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Textual Analysis Of A Movie

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There are some films that are notorious for making people cry. 2 Think of Schindler’s
List (1993), Titanic (1997) and Sophie’s Choice (1982). Even kiddie flicks such as
Toy Story 3 (2010) and Up (2009) make these tear-filled lists. 3 These films must elicit strong emotional responses from their audiences but how is music used to accompany or even amplify these sob-worthy motion pictures? This essay will survey a selection of six films known for their emotional impact and attempt to analyse what function music serves in their most devastating scenes. Aspects such as instrumentation and tempo will be explored as well as whether the music’s tone agrees with that of the scene. Are the scores more effective if the music feels sad on its on terms? …show more content…

More often than not, the musical themes of the film return in these moments, allowing for a more devastating blow to the emotions. There also seems to be a tendency in Hollywood to put “sad” scenes in slow motion. We will try to understand why this is the case and analyse how the music reacts to this change in time. As a result of slow motion, the realistic sound effects in these scenes seem to become muffled, allowing the music to take command. Finally, we will also have a look at how these over-the-top dramatic techniques have been parodied. Music has been shown to have a strong effect on emotion in psychology research. 5 Hence it should be of great interest to see how filmmakers use score to make us reach for the tissues.
Steven Spielberg’s film Schindler’s List (1993) is famous for being one of the most depressing films ever made. 6 It is the first mainstream Hollywood film to be set during the Holocaust and hence there was a lot of responsibility on the filmmakers to make sure the film was respectful for both Holocaust survivors and victims. 7
Spielberg has said that he wanted the film to above all else convey the feeling of what it was like to be a Jew in Poland during World War II. 8 So how does the great …show more content…

As
Rose begins to understand Jack has died, there is very little extra-diegetic sound. A gentle chiming can be heard which gives the scene a sense of the mystical. The calls of the rescue boat become muffled and slow: the shots of the boat are in fact in slow motion. When Rose fully understands that Jack has been completed refrigerated, we hear the sound of a female voice, accompanied by some gentle synths. The singer is performing a rendition of Rose and Jack’s love theme, which has been developed throughout the film. This particular version of James Horner’s theme is more bare than its other occurrences, which have been more heavily accompanied. Most of all, it is interesting that upon losing that relationship, music plays that was supposed to be representative of the strength of that relationship. The score, by association, is able to remind us of what has been lost – the theme has collected their formative moments as their relationship grew throughout the film. Now there’s a double-edge to this because quite famously the love theme for Titanic became a hit single for pop singer Celine
Dion. Thus the emotional score also becomes a commodity to be sold for

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