Music Behind the Scenes: Suspense
Music Behind the Scenes is the definitive look at the way music has become an integral part of movie-making. Each episode looks at specific movie genres and uses a wealth of instantly recognizable film footage, archive clips and interviews with major directors, their composers and stars. Music has become a powerful tool for today's directors that can in seconds create an emotional shift of enough intensity to reduce an audience to tears, laughter or have them jumping out of their seats. This series offers an entertaining and emotional journey into this most crucial aspect of all great movies. This episode examines how composers create suspense and terror in a movie scene and how sweet melodies are used to subvert the shocking visual material of a film. Scenes expressing horror are preceded by an extended drone note to replicate anticipation of terror. Composers play with this convention - Bernard Hermann composer for Psycho recreated sounds of stabbing with short staccato notes from violins while Walter Murch used silence and sound effects for dramatic effect in The Godfather. Featuring interviews with Jamie Lee Curtis, John Carpenter, and Michael Madsen.