Recently I saw David Lynch’s Blue Velvet in the BFI, it was very interesting to see such a surreal film in such a calm environment as a cinema theatre. Hearing the reactions from the crowd helped convey the different emotions and ideas that the screen projected. It amplified the weird nature of Blue Velvet and it was satisfying to encounter the surreal with the company of a full theatre. I am a great fan of the sound design in David Lynch films, the great use of drones draws your attention in, creating a float like sensation, fluttering between consciousness states.

Sound is smartly used to set spaces and boundaries between scenes, associating each space with a motif and feeling. With the use of sound Lynch gives characters to spaces, helping with the narrative of the film with deep symbolism. Those such techniques peer discretely in the human psyche, manipulating the subconscious, engraving the film’s message and themes in the mind of the audience. A great example of this is a scene in the later half of the movie where Jeffrey the protagonist enters to Dorothy’s apartment and discovers the source of the missing ear. In the scene the song ‘Love Letters’ plays in the back, creating a weird juxtaposition between the happy music and the horrific images. Then Jeffrey quickly escapes the room towards the hall and the sound changes drastically, adapting to the scenario and space of the hall. The great contrast between the ambiences of both rooms draws the audience into different worlds, it gives the illusion that each different schenography is independent from the rest.

For doing the sound design of my project I will create a similar effect such as the ones in Blue Velvet, using slight changes of sound to determine spaces in different scenes. My approach is to make such changes as imperceptable as possible, such as the sound hits purely in the subconscious. I will use this techniques to convey the theme of the battle between the real and the illusion.