I guess I'm coming at this problem from the other direction. In Blow Up we have a disjunction between what is seen and what is heard. Consider how ordinary it would be if the tennis ball were present but its noise absent. We would simply motivate its the distortion of realism as an emanation of the observer's subjectivity. Distortions of the soundtrack are one of the most popular ways of flagging a distorted subjectivity, and often are very important in motivating related visual distortions. To take two quite mainstream examples 1) In the opening of Falling Down the main character's inner turmoil constructed by an expressive (MTVish) montage and overwrought soundtrack. The montage fragments space in a series of ever closer shots until the act of looking too hard has destroyed any context or content that the individual details may have had - an overload of nothingness rendering the protagonist's hysteria. The film's transition from a relatively objective construction of the traffic jam he's in to these inner pyrotechnics is bridged by the soundtrack. Initially composed of very low key non-diagetic orchestral music and a diagetic radio talk-back show, the sudden introduction of searing guitar riffs, drum bursts and other rock heroics flag the change in perspective. Without this signalling, this sequence would probably seem like one of those late 60s early 70s films which create their ambience by suppressing non-diagetic music and thereby the RELIABLE information that this emanation of the narration (diagetic music is of the diagesis, non-diagetic music is of the narration) normally provides. 2) A more obscure but fun second example is Souls for Sale / Confessions of an Opium Addict . Having been compelled to smoke opium, Vincent Price must flee the den pursued by the Tong. The entire scene is played in slo-mo (a good 5 minutes) and the soundtrack is virtually silent. The noise of Price crashing through windows and being shot at are included, but not properly synchronised and not in any 'slo-sound-mo'. But at the beginning of the sequence what the viewer notices first is the conspicuous silence. Price is lying on a bed, so movement is no issue. The silence is what contextualises the slo-mo when it starts as an emanation of Price's stoned subjectivity. In an only moderately interesting B-film, this sequence is notable for how effective it is - it's riveting. As much as we might trust the camera's eye, as the cinematic equivalent in many ways to the authoritative voice of the storyteller, the soundtrack perhaps more than the visuals (think of how much the soundtrack tells us about how to approach the visuals) is expected to reliably narrate. The scene from Blow Up as it stands uses the more extreme disruption of the soundtrack to insist that tennis is being played. Where a silent match could easily be motivated by as subjective realism, the sequence as it stands cannot be so easily assimilated. Realistic reading being thus blocked, the symbolic level becomes foregrounded. [This is not intended as an exhaustive reading] We know tennis is being played, we hear it, we see the players, but the ball alludes us. In the film as a whole we know an investigation by a detective character is being carried out, but in this game the ball (the crime, clues, information) , which we're accustomed to watching, is entirely suppressed. It is specifically by violating the soundtrack's 'position of trust' that this effect is created. As to those examples of conflict between what a narrator says and what they actually did, ie., in a flash back - Clint Eastwood killing confederates coldly in The Beguiled while telling people how humane and honourable he is, the prospective tenant in Shallow Grave answering 'No' to the question of whether he has ever killed a man while the flashback shows him doing so and the great number of comic usages of this kind of thing - the reason we privilege the flashback itself when there is conflict is not a video/audio thing in these cases but because flashbacks are of the narration, where as dialogue is of a character. Where audio is of the narration, non-diagetic music, we tend to consider it reliable, where it is of a character - dialogue, voice overs - we are at least ready to accept that it may be unreliable. Similarly flashbacks can be constructed unreliably if they're sourced strongly to a character, as in The Usual Suspects and also used for expressive purposes if linked closely enough to a subjectivity - Mr. Orange's cops-in-the-toilet scene in Reservoir Dogs - or accepted as accurate if the film distances them from any narrating character or subjectivity, as in The Beguiled etc. well, let me know what you think Peter Thomas ---- To signoff SCREEN-L, e-mail [log in to unmask] and put SIGNOFF SCREEN-L in the message. Problems? Contact [log in to unmask]