Directed by: John Krasinski

Composer: Marco Beltrami

Sound Design: Brandon Jones

Supervising Sound Editors: Erik Aadahl, Ethan Van der Ryn

The big part of ‘A Quiet place’ narration through the sound consisted from the foley recording and the score. Both very specifically executed in since the movie is based on groundbreaking lack of sound which of course doesn’t mean the complete absence of it.

Sound designers who participated in creation of sound design for the film are Erik Aadahl and Ethan Van der Ryn. They mentioned that the sound was actually written into the script and played very significant role int the whole story telling, which doesn’t seem to be the usual practice.

Aadahl and Van der Ryn admitted the difficulty of a challenge to work on a movie with this much absolute silence. With barely any spoken dialogue or loud sound effects therefore “the quiet becomes loud and the loud becomes ear-piercing” (Alkhulaifi, 2022). They are mentioning that very interesting part of the post production was really scaling back and be more minimalistic with the use of the sound.

The lack of sound in the movie tells the story in a way that any loud sound inherently means death. This is John Krasinski’s main premise in the building the constant underlying tension. Classical horror movies are often based on ‘jump scares’ which can be criticised that they aren’t in fact scary but only startling and the tension from the scene dissolves quickly since the physiological response of the body doesn’t recognise ‘jump scare’ as an actual threat. You will not find many jump scares in ‘A Quiet Place’. Any causally louder sound either happening suddenly or brought up slowly and building with tension creates different physiological response which can prolong the feeling of the thrill of even the fear because viewer sympathise with characters knowing that the mere existence of the sound means danger.

The story telling with the sound in ‘A Quiet Place doesn’t end only with the building a thrill and tension by utilising the silence. Focus on quiet sounds play big role in the narrative, too, for example checking the hearth beat of unborn child with a stethoscope or romantic moment of sharing the earphone from the walkman whilst mother and father of the family are dancing together or masking quieter sounds by louder by ones when father and son freely talking whilst they are hidden behind the waterfall.

One of the main characters, the daughter, is deaf and played by deaf actress Millicent Simmonds. Film has several scenes which are nearly quiet or totally soundless to highlight her point of view. ‘A Quiet Place’ has been praised for its representation of the Deaf community, its use of American Sign Language (ASL), and being one of the first films to showcase the cochlear implant (Mendoza, 2021). In spite of the positive aspects of featuring deaf community ‘A Quiet Place’ overcomes ableism in the film industry only until certain extend and received also critiques. I will talk about those more in the reflective writing.

https://www.vox.com/2018/5/26/17396174/a-quiet-place-sound-design-loud

https://www.motionpictures.org/2018/04/the-a-quiet-place-sound-design-that-makes-audiences-afraid-of-their-own-noise/

https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1419&context=the-mall

Mendoza, A. (2021). How a Quiet Place is Harmful to Those in Quiet Worlds. The Mall, [online] 5(1). Available at: https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/the-mall/vol5/iss1/11 [Accessed 22 Nov. 2023].

sites.northwestern.edu. (n.d.). Analysis of a Sound Design Piece — A Quiet Place 2018 – Mariam Alkhulaifi. [online] Available at: https://sites.northwestern.edu/mariamalkhulaifi/analysis-of-a-sound-design-piece-a-quiet-place-2018/

This is the plan for brainstorming initial ideas about the sound design and eventually making a more systematic plan for recording the foley. I have watched the clip with no sound, thinking about possibilities of sound design only based on my brief knowledge of the film without seeing the film before or approaching to the research. I broke down scene by scene describing events and actions happening considering also the movement of the camera. Next step will be to compare my initial thoughts with the vision of the director and how close (or far) I was from his ideas. This plan will be additionally and continuously updated by adding sound design, production and recording ideas.

0:00 – 0:05 (Camera static)
– Wind blowing into the dry grass

0:05 – 0:10 (Camera static)
– Leaves dancing on the quiet empty road when wind blowing

0:10 – 0:15 (Camera static)
– Quiet wind, paper posters on the wall (on the left) quietly rustling

0:15 – 0:19 (Camera static)
– Paper posters still rustling quietly but more loud than in the previous scene

0:19 – 0:23 (Camera static)
– Dark empty store ambience – silence

0:23 – 0:28 (Camera static)
– Dark empty store ambience – silence interrupted by eerie crackling nosies in the far

0:28 – 0:34 (Camera static)
– Kid run quietly tip-toeing from the left to the right in the store’s ambience [use of the phaser within the quiet ambience to create sense of movement by someone’s quiet physical presence]

0:34 – 0:41 (Camera static)
– Teenager walks slowly tip-toeing and looking around from the left to the right in the store’s ambience [use of the phaser…]

0:41 – 1:01 (Camera is slowly moving from the left to the right)
– Slow tip-toeing from the left to the right very close [use of the phaser…]
– Quiet run from behind to the front [use of the phaser…]
– Slow tip-toeing from the left to the right and then approaching closer from the far in the store [use of the phaser…]

1:01 – 1:11 (Camera is slowly moving from the left to the right)
– Quiet slow steps from the left to the right [use of the binaural microphone to capture ‘sensation’ of the person wearing hearing aid; use of the phaser…]

1:12 – 1:13 (Camera is slowly moving from the left to the right)
– Kid runs very fast but quietly from the left to the right [use of the phaser…]

1:13 – 1:18 (Camera is slowly moving from the left to the right)
– Kid runs moderately fast but quietly from the left to the right [use of the phaser…]

1:18 – 1:33 (Camera is slowly moving from the bottom to the top)
– Adult woman is quietly approaching from the back of the store and turning to her right and searching through shelves for the medicine.
Kid is sitting on the floor and quietly sobbing.

1:34 – 1:37 (Camera static)
– Kid quietly sobbing on the floor
Ambience of the store

1:37 – 02:10 (Camera is slowly moving from the top to the right bottom)
– Handling plastic medicine bottles
– Taking one and bringing it to the child walking away from the shelf to the the back
– Administrating a pill to the child
– Opening the bottle of water

02:10 – 02:22 (Camera static)
– Child quietly flushing the pill by water
– Closing the bottle of water
– Person quietly approaching from the right behind the shelf observing quietly woman and child
– Woman is turning around and using the sign language to communicate

02:22 – 02:31 (Camera goes slightly down)
– Walk behind the shelf slightly in the back walks away to the right

02:31 – 02:55 (Camera slowly zooming in)
– Little boy on the floor is drawing something on the floor in the middle of the corridor
– Teenage girl is slowly approaching to him and leaning on her knees to see the drawing
– Girl is asking boy in sign language about the drawing

02:55 – 02:56 (Camera going up following the hand)
– Boy is expressing a rocket in sign language

02:57 – 03:00 (Camera static)
– Girl is responding to boy in the sign language

03:00 – 03:06 (Camera static)
– Boy is responding in sign language

03:06 – 03:12 (Camera static)
– Girl is quietly sitting being concerned and not responding

03:12 – 03:14 (Camera slightly moving to the right)
– Boy is standing up and walking away to the right

03:14 – 03:18 (Camera slightly zooming in)
– Boy walking away to the left not visible, girl is observing sitting in the spot

03:18 – 03:32 (Camera slowly go to the right bottom towards the drawing on the floor)
– Boy quickly turns left behind the the shelf in the back
– Girl stands up and tip-toeing follows the boy to the back

03:33- 03:37 (Camera slowly going up)
– Boy is balancing on the plastic box trying to reach something in the shelf

03:37 – 03:41 (Camera slowly going to the right)
– Boy is awkwardly trying to reach a space shuttle toy in the shelf

03:41 – 03:42 (Camera slowly going up to the right)
– Boy is pulling the shuttle toy from the shelf and it is about to fall on the floor

03:42 – 03:44 (Camera moves shortly but swiftly to the right)
– Girl swiftly but quietly run towards the boy and catches falling shuttle toy landing on the floor with her knees
– Person is bringing basket towards in the very back of the corridor

03:44 – 03:47 (Camera slowly going up)
– Girl is nervously gasping but staying quiet

03:48 – 03:52 (Camera slowly going up)
– Girl is nervously gasping but staying quiet looking up towards the boy and then to the back of the corridor

A family struggles for survival in a world where most humans have been killed by blind but noise-sensitive creatures. They are forced to communicate in sign language to keep the creatures at bay.

In a devastated Earth overrun by invincible predators of a possible extraterrestrial origin, the Abbotts are struggling to survive in the desolate urban jungle of New York City: a death trap defined by a new era of utter silence. Indeed, as noise attracts this new type of invader, even the slightest of sounds can be deadly. However, even though it’s already been twelve months since the powerful monsters’ first sightings, the resilient Abbott family still stands strong. In this muted dystopia, learning the rules of survival is crucial. And now, more than ever, the Abbotts must not make a sound. —Nick Riganas (IMDb)

I have chosen to make sound for this film from several reasons. 1) I like sci-fi movies with haunting eerie atmosphere 2) Considering the narration of the film, there is a lot of potential on creating tension with the silence and creative use of sound effects to play with psychoacoustics with not necessarily having a loud sounds or any sound at all – for example the phaser – it can create sense of presence and movement without actually hearing it.

This Foley recording was created by Baria Qureshi, Dani Dasero and Vit Trojanovsky.

For the recording, we have used a large condenser diaphragm microphone AKG C414. First, we used two to capture possible stereo image but then we decided that for the purpose of this exercise, there is no need for that and used only one. All of us tried every role during the recording – performing foley artist and monitoring with recording in the studio.

We have performed folly sounds in the real time while watching the action on the screen. It didn’t always match 100% therefore we were adjusting recorded clips on the grid.

The parabolic microphone is highly directional and suitable for capturing sounds from very specific directions. A dish-shaped reflector focuses sound waves onto a small microphone located at the focal point of the dish. They are known for their ability to capture sounds from a relatively long distance.

A shotgun microphone is a directional microphone but not as much as a parabolic mic. They are good for capturing sounds from a specific direction whilst also allowing to capture some of the ambience.

A hydrophone is a contact microphone specialised for recording under the water. With a special cup, it can be used as a classic contact microphone.