Sound of Metal

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🎙️ EPISODE 313: 02.17.2021 !¡! CONTEST TIME !¡! The audiofile for this ep somehow got fudged up beyond my repair. SO: calling all amateur sound engineers. Here is the source file that I can't seem to clean up. Do your worst and send it back to me to win a mystery prize! (FYI - I left the audio 'as is' because I felt it was making some kind of point and/or felt right in relation to what this movie is all about on stuff.)

This film felt like a throwback, in that it's only trying to do one thing well: tell a meaningful story.

Woah, you say, aren't most movies trying to do that? Oh for sure, for the most part, but all too often they're saddled with some larger thematic baggage and/or niche thing/vibe to make it 'stand out'. And, honestly, I'm fine with that too. You can make a larger point something other than what's specifically happening onscreen and you can be weird for weird's sake so long as it doesn't override everything else, crushing all humanity in the process.

Why Sound of Metal, the first feature by Darius Marder, resonated with me is because I wasn't thinking about anything else besides this one guy's arc. I wasn't thinking about cinematography (though the movie looks good), or the role of capitalism on the story (though that door was certainly open). The singular focus is on story: a former addict and drummer in a loud, fairly experimental rock two-piece, loses his ability to hear, suddenly and dramatically. And the film follows the most classic three-act structure imaginable; it's almost cookie-cutter. It's a testament to Marder and especially Riz Ahmed in the lead role that the film never felt stale or rote.

Big kudos to the sound department on this production, as well. It takes a lot of tricky, nuanced editing to make the audience feel the loss of hearing, as well as the discordant new world after the cochlear implant. Or, perhaps a better compliment is to simply say that if they'd failed at this, the whole movie falls apart.

Ahmed deserves all of the praise he's been getting and this film–a strong, high 9–is one of the best of 2020 for sure. Run, don't walk.

CHRONOLOGICALLY
⫷ EPISODE 312 - (YOU ARE HERE) - EPISODE 314 ⫸

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