Corporeality, Musical Heartbeats, and Cinematic Emotion

Abstract

Film music's emotive power -in particular its ability to seemingly engender a state of suspense or even 'fear' when watching a horror movie -is well known, and is both recognised by spectators and exploited by filmmakers. We know, for instance, that turning down the volume may serve to alleviate some of the emotional symptoms experienced when watching a film on television, and that blocking one's ears in the cinema is far more difficult to accomplish than the less effective method of averting one's eyes. 2 Yet, perhaps because of the familiarity of the effect, there is comparatively little attention paid to this phenomenon in the rapidly growing field of film musicology: rather, studies are often content to posit some magical and ineffable link between so-called 'nondiegetic' film music and emotion, and to sidestep interesting philosophical or cognitive issues. 3 In this article, then, I want to confront this phenomenon and tackle some of these issues head on, challenging many of our assumptions about the narrative status of film music and sound on the way. By invoking philosophical models of cinematic fiction offered by Kendall Walton and Gregory Currie, I will explain, firstly, what is happening when we think we are experiencing an emotion in the cinema as a result of film music or film sound, placing particular emphasis on 'fear.' This approach, 1 This article has its origins in a paper given at the 'Sound, Music and Moving Image' conference in September 2007. My thanks are extended to the anonymous readers of the article and the editors for their suggestions, and to Dr Nicholas Attfield for his comments. 2

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