Sound Research WIKINDX
Sound Research WIKINDX |
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de Valck, M. (2005). Sound gag: The use of sound for comic effect in the films of Jacques Tati. New Review of Film and Television Studies, 3(2), 223–235. Added by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard (10/21/05, 2:46 PM) Last edited by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard |
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| Resource type: Journal Article ID no. (ISBN etc.): 1740-0309 BibTeX citation key: deValck2005 Email resource to friend View all bibliographic details  |
Categories: Film Music/Sound Keywords: Comic effect Creators: de Valck Collection: New Review of Film and Television Studies |
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| Abstract |
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"This paper begins by introducing the term 'sound gag', based on the 'sight gag', and proceeds to argue that 'sound gag' is appropriate for describing Tati's use of sound for comic effect. The first part analyses Tati's use of sound; it characterizes his approach of sound as physical and indicates the minor role language plays in his oeuvre. Tati's use of sound is explained as a deviation from the classical soundtrack. In the second part the similarity between Tati's style and the cinema of attractions is put forward. I argue that Tati's background in vaudeville already alludes to the relations between his film oeuvre and the early twentieth-century popular forms of mass amusement, the avant-garde interests, and in particular the sound experiments of both the nickelodeons and the avant-garde intellectuals. The term sound gag, then, becomes a starting point to explain how Playtime could fail to address the expectations of Tati's popular audience at the time of its release, but in time won intellectual and academic acknowledgement by means of the recognition and re-valuation of the other levels on which Tati's films work."
Added by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard Last edited by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard |
| Notes |
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Sound gags, by analogy to sight gags, in Tati's films.
Added by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard |
| Quotes |
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p.232
Explaining the term 'sound gag', as it relates to Tati's comic use of sound, de Valck states: "[i]t points on the one hand to his physical, non-narrative approach of sound in which the incongruity of the juxtaposition in the non-verbal joke is resolved by the acoustic qualities of the sounds that are presented simultaneously with the images..."
Added by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard
Keywords: Comic effect |
| Paraphrases |
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pp.225–226
Discusses an example of Chion's (1994, pp.129–131) acousmêtre in Les Vacances de M. Hulot (1953). The railway station loudspeaker has power over the holidaymakers who rush from platform to platform at its command. But because the command is unintelligible, this is a sound gag and an example of humourous acousmêtre. Chion, M. (1994). Audio-vision: Sound on screen. C. Gorbman, Trans. New York: Columbia University Press. Added by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard Keywords: Comic effect |
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p.226
Discusses the synchronising of unusual sound effects to footsteps in Mon Oncle (1958), for example the use of ping-pong balls and other objects
Added by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard
Keywords: Comic effect Conformity & expectation |
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p.228
Uses the term fidelity as a synonym for veridicality and suggests that Tati used lack of fidelity/veridicality to comic effect by synchronising unorthodox sounds to orthodox images.
Added by: Mark Grimshaw-Aagaard
Keywords: Comic effect |