Pinocchio has been a popular subject for films in 2022. Three different films portraying their version of the immortal puppet were released this year, with director Guillermo del Toro’s stop-motion animated film (now streaming on Netflix) being the latest one. Here, sound supervisor Scott Gershin talks about their approach to crafting a unique aesthetic for Pinocchio – from creating a sonic arc throughout the film to designing wooden sounds with personality, and everything in between:
Netflix’s All Quiet on the Western Front, directed by Edward Berger, is a harrowing look at trench warfare during WWI. The film (adapted from Erich Maria Remarque’s novel) depicts the physical and emotional atrocities of war as experienced by young German soldier Paul Bäumer. Here, supervising sound editor/sound designer Frank Kruse, co-sound designer Markus Stemler, and re-recording mixer Lars Ginzel talk about their approach to making the film feel gritty, scary, and devastating – putting the audience in the trench beside Paul and his fellow soldiers.
Director Ti West takes an ‘Old Hollywood’ approach to Pearl, the second film in his X horror film series. Set in 1918, the film tells the backstory of Pearl, who grows up on an isolated farm in Texas. Here, 2x-Oscar-winning supervising sound editor Karen Baker Landers talks about evolving the sound to match Pearl’s descent into madness, using subtle, natural sounds to create feelings of anxiety and tension, working sound around a massive score, showing restraint on the gore sounds, and she talks about the sound of specific scenes, like the subjective approach on Pearl’s dance tryout, and more:
In celebration of Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me’s 30-year anniversary: Sound supervisor Doug Murray shares lots of fascinating sound stories behind the haunting film and the Twin Peaks series, the creative joys of “sound painting” with David Lynch, channeling Alan Splet’s sensibilities, its impact on film sound today, the sound for signature scenes – and how it transformed him as a sound designer. Hear the full interview below:
Director Dan Trachtenberg’s Predator prequel Prey (distributed by Disney+, Hulu) is set in 1719, so the sound team – led by supervising sound editors Chris Terhune and Will Files – got to reimagine the advanced weaponry and armor known from previous Predator films in a more primitive form.
In turn, the Predator in Prey faces off with humans who are also less technologically advanced – a tribe of Comanche with stone and wood weapons and a roaming pack of French fur traders, who have black powder muskets and pistols.
Here, Terhune talks about redesigning iconic Predator sounds to fit the more primitive time, Dialogue/ADR Supervisor Jessie Anne Spence discusses the unique opportunity to record and edit Comanche dialogue and group, and re-recording mixer Craig Henighan (who co-mixed with Terhune) talks about finding the emotion for the mix in Dolby Atmos.
Director Jordan Peele’s film Nope has surpassed $100 million the US box office. The IMAX-filmed and Dolby Atmos-mixed movie is definitely a spectacle for the big screen! In this massive interview, A Sound Effect talks with supervising sound editor/sound designer/re-recording mixer Johnnie Burn about his collaboration with Peele in the pre-viz phase to the final Dolby Atmos mix at Universal Studios, & everything in between:
A24’s mockumentary Marcel the Shell With Shoes On is a live-action film that incorporates stop-motion animation for the main character – a shell named Marcel – and his family. Director Dean Fleischer-Camp plays with perspective, sometimes showing the world from Marcel’s POV at one inch tall, and other times from a standard POV. Or, sometimes the sound is from Marcel’s POV even when he’s not in the shot. On top of it all, there’s this documentary feel that’s true to the original Marcel the Shell videos that were a YouTube sensation.
Here, supervising sound editor/sound designer/re-recording mixer Ruy Garcia talks about letting the emotion and story make the rules instead of adhering to a strict set of dos and donts. He talks about the film’s foley, recording custom sounds, working during the pandemic, playing with perspective, and so much more! Plus, he shares some really cool behind-the-scenes videos and pictures of their process.
Supervising sound editors Will Files and Doug Murray had a rare opportunity when they started work on Director Matt Reeves’s The Batman: they did the sound for the film trailer! And those trailer sounds not only set the tone for the film’s sound later on, they were even carried forward to the final mix. Here, Files and Murray talk about their incredible adventure of building this soundtrack during Covid, creating iconic sounds for the Batmobile, working against Michael Giacchino’s nearly-complete score, and so much more:
Director Denis Villeneuve brings author Frank Herbert’s sci-fi classic Dune to the big screen. Like his previous film Blade Runner 2049, Villeneuve weaves sound design and music into a fluid sonic experience that feels cohesive and distinct.
Here, WB Sound re-recording mixers Ron Bartlett and Doug Hemphill talk about how they found the perfect balance of the two, the mixing decisions that helped pull focus on what best tells the story, how they used the Dolby Atmos surround space, and more:
Go behind the inventive sound of Everything Everywhere All At Once here, in Jennifer Walden’s excellent group interview with supervising sound editor/re-recording mixer Brent Kiser, ADR supervisor Julie Diaz, sound designer Andrew Twite, and re-recording mixer Alex Fehrman.
American documentary filmmaker Sam Green worked with Oscar-winning sound designer Mark Mangini to craft a unique sound experience for his film 32 Sounds, which just premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. The immersive documentary is a meditation on the power of sound to bend time, cross borders, and profoundly shape our perception of the world around us:
Want more film sound stories and resources?
Check out the Film Sound Power List here!
Check out the Film Sound Power List here!
