Keira's Second Essay

Sound and Editing for ‘Memento’
To discover more about the openings of thrillers and how they should be presented, I am now looking at a different film and analysing it in terms of two different production elements. Sound can be very important in distinguishing thrillers from other genres of film as it has a lot to do with the atmosphere created, and this can strongly influence the feel of the film upon the viewer. Likewise, the style and pace of editing can communicate a specific meaning to the audience; ‘Memento’ is considered a fairly unusual film in style and storyline so this will make it interesting to look at.
The music at the start of the film is the very first thing the audience hear, and so sets the tone for the rest of the film. ‘Memento’ has conventional thriller music in that it is in no way upbeat or cheerful-sounding, but rather slow and in some ways creepy. However, it doesn’t really attempt to establish a tense or thrilling atmosphere and is instead quite sad sounding. This is created by the long, drawn out chords which are played slowly and repetitively which sound like they come from a variety of instruments – most likely from an orchestra. String instruments are commonly used in thriller music as they can produce both sudden, sharp sounds (such as the well-known screeching noises in ‘Psycho’) and more beautiful, choral sounds such as the ones heard here. Over the top of this music is the occasional sound of the Polaroid being shaken. This draws our attention to the movement of the hand and what is on the Polaroid itself (which is important to the story and in particular the following shots). This is a very long shot which continues throughout the beginning titles - there are no cuts until 1:10 minutes into the film. This keeps the audiences attention on both the names on the titles and, more importantly, the content of the picture. It also eases us in to the action of the film, which corresponds with the music perfectly.
The first cut is a match on action to the man whose hand we’ve just seen as he takes a photo. When the camera takes this is another sudden noise which appears to have been emphasised as it is louder than one would expect, and again draws our attention to what’s happening. The music stops at this point, also, and is replaced with a more surreal sound – still music, but with more reverberation and almost sounds as though it is being played backwards (which is perfectly possible, considering the action taking place). This adds a tenser feel to the scene although the sounds are still drawn out as before, carrying on the sad atmosphere. The shots are still of reasonable length at this point but become shorter and increase in pace as soon as we start to see the objects in the room. Notice that there are no ELS shots to establish the setting – just straight cuts to shocking images of blood on the wall, a bullet etc. This means the audience don’t have time to fully take in the surroundings which may give them an uneasy feeling, and partly add to the enigma code of the film. We can also hear the sounds of these objects moving (bullet, glasses, gun etc.) which sustains the realism somewhat. These sounds build quite rapidly (with the shots) to culminate in the gun shot and the unintelligible scream of the man – the loudest and most sudden sound so far – which is supposedly intended to shock the audience and draw them into the scene. This shot is cut very short, and stops before we get chance to properly see the man’s face; this shows the audience that they’re not allowed to know whom is murdered here as that is the mystery of the film. Before this final shot there was a cut back to the man so that the audience could see his facial expression and to remind us of his involvement in the scene (a useful editing technique in thrillers appears to be reinforcing information in the viewers’ minds so that all is more clear at the end of the film).
It is very important to note that all the shots in this scene were shown backwards, as though we were watching a sequence of events being rewound. This is one of the main themes of the film, and so sets it up right from the beginning with a confusing opening.
There is an immediate change in this sequence in that it has been put in black and white, contrasting to the vivid red we have just witnessed. Also contrasting is how the shot length has returned to being more drawn out so as to relieve the tension and the shots are left for enough time to allow the camera to move – taking in more of the setting by tilting and panning, which is far less unsettling than the previous short shots. The sound here is again echoic, with a fairly metallic, tinny edge to it. This repeats in rhythm of a heartbeat throughout the sequence, quite fast, which could both represent the man’s heartbeat and echo the audience’s after the shock they’ve just been given. Either way, this is an effective backdrop to the dialogue and introduces a reassuring certainty (juxtaposing to the confusion we are likely to be feeling). In a similar way to this, the shots seem to be edited to change in time with the speaking, both to add a sense of organisation and to emphasise certain words (‘but’, ‘perhaps’, ‘3 months’) The voiceover itself is a calming, relatively deep male voice, which leads us to assume is of the man in the shot. This helps change present a more relaxed atmosphere than the urgency and suddenness of the previous sequence. The only other sound is the keys being touched which I presume shows the audience that this is really happening, and is not just someone’s vision or dream. The final shot is faded out which could suggest the passing of time or perhaps the fading of a memory; either way, it seems the natural way to end the unusual scene.
From this first two minutes I have observed some more unusual techniques in creating the opening of a thriller which are nonetheless highly effective in communicating atmosphere to the viewers. This surreal opening intrigues the audience and makes us want to learn more – something which is essential in the start of any story.

Here is the youtube clip i used for my analysis: