Sound Textual Analysis

Sound Textual Analysis 

The scene which I have chosen to do my sound textual analysis on is the “Everytime” Scene from the American artistic drama called “Spring Breakers” which was released on March 15th, 2013. The film was written and directed by Harmony Korine who is a 41 year old American film director. The film features James Franco, Vanessa Hudgens, Rachel Korine, Selena Gomez and Ashley Benson. To give a little context, the film is about four college aged girls who want go to a party destination for their spring break, they get arrested for something quite insignificant but then they are bailed out by a drug and weapon dealer and altogether “bad guy”, Alien. the girls end up getting sucked into his world of drugs and violence and become part of it them selves.

Spring Breakers (Poster)

The scene starts with ambient sound, you can hear the wind blowing through the leaves of the tree in the shot, and you can hear the sound of waves or flowing water and also the sound of seagulls, this is done as sort of an “establishing shot” but with sound, it lets the audience know where this scene is taking place. With the sounds given to us we can decipher that the scene will be taking place on the ocean front because of the probable personal experience of the audience and thanks to the help of what one stereotypically thinks of when thinking of the sea/ocean we picture seagulls, the sound of the water and the sea breeze. 

As for diegetic sound, you see three of the girls walk out of the house, and so the diegetic sound which you can hear is the footsteps of the girls walking out. You also here the slight clattering of metal at 00:02, as one of the girls grips a gun in her hand, even though it is not very loud it is quite a distinctive sound which you hear a lot in movies, this combined with the movement of the gun which is in the hand of the first girl too walk out of the house is done so that the audience notices the gun in the girls hand; because we here the sound of metal clattering so we look where it is coming from, an our eyes are instantly drawn to the movement of the gun which is the first thing to appear out of the house.

Spring Breakers "Everytime" scene (00:02)

As well, you can here the sound of a Piano being played, at first we are not sure weather this is diegetic or non-diegetic sound. But when the camera pans left at 00:05, it is revealed to us that the sound being heard is actually coming from a piano, which is placed outside and being played by the character Alien. Since we can see the source of the sound in question on screen, this now tells us that the sound we here is diegetic. The piano which is being played starts off quite fast, and as the character Alien see’s the 3 girls exit the house with guns the pace of the piano playing gradually slows down. This seems to be the opposite of the convention normally used in a lot of films, where the music slowly speeds up and gets louder, until the point where something happens, to create suspense. In this case the director has chosen to do the opposite, the piano sound starts off quite fast paced, and as the girls get closer and closer too the piano, the music slows down, synchronously to the gradually shortening amount of space between the 3 girls and Alien. This along with Alien’s facial expressions of slight fear and discomfort, is done to create suspense for the audience, we think that maybe something will happen when the music will stop, so unconsciously the audience start getting worried and apprehensive of what might happen once the music stops. The final note played does not match well with the notes played before, it is a lot lower them, this tells the audience that this is the final note and that something might happen since it is the big finale of this piece.

Spring Breakers "Everytime" scene (00:09)

Spring Breakers "Everytime" scene (00:10)

The next sound we hear is diegetic, it’s voice, one of the girls saying to Alien “play something” she says it rather aggressively like an order, this is emphasised by the gun she is holding. Alien reply’s rather nonchalantly, asking them what they want to hear, and they reply by saying “play something sweet, something uplifting” & “Play something f**king inspiring”. The song which Alien decides to perform is “Everytime” by the American singer & song writer, Britney Spears. 

Britney Spears

Britney Spears "Everytime" Single Cover

Alien starts playing the song at 00:46, some of the lyrics are “Notice me, take my hand”, “Every time I try to fly, I fall without my wings, I feel so small”, “I guess I need you baby”. The connotation behind these lyrics being used at this point in the movie is that these lyrics are very weak, they symbolise being vulnerable, The “notice me, take my hand” lyric sounds like a pled for attention from a scared child, the “I need you baby” and “I feel so small” lyrics show that the person in question cant be alone and needs to be with someone and that they feel small, and the connotations behind small are weak, vulnerable, powerless and because of this probably scared. the girls are dancing and singing along in their cheap, girly, pink tiger bathing suits, their pink, my little poney balaclavas, and their sweatpants with “DTF" on the rear, which stands for “Down To F**k” and  they also have shotguns in hand. This gives avery big contrast between the lyrics and the situation because the lyrics represent someone so weak and helpless yet the girls singing it are dressed so provocatively and violently. What the director has done here is called counter-intuitive soundtrack dissonance, he decided to add music to the scene which was "wrong" or “ill-fitting”, this practice is used to force out an emotion, weather it be sadness or laughter or some other feeling. By creating this sense of unfit it forces the consumers to listen to the lyrics and see the difference between them and what is happening on screen, by doing this, a greater rection from the audience can be achieved in comparison too if a song which did fit with the situation was chosen.

Spring Breakers "Everytime" scene (00:28)

At 01:33 the song goes from being diegetic sound (Alien and the girls singing the song), to non-diegetic sound (the original song “Everytime” by Britney Spears being played). The sound is now non-diegetic because we cannot see the source of the sound on screen, and their is no implication that the characters can hear what the audience is now hearing. The start of this non-diegetic sound triggers a montage which shortly proceed’s (01:55) where the song is being played over the top of it. This montage with the song is the greater continuation of the already started counter-intuitive soundtrack dissonance. This montage is a compilation of shots showing the 3 girls and Alien doing criminal activity and not what the audience would think of when they think of 3 teenage girls. We see shots of violence, for example at 02:10, where one of the girls is holding a mans head between her legs in a rather sexual, provocative and manly manner with a gun to his head. Another violent scene is at 2:19 where the girls seem to be robbing a store at gun point. There are also shots of the girls doing drugs like at 03:46. All these shots of violence, blood, guns and drugs in contrast to this sweat, innocent, vulnerable sounding song which is playing throughout this scene emphasises the already commenced feeling of this song not belonging, and not being the correct song for this scene.

Spring Breakers "Everytime" scene (02:02)

Spring Breakers "Everytime" scene (02:46)

Spring Breakers "Everytime" scene (03:46)

At 04:05 we non-diegetetically hear Alien’s voice whisper “spring break”, it is almost as if he is trying to hypnotise us into wanting to do the same thing, he is reeling in the audience to want to do the same things, as he did to the 3 girls.

Then to wrap up the entire scene, at 04:06 there is a non-diegetic sound bridge with the use of a sound effect in it, which leads from the end of the montage to the start of the final shot in the scene. The sound effect used as a sound bridge is distinctively the sound of a gun reloading which ties back to all the violence in the scene. This sound bridge smoothly transitions to the final shot of the scene  at 04:07 which has only diegetic sound. It is Alien and the 3 girls standing by the water, and Alien shouts “spring break, b**ch’s!” and then they all start firing guns and cheering (diegetic sound). This completely raps up the scene because it talks about the them of the film which is spring break and what it is to them, which is shown by the firing of guns which can be very well heard and echoes throughout the air, for everyone to hear.

Spring Breakers "Everytime" scene (04:09)

In conclusion, I find that this scene from “Spring Breakers” was an excellent scene for sound. It showcased a mix of diegetic and non-diegetic sound, it had a song in it, it had ambient sound, it had a sound bridge which had a sound effect in it, and to finish with what impressed me the most was the fantastic use of counter-intuitive soundtrack dissonance in this scene.