The Sound of Gravity

The movie Gravity, written and directed by Alfonso Cuaron elevated the standard for how things should sound in outer space entirely. Although their have been so many brilliant films located in space, such as Star Wars, and Alien, Gravity set a more realistic version of space's ambient tone. Because in space sound cannot be transmitted throughout the atmosphere, essentially nothing can be heard. But because of brilliant audio engineers, and Cuaron's artistry the sound comes from the perspective of the actors interaction with elements. If the actor grabs or touches something the vibration will travel into their ears. For people who haven't worked on sound, or know very little about it, this means all of the sounds you hear in the movie DOES NOT come from recordings on set, it is entirely recorded separately.

If you haven't seen the movie, which I recommend you do the film is about shuttle explorer STS-157, on which Dr. Ryan Stone (played by Saundra Bullock) who is on her first mission. She is accompanied by Matt Kowalski (played by George Clooney) who is on his last expedition. During a spacewalk mission control channels the Explorer (the name of the shuttle) that there has been a Russian missile strike and the debris is headed their way. Minutes later a cloud of debris hits the shuttle and detaches Stone leaving her drifting alone throughout space.

What I find so fascinating about the movie, is because it comes from the actors perspective, who is flying around in space, the music and the sound are constantly traveling around you. Cuaron and the engineers composed the sound to surround you and pan into different speakers. What this did was it built up the emotion and fear into being lost in a completely different world, and made you feel like you were there. For sound nerds like me, the plug-in the engineers used to pan the sound and the score is called "Atmos" which is located in Pro- Tool 7. Whats so cool about this plug-in is most of the panning is automatically tuned by the program itself. According to the re-recording mixer Skip Lievsay who worked on No Country for Old Men, Fargo, and No Country For Old Men, most of the scenes were autopanned with Atmos.

The love and the passion that Cuaron puts into the cinematic experience of the movie encourages me  as I enter the beginning stages of my career. It proves that with countless hours of work, very little sleep, and a lot of drive you can create anything. I sincerely hope this movie lives up to its potential at the Oscars. For 90 minutes I was convinced I was lost along side Saundra Bullock traveling with nobody in outer space. And the music and sound had me on the edge of my seat during this terrifying situation.