British Sounds Analysis

British Sound Analysis:

A voiceover in the film British Sounds states, "Sometimes the class struggle is also the struggle of one image against another image, of one sound against another sound. In a film, this struggle is between images and sounds." We as spectators are able to make connection with that statement as we watch the segments in the film unfold. As the tracking shot captures the auto assembly line, the diegetic sounds of the noisy machines overwhelm us. This similar technique can be seen in another Goddard film Week End as he captures an endless traffic jam. In addition to the sound of the machines, Goddard adds the narrative voiceover creating a dichotomy between the two audios. The spectators are left to strain to hear what the narrator is saying through the roaring noise of the machines. As we continue watching the film we are able to recognize the tension Goddard has tried to create between the images and sounds. In the second segment we can see the contrast between the image and sound as the film captures a naked woman while a voiceover explicates on feminist rights. We begin to question the male gaze and women rights as the scene becomes ambiguous. In the third segment Goddard captures an angry commentator with his racist dialect. Throughout the whole segment Goddard adds in cutaway shots of irrelevant images with no audio accompanying it, the images have nothing to with what he is saying. This random insertion of images give a sense of contradiction to what the commentator is saying. It is as though there is no meaning behind what the anchor is saying because the irrelevant images do not support his speech; in a sense the speech becomes invalid. I find that the forth and fifth segments are very different in comparison to the first three when we look at the picturization. In these segments Goddard uses handheld camera and moves the camera freely when capturing the scene. This free movement of camera gives the audience a point of view