Table of contentsThe haunted houseThe office, part 1Rachel's office, part 2Blake's kitchenThe officeThe toiletThe child Matthew's bedroomThe common roomGibson and Imogen / Office RachelBlake's Common Room ClimaxThe End Overall, I enjoyed the play, but I felt there were a handful of moments that were unreasonably stupid and prevented one from being fully immersed in the world of history. The production quality, as would be expected from a BBC Radio 4 piece, was of a high standard, with each scene featuring multiple levels of complexity, combining primary and secondary sounds to create a rich story world. Mise en Scène's syntagmatic choices made it easy to visualize what each location looked like and how characters moved in space and in relation to each other through primary dialogic cues and secondary sounds of physical movement and perspective acoustics. Even though I didn't know all of the characters' names, I never felt lost and was easily able to create a unique image in my mind for each character. The play executed this by using voice actors with a wide and diverse range and giving the characters distinct, even somewhat archetypal, personalities. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get an original essayIn this analysis, structured by scenes and presented in chronological order as one would perform the final piece, primary and secondary sounds will be examined in an effortful manner to find trends, plotlines, and whether the script's choices made this fictional drama piece more or less powerful. The Haunted House Bad Memories begins with secondary diegetic sounds of crunching footsteps on leaves and gravel, denoting a journey until we arrive at the creaking doors and the sounds of footsteps echoing across the hard floors of a structure. This will quickly become a room staple and will be used extensively throughout the room. Once the two male characters start speaking, there is a lot of reverberation in their voices, in some cases it becomes a complete echo, which makes the audience feel like the interior space is very large, with little or nothing on the walls to absorb. reverberation. This, along with the other secondary sounds of the wind blowing, indicates that we are outside. Almost instantly, the sound combination is meant to evoke a symbolic feeling of dread, fear, and danger. It does this by playing on traditional haunted house and horror movie tropes that people in the Western world have conventionally recognized as scary. At 0:59, our assumptions about the danger of the structure are supported by primary sounds from one of the two male characters indicating that a previously occurring fire has caused suspected structural damage and that it is unsafe to venture out further away. From their first exchange of words, it is clear that they are in violation, which leads me to assume that they are doing it under the cover of darkness. Although we don't have names yet, from their familiar exchange of primal sounds, the two males know each other, and it's clear that one is much more shy and afraid of the house while the other is more reckless and daring. The shy male clearly uses primary language at 1:19 to mean a warning to the more reckless male to "don't go in there." This use of the primary sound, supported by the frightening nature of the secondary sounds, is accompanied by a symbolic connotation of imminent danger andof apprehension. Visually, I draw on my own experiences to see what it might look like. Even though the two male characters are British, my mind conjures up the forests and abandoned houses I've seen in American horror films. Since we are told there was a previous fire, my mind also paints the wood of the house black ash and a faint smell of charred campfire logs clinging to the fresher scent of a hardwood forest . The timeline of the story in the first scene feels present and unfolding as we are experiencing it. Scene 1 throws the listener into the middle of the action with no idea who the characters are, where they are geographically, or what their motivations might be. Although we have to guess at the story throughout this scene, the main dialogue does a great job of giving us enough verbal queues to know where the characters are moving spatially in the scene and in relation to each other . For example, at 1:08, the more adventurous male goes upstairs, where we get a distant perspective of his voice while staying close to the shy male. Finally, at 1:21, we are given one of the male's names, Tom, after loud secondary sounds of crashing and wooden planks breaking. Even though we had no investment or buy-in for the characters' safety or survival, the stress in the male characters' voices as well as the sound effects creates tension and suspense. Perhaps it is only our curiosity about what happens next that is exciting about potential deadly action occurring so early in the storyline or it could be that throughout this scene a close-up perspective was used , which helped create intimacy between the characters and the listener. The diegetic sounds of heavy breathing and creaking structurally unstable wood follow the trajectory of increasing fear and danger for our characters to the climax of Tom falling through the ground and letting the listener know through primal sounds that he found a group of human bones. Before we hear Tom indicate that there are human remains there, we hear a sparkling whimsical sound, then a faint female voice singing. This secondary sound is meant to indexically evoke the presence of a spirit. Even though both men don't react to the sound, I believe we are meant to perceive this sound as occurring in the story world, even if from a production perspective it was added in an indigestible way. We can also evoke his terror through the tone of his voice and the urgency with which he asks for help to get out of the abyss. This scene ends with non-diegetic secondary sounds of gusts of wind, banshees, and unattached screams to signify the transition, with a final fade to silence. The use of these sounds together occurs in several places in the piece and will collectively be referred to as "spooky secondary sounds." Overall, the paradigmatic choices of using classic haunted house sounds give the overall scene an artificial, campy feel. 1We move to the second scene with secondary footsteps on the tiles. This scene, set in the present day, uses acoustic reverb, knocks on the door, conversations, and quiet, whispered knocks to lead us to believe that the character is in a nondescript professional office. Through primary dialogue, we are introduced to the following set of characters: a man with an air of authority who introduces himself as a law enforcement detective Marquez and Rachel, the office owner, a woman who specializes in audio recordings. AOnce Detective Marquez is in Rachel's office, the acoustic perspective records very close to both characters, giving a feeling of intimacy, and there is absolutely no secondary ambient sound until the detective leaves the office to give Rachel time to analyze the recorder. This pattern of narrow acoustic perspective of the characters with little to no ambient secondary sounds in Rachel's office will continue throughout the play. Detective Marquez gives the audience a montage reference point via his primal dialogue apology to Rachel for arriving just before closing time. and dives into the backstory at 3:13. Through this exchange of primary dialogue between the characters, the audience also learns the history of the haunted house, the overall timeline of the story up to that point, and the male characters in the first scene. Also helpful was the diegetic timeline that Detective Marquez established for Rachel, allowing us to place the previous set of characters, the house fire, and the five corpses on a linear mental progression. During this exchange of dialogue, we are also introduced to the key characters we have not yet met who make up the collection of bodies found in scene 1: Jonathan, Imogen and Matthew Blake, Philip Gibson and an unidentified woman. Detective Marquez discusses the oddities of the case and Rachel's increasing sighs and forced exhalations, symbolically evoking interest, exasperation, and disbelief. In a short time, the audience has been given a lot of information through the main dialogue and at 5:54 p.m. there is a bit of comic relief from Rachel as she orders Marquez a Grand Latte. This scene ends with the appearance of the first secondary sounds we have heard in a while, the door slamming and the sounds of the tape recorder being rewound. Rachel's Office, Part 2 Knowing that Rachel is alone with the recording, we know everything. she hears. The sounds of the start and stop buttons being pressed with a distinctly audible click are recorded with a close-up perspective while the beginning sounds of the tape deck have an initial layer of static added non-diegetically in post-production to help differentiate for the listener. that they transitioned to the recorded past story world of 2004. After about ten seconds of layered static audio, the audio from the recorder becomes clear and acoustically closer as we become more present in the world of Blake family history from November 4. , 2004. Creating that sense of intimacy with the deceased members of this house by changing the way the audio sounds to the listener helps us buy into the story, care about the characters, and even though we know the ultimate ending, makes us curious how it happened. This pattern remains true for most of the piece as we switch between the tapes and the narrow acoustic perspective of Detective Marquez and Rachel's voices and the reverberation of her office and will therefore not be mentioned again in this analysis until the scene breaks with this established convention. In less than a minute of play, we go through a few hours of story, marked by the return of Detective Marquez to Rachel's office with his café au lait, which he had verbalized in scene 2. This paradigmatic choice in the storyline was a wonderful way to create rapid movement of time without feeling disjointed. Rachel accepts her latte with a sigh of frustration and annoyance, probably in response to the last few hours she spent trying to access the corrupted audio files, which she begins playing for Marquez. On the cassettes weWe hear primary monologue and dialogue and a host of clear ambient sounds of crisp walking, birdsong and Phillip Gibson denoting iconic cues from its remote, woodsy setting. Since I now know the timeline of the story world, this version of the forest is bright, sunny, and worry-free because it is before the murder. Bird song also contributes to indexically evoking the day and symbolically designating spring or freshness. The atmosphere of this scene is much more serene than the first time we discovered the Blake house. However, the unease returns very quickly through the use of primary dialogue between Gibson and Jonathan Blake, when the seed of doubt about Gibson's good intentions is sown and then watered by Marquez and Rachel after stopping the tape as we were leaving this scene. Blake's Kitchen As the recorded past shifts to a more present feel, reverberations suggest we are inside and verbal indexical references such as an offer of tea and the boy Blake Michael's request for a snack suggest that the characters are spatially in the kitchen. The voices of the three adults are nervous, only the voice of the young boy seems banal. With the introduction of Imogen and Michael Blake, this is the first time there have been more than two characters in Mise en Scène. With four characters, things could get confusing but the producers made strong paradigmatic decisions in choosing actors with very distinct voices, making it easy to identify each character. Just before we return to Detective Marquez at 10:54, we hear the faint, distant voice of a fifth character who is verbally referred to as Bisa. , the nanny. Its acoustic perspective is very distant, which denotes its low level of importance in the story. Personally, I think adding a fifth character in a close-up perspective would have been too overwhelming for the scene. StudySecondary's sound effects support the dialogue that took place at 12:03 when Jonathan invited Gibson to speak more privately in his office where our initial perceptions of Blake's Wealth are verified through primary dialogue. On the way to his office, the dialogue sets the stage for the importance of flooring as we witness elongated footsteps on stone floors. Jonathan states that he kept the old flooring from the previous house and we have a feeling this information will be important later in the story due to the amount of time spent on such a mundane fact. For me, I think the clearest indication that a new scene has started is at 12:24 where there is a deep, non-diegetic boom sound followed by the sparkling, whimsical chimes, strong wind, songbirds and ghostly howls that we heard earlier in the program that symbolized the presence of a supernatural being. We hear these sounds again at 4:16 p.m. and 4:58 p.m. Since none of the characters present during the actual recording react to these sounds, we can assume that they are not diegetic in the production sense. However, our living observers, Marquez and Rachel react to these recorded sounds, meaning they also have a diegetic place in the story. This fits the common trope used in other supernatural stories and films where a machine is needed to perceive the presence of ghosts since humans are not capable of doing so without assistance. The Toilet We return to the recorded story and within ten seconds Rachel. the hurried playing, the deep, resounding secondary sound that symbolizes doom, is heard as Gibson uses the main monologueto tell its recorder: “Something is here”. Now that Gibson had the chance to listen to his tape while hiding in the toilet, he heard the same mysterious disembodied girl singing that Rachel and Marquez heard. The listener is meant to feel uncomfortable and frightened by this revelation, which is paired with a knock on the bathroom door that startles him at its unexpected volume and proximity. In terms of editing, we don't know how much time has passed. or how Gibson went from Blake's office to the bathroom after Rachel had just declared that over an hour and a half of the tape was corrupt. This scene features many new secondary sounds to help support the spatial positioning of the characters in the house: a toilet flushing, a creaking door, footsteps, and a distant telephone ringing with an equally distant Imogen calling for her husband Jonathan . that a call was received for him. At this point, Jonathan's voice evokes unease towards Gibson and you can feel a sense of suspicion rising as Gibson asks permission to wander around the house alone. We hear Jonathan quickly leave the scene as his quick steps fade on the way to the phone, leaving Gibson alone to explore the house. Matthew's child's bedroom. This scene begins with the return of the deep boom and accompanying footsteps to signal Gibson's movement. toilets and other parts of the house. Video game noises are heard, suggesting that Gibson entered young Matthew's room. The deep symbolic boom of doom returns when Gibson questions Matthew about the mysterious girl on the recordings. As Gibson questions Matthew, the tone and pitch of his voice drops and becomes almost predatory. It's here, at 8:51 p.m., that you know Gibson isn't just a reporter and he's definitely there with an ulterior motive. Personally, I feel uncomfortable in this scene because he is alone with Matthew and acts inappropriately. This is validated when Gibson's voice returns to its cheerful, professional manner when Jonathan runs into the room and when Rachel turns off the tape to tell Detective Marquez, "This guy is really scary." Before this scene ended, the producers made an interesting paradigm. choice in the storyline at 9:50 p.m. when Marquez asked if Rachel had a husband. It was inappropriate, blatantly personal and irrelevant. This did contribute to increased awkwardness, but it was not echoed anywhere else in the play and should have been removed. The common room When the tape is restarted after the verbal exchange between Detective Marquez and Rachel, time has passed and the three adults are in a common space. We know it's now dark outside and at dinner time thanks to Imogen, Jonathan and Gibson's main dialogue. Imogen's voice sounds nervous as she tries to convince Gibson to spend the night and Jonathan starts to think something is seriously wrong. During this scene we quickly switch between the current present world and the world of recorded history, which is a bit dizzying at times. Many of the same conventions are used to refer to when we are in the world of recorded history or the present world of Rachel's office. The multiple minutes of main dialogue are recorded in a subdued acoustic perspective with very little secondary sound as the adults argue over the true nature of Gibson's presence there as a paranormal investigator. The absence of secondary sounds, the argumentative dialogue but the presence of reverb gives the listener a feeling of tension as these three individualsparticipate in a heated exchange in a small space. Gibson is recorded in a close-up perspective as he details the origin story of the haunting and the importance of the stone floor to the Blakes, while both the listener and the Blakes nervously hold their breath. At 27:54, Rachel begins arguing with Detective Marquez. because she started to believe in the fantastical nature of the story while Detective Marquez still believes that there must be a logical explanation for everything. The secondary sounds help us visualize that Rachel is working on some piece of equipment with a keyboard as she tries to filter out some additional parts of the audio tape to play. The main exchange between Rachel and Detective Marquez at this point suggests that they have been there a long time and are tired and frustrated. Gibson and Imogen / Rachel's Office Imogen speaks privately with Gibson as they set up a recording device that will play sounds in real time on the speakers. We continue to hear the house reverb sounds, but when Gibson turns on the speakers, we also get a short feedback reverb from the speakers themselves. During the last five minutes, there was a lull in the secondary sound that might help prepare the listener for the onslaught of frightening sounds that are to come in this highly predictable supernatural drama that plays out at 32:27 below the form of more frightening secondary sounds. We are abruptly taken back to Rachel's office and this shift happens often and quickly in this scene. Rachel's tone, pitch, and strength of voice clearly suggest that she is distressed by what she heard on the recording, and through her expertise, she verifies the validity of the terrifying sounds on the recording. We hear the play button click and return to Gibson and Imogen with some time having passed. Now that the tension is established, a cacophony of sounds bombards the listener. The overall volume increases as screams and moans fill the stage. This sound is diegetic as Imogen and Gibson react with fear and terror. Marquez receives a call on Rachel's phone and scratches notes on a notepad, implying that the information he just received is going to be very important and that he doesn't want to make a mistake. When he shares this information with Rachel and the listener, everyone gets chills as he reluctantly reveals the connections between Mary the person and Mary the potential ghost. Rachel's voice continues to rise in pitch and speed, evoking her adjitation. The Blake Common Room Climax We leave Rachel shaken in her office and jump straight into the world of the Blakes' story. This time the transition breaks away from the motif and goes straight to the near, non-static sound of the recorded past, but it uses the deep boom of doom to demarcate the transition. Through the main dialogue between Jonathan and Gibson, we learn that Jonathan saw the ghostly bad girl and Gibson warns that "she's here", so they return to the amplifier speakers and hear the ghost say "I came home " in classic spooky ghost fashion, one minute after his death in the real world of November 2004. Just like in the last scene, we switch between the current feel of the world of recorded past history and the world of the past story present day of Rachel's office, with hints of a click of the button letting us know that we are returning to the saved world. Rachel's voice continues to intensify with terror and unease as the detective tries to calm her down. Her increasing tone and increasing speed of words per minute suggest that she is becoming increasingly anxious.