Cinema sound and the Interstellar debate

[Proxima4]

The news last week (on loads of British talk shows and such) made something of an issue about "The increasing problem with poorly mixed vocal and sound effect elements in film and t.v" sighting Christopher Nolan's latest film Interstellar as a recent addition to this list.

Whats your thoughts?

I watched the film, thought it brilliant with a good soundtrack and could hear the voice acting, however as with a lot of action films these day's my ear drums nearly ruptured to the sound effects moments.

Is it the case that in theartres something can happen to disrupt the intended sound balance and mix values or is it that skill is lacking of certain designers to balance the mix?

I would love to hear from someone in the business?

[RunBeerRun]

Haven't seen it, don't think anyone in any industry is going to post unless under a ridiculous incognito, which probably happens often.

[SODDI]

I've been hearing it for years, both in theatres and on home video.

It sounds like the movie's audio unit is simply dumping in shit foley on the rear channels and not paying attention to how it works with the rest of the sound.

[nineofkings]

Related: Today Google gave away a movie soundtrack, the "Awesome Mix Vol 1" for free to US users, so I decided to check it out. It consists of remastered hits, mainly from the 70's. However, I was shocked by how bad the remasters were. For maximum theater impact, they were limited to shit (The Rasberries' "Go All the Way" pumps particularly horribly), and the stereo was enhanced until the lead vocals were buried. I had to import the songs into my DAW and bring the sides down so they'd be enjoyable. Good mixing/mastering doesn't make a song good, but bad mixing/mastering can ruin it.

IMHO, I'd imagine that the problem with modern dance music and soundtrack production are essentially the same. Their end goal is to be functional. Quality as such is not as important as the immediate impact that the listener experiences at a festival or in a theater.

[Tricky-Loops]

Good mixing/mastering doesn't make a song good, but bad mixing/mastering can ruin it.

That's the problem with many re-mastered songs, most of them are worse after the treatments...

[Vier]

Interstellar was overly loud, but in the situations where I noticed the vocals not being very audible, in the context, I thought it was perfectly alright.

[woggle]

Not seen interstellar yet but there has definitely been a change in mixing sound for TV at least where dialogue is much lower relative to SFX and music. Easy to test by comparing some older movies with modern ones. I find it incredibly annoying. For TV it is as though the soundtrack is mixed for someone in an isolated Home Theatre environment rather than a place where other people in the next room/flat aren't wanting to hear a show they aren't watching

[robotmonkey]

I was just recently thinking about this myself in another context. I have not yet seen Interstellar but considering all the hype and some of his recent films I do not have very high expectations.

What I was wondering about was the recent obsession with "cinematic sound" because most of the 21 century films I've seen (and I've seen a lot, I assure you) 99% have had totally uninspiring and bland cookie-cutter soundtrack with overly loud sound effects. I just can't point to any memorable soundtracks from the last 15-20 years.

Now, granted, there have always been certain dominating styles in movies (big orchestra in Hollywood music, jazz-funk in crime and blaxplotation movies etc). But never has the film music sounded so boring, uninspiring and totally unoriginal. For me the "cinematic sound" these days symbolizes the most boring kind of film music ever. You always have the same orchestra and choir sounds mixed with over-reverberated SFX hits and taiko drums and such. Also the music is often overused - there's no need for stupid orchestral cues in every scene. Add to this too loud explosions and it becomes very tiring. Even the orchestral scores of the 50's and 60's did not get so bland. On the contrary, orchestral scores of the the 50's and 60's could be very avant-garde.

In the 70's and 80's superb original and experimental scores were constantly turning up and the music was never overused to the point of becoming irritating and tedious. Jerry Goldshmit, Vangelis, Tangerine Dream, Mark Isham, Maurice Jarre, Howard Shore, John Scott et al constantly made some stunning electronic soundtracks for a lot of movies. And what I like about about the 70's and 80's is that experimental electronic music could turn up anywhere - it was not tied to science fiction. For example, take Maurice Jarre's score for Witness. It was fantastic in the context of the movie.

[GeckoYamori]

There's much more money at stake nowadays so there will be much less risk-taking involved in every aspect, from the script to the style of the score. Hans Zimmer set a certain type of template for the "blockbuster score" (which is pretty much that relentless barrage of nondescript stacatto strings) in the mid 00's and that's all the studios have wanted ever since.

[SampleScience]

Not seen interstellar yet but there has definitely been a change in mixing sound for TV at least where dialogue is much lower relative to SFX and music. Easy to test by comparing some older movies with modern ones. I find it incredibly annoying. For TV it is as though the soundtrack is mixed for someone in an isolated Home Theatre environment rather than a place where other people in the next room/flat aren't wanting to hear a show they aren't watching

I totally agree and share the pain. The dialogs are often too low in the mix and the music + Sfx so loud I get complains from the neighbors... So I have to turn down the volume when the music gets in and turn it up when the characters talk.

Older movies had far better mixes and I agree that the soundtracks were more challenging than what we hear nowadays.