Yesterday (2.10) Variety‘s Zack Sharf reported on a recent Chris Nolan and Timothee Chalamet discussion about this and that. One of the topics was the reception to Nolan’s Interstellar (’14). The spaced-out space saga costarred Chalamet, made a ton of money ($681 million worldwide) but was deeply despised by people of taste when it opened in the fall of ’14, and is still hated today.
Nolan’s analysis of the dislike for Interstellar completely avoided the sound-mix issues. He didn’t even mention the sound. Here’s what he said instead:
“You’re trying to be polite. The film was received in a slightly ambiguous way. It was a little bit sniffy. Some of the responses were a bit sniffy from critics and a little from audiences. It made very good money around the world. There was a sense of people not quite being…it sounds egotistical to say they weren’t ready…but [critics] weren’t ready for it from me.”
Not “ready” for it? Much or most of the dialogue was buried in a whomp=thromp sound mix that drove sensible people nuts.
From HE’s 10.27.14 review: “I was saying to myself as I sank into the second hour, ‘If I could hear more of the dialogue I might be into this a bit more, but all I’m really hearing beyond the odd word or phrase of occasional sentence is the whomp and the romp and the stomp. Given my limited comprehension of the dialogue due to this shitty sound system I have to say that I really hate hate HATE movies that make me feel dumb. And this film is making me feel like an effing moron. McConaughey and Hathaway and Damon are in hell on the ice planet of Hoth, and I’m in hell in the TCL Chinese.”
“What Sex With Chris Nolan Must Be Like,” a College Humor riff posted in 2014.
From HE’s “Actionman,” received today: “You’re not lying. Either the sound mix was terrible or the people at IMAX said turn it up and keep it up because at the Cinemark in Manchester, CT, in their IMAX-lite, you could barely hear dialogue that should’ve been heard. I don’t understand how something like this could happen.”
From Cinema Blend‘s Sean O’Connell: “At our screening, the audio mix on the Interstellar presentation was so off, I had to ask a colleague if the speakers in our house were broken. There was a recurring buzz from the speakers in the mix. It would arrive during certain scenes, linger for a few minutes, then disappear. Our screening wasn’t an isolated event.”
From an 11.6 “My Two Cents” column by Digital Bits editor Bill Hunt:
“And a word about Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar: I don’t want to post a review of the film yet, because I think you really need to see it yourself and form your own opinion. I’ll just say that I had decidedly mixed feelings about the film. However, the one thing I do want to note is that Dr. Jahnke and I experienced a problem with the audio at the 70mm screening we attended last night (at the Cinerama Dome in Hollywood) and it’s apparently widespread. The problem is that the film’s score seems to be mixed too high, so that you lose lines of dialogue here and there – every so often, the character’s dialogue becomes almost inaudible. If you encounter this, report it here at the official website. Hopefully, that will encourage Nolan and company to get this fixed ASAP.”