“You’ll Get Your Big Trip”: Acousmatic Music, The Voice, and the Mirror Stage in Enter the Void

Balderston, Mark

Savannah, Ga. : Savannah College of Art and Design

2013-05

Thesis (M.F.A.) -- Sound Design

Savannah College of Art and Design -- Department of Sound Design

Includes bibliographical references (p.33-34).

Sound effects and the voice are crucial element of film’s mise-en-scène in articulating cinematic space. In this thesis, I examine the use of experimental electronic music and the role of the voice in constructing the metaphorical spaces and subjective perspectives in director Gaspar Noé’s 2009 film Enter the Void. Rather than create a continuous diegetic space, Enter the Void seeks to convey inherently unknowable experiences such as out-of-body trips, death, and the afterlife. I approach the film from a psycho-analytical and structuralist perspective, comparing the protagonist’s compulsive use of psychedelics to the film’s attempt to create a pre-symbolic experience of sound. I find that a fixation on the fantasized unity of the mirror stage drives both the film’s score and the protagonist’s behavior. Finally I examine the manner in which spatio-temporal manipulation of the voice influences perceptions of cinematic space and time.

CHAIR: LeGrand, Stephen

Stone, David

Cox-Stanton, Tracy

English

Sound Design

Text

PDF : 34 p. : ill

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