Taxi Driver and The Social Network- What state of the art sound design can do
I was watching the movie “The Social Network” recently, I had watched it earlier and I liked the movie quite a bit. A couple days back, I felt like watching the Social Network Again! What blew my mind was a scene between Jesse Eisenberg and Justin Timberlake who play Mark Zuckerberg and Sean Parker (The creator of Napster). It is a night club scene where both of them with loud music playing in the background and their sounds are faintly heard. You pay extra attention to listen to what they are saying and there lies the genius of Fincher's sound design. Its a longish scene and you get sucked into it as if you are listening to their conversation in the club. True genius.
Taxi Driver is one of the greatest movies of all times and obviously i was watching it a few days back. It is a deep character study and an exploration of loneliness. As a film it just changed the game completely, with character voiceovers in the background, background score etc. Robert Di Niro got a cab drivers license for the movie and drove around New York in preparation for the role. Mind Blowing stuff. Coming to the sound design aspect of it. In one of the scene, Di Niro and another character discuss the mental state of Travis(Di Niro) a busy road with sounds of taxis and people coming in background and both of them talking. There was bit of a silence and chaos in the scene which was absolutely mind blowing. An Indian influence of that scene can be found in the Movie Gangs of Wasseypur’s ending scene where Nawazuddin Siddiqui is about to be shot. There is silence in the scene with background sounds of Indian highways. Absolutely top class stuff.
These films have changed the game, that’s why they obtain Cult Status. Hail Scorsese, Hail Fincher and Hail Anurag Kashyap!
