Sound of Metal: When the world is far away from your ears

Willow Warbler/Text

On this year's Oscar nomination list for Best Picture, "Sound of Metal" appeared in surprise. This debut feature film, which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival, received a lot of praise when it came out, but it was purchased by Netflix and officially competed with the hit film "Mank" and other small gold people, which was still unexpected by many people. Director Darryls Marder is not a young director in the strict sense, as a post-70s student, he has a relatively rich experience in the industry, the previous screenwriter "Outside the Pine Forest" and the director of the documentary "Plunder" have been steady and steady, and achieved satisfactory results. As for "The Sound of Metal", he tried his first attempt at directing fiction films, setting up a challenging topic of "deaf rock musicians" for the film, which shows his ambition.

"Voice of Metal" is a film that combines author expression and commerciality, and it has to be said that the director has shown his skills in balancing the two aspects. The story revolves around the life of drummer Ruben, who forms a band with his girlfriend and tours across the United States. On stage, they are fierce young people, expressing themselves with sweat and music. However, misfortune fell on Ruben. After one performance, he suddenly found that his hearing was impaired. The arrival of a physical illness caught people by surprise, and Ruben, who made a living from music, became deaf. The film captures the helplessness and despair of a normal person when his physical function deteriorates rapidly, and with excellent sound design, restores the perception of the external sound of the hearing impaired, bringing the audience a strange sense of immersion. The film often "forces" the audience to stand in Reuben's point of view, blurring the sound source, reducing the decibel, and making the audience feel as if deaf and unable to distinguish the sound and dialogue in the film, creating a strong sense of immersion.

Ruben's healing process is the focus of the film, and in a dedicated community for the hearing impaired, he begins the long process of accepting the disease. Ruben is portrayed in the film as an unspeakable musician with a grinning personality, and in many cases he is unable to organize precise language to express himself. The loss of hearing made him manic, but cochlear implants, as the ultimate solution, also kept providing him with hope. The rehabilitation facility provided Ruben with plenty of space to examine his own life, and his contact with children in the deaf-mute school also calmed him down. In the middle of the film, the rhythm is noticeably soothing, recording his reconciliation with himself. Reuben, who has undergone surgery, can re-talk with the surroundings with the help of the cochlear implant, but the sound presented by the external sound source through the cochlear implant is not completely clear and perceptible, but with a rustling sound, like a disturbed radio wave, the "metal" in the title of the film also refers to the change brought by the small metal object of the hearing aid to the protagonist.

It is worth mentioning that although Reuben and his girlfriend Louise showed their sweetness on the stage at the beginning, the feelings of the two did not go to dog blood. Born in a wealthy family, although she is willing to embark on the road of wandering for love, in the face of her boyfriend's life crisis, she also takes this opportunity to recognize her future path and understand the life she wants. She left Ruben to recover in the community and chose to leave. In the middle of the film, Louise disappears completely, but completes her arc of growth off-screen. The director's portrayal of her is a woman who tries to find herself in the lost, and her relationship with Ruben constitutes a moving companionship, rather than the endless sacrifice of "I am willing to take my life for you". Such a realistic treatment makes the interaction between the two more organic, and the sparks that collide between two independent individuals when the dilemma comes are also particularly moving.

Ruben hopes to regain a normal state of life through cochlear implants, while some people do not think that deafness is an abnormality, they refuse to use hearing aids in their daily lives, and accept sign language and lip language communication. "Voice of Metal" also expresses the different attitudes of hearing impaired people to their own disabilities through the perspective of the male protagonist, and in this regard, the film has a deeper social significance.

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