two characters. There is also dramatic music playing. The backgrond noise gets quieter when the two men are talking, and the music and narration are clearly non-diegetic. Even though the man narrating is present in the scene. I'd say the gunshots are foley, because they can't have been actually shooting guns on set.

The creepy part is really quiet with a sort of ambient hum in the background, that develops into jackal noises. I don't really know what to call it, because there aren't any animals, but the sound is apparently coming from a statue... sort of. So it IS sourced, so i suppose diegetic? Anyway, then some sand shoots up, and the sound of that is obviously foley, because sand wouldn't make whooshing noises like that. And the scream, well, it's been edited and added in over the top, but I don't know exactly what to call that.

The really innocent scene has lively Egyptian music and the sound of a busy city at first. Then a female voice starts talking before the audience can actually see her. I think it's a good effect. Other than that, most of the sound seems pretty average. It's just her talking to herself, and echo noises. Seems fair though, because she's in a big library.

I think this exercise has helped me realise how much there is in making sound for movies. There's so many things that you have to take into consideration.

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Christian Haines - Audio Arts Lecture, 7/8/07

The Mummy film, copyright 1999, Universal Studios