The Voice in Cinema

7/24/2019 The Voice in Cinema

1/19

Yale University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Yale French Studies.

http://www.jstor.org

The Voice in the Cinema: The Articulation of Body and SpaceAuthor(s): Mary Ann DoaneSource: Yale French Studies, No. 60, Cinema/Sound (1980), pp. 33-50Published by: Yale University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2930003Accessed: 02-11-2015 18:04 UTC

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of contentin a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship.For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

This content downloaded from 74.217.200.182 on Mon, 02 Nov 2015 18:04:35 UTCAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=yalehttp://www.jstor.org/stable/2930003http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/2930003http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=yalehttp://www.jstor.org/


2/19

Mary

Ann Doane

The Voice

in

the

Cinema:

The Articulation

f Body and

Space

Synchronization

The silentfilm s certainlynderstood, t least retrospectivelynd

even

(it

is

arguable)

n its

time,

s incomplete,

s lacking peech.

The

stylized

gestures

of the

silent cinema,

its

heavy pantomime,

have

been defined

as

a form of

compensation

for that

lack. Hugo

Miinsterberg

rote,

n

1916,

To the ctor f

the

moving ictures

..

the

temptation

fferstself

o overcome

he

deficiencythe

bsence

of

words and

themodulation

of

thevoice ]

by a

heightening

f the

gestures

and of

the

facial play,

with the result

that the

emotional

expression

becomes exaggerated. '

The absent voice

re-emerges

n

gestures

nd

the

contortions

f theface-it

is

spread

over

the

body

of

the

actor.

The uncanny

ffect f the silent

film n the era

of sound

s

in

part inked

to the separation,

by

meansof ntertitles,

f an

actor's

speech

from

he

image

of

his/her

ody.

Consideration

f sound

n

the cinema

in

its

most

historically

nd

institutionally

rivileged

form-that

of dialogue

or

the use of

the

voice) engenders network fmetaphorswhose nodalpoint ppears

to

be the body.

One mayreadily espond

hat

his s only

natural -

who

can

conceive

of a voice

without

body?2However,

the body

reconstituted

y

the technology

nd

practicesof

the cinema

is a

I

Hugo Munsterberg,The Film:

A

Psychological Study (New York: Dover

Publications, nc., 1970), p. 49.

2Two kinds of voices without

bodies immediately uggestthemselves-one

theological the other scientific

two poles which, it might be added, are

not

ideologicallyunrelated): 1.) the

voice of God incarnated n the Word 2.)

the

artificial

voice of a computer.Neither eems to be capable of representationutside f a certain

anthropomorphism, owever. God

is

pictured, n fact, as having a quite specific

body-that of a male patriarchal

igure. tar Wars and Battlestar alactica

llustrate

the tendencies oward

nthropomorphismn the depiction f computers. n the atter,

even a

computer named Cora)

deprived

f

mobility

nd the simulacrum

f

a human

form, s given a voice which s

designed o evoke the mage of a sensualfemalebody.

33

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


3/19

Yale FrenchStudies

fantasmaticbody,

which offers support

as

well

as a point of

identification orthe subject addressedby the film.The purposeof

this ssay s simply

o trace ome of the

ways n which his antasmatic

body acts as a pivot

for

certain

inematic

ractices

f

representation

and authorizes and sustains

a

limitednumberof relationships e-

tween voice and

image.

The attributes

f

this fantasmatic ody

are first nd foremost

unity throughthe emphasis on a coherence

of the senses) and

presence-to-itself.he addition f sound

to thecinema ntroduces he

possiblity fre-presentingfuller and organically nified) ody, nd

of

confirminghe

status f speech as an individual roperty ight.

he

potentialnumber

nd kinds f articulations

etween ound nd image

ar reduced by the very name attached

to the

new

heterogeneous

medium-the talkie.

Histories fthe cinemaascribethe

stress n

synchronization

o a

public

demand : the public,fascinated y

the

novelty,wanting

o be sure they

were

hearingwhatthey

aw,

would

have felt hat trickwas beingplayedonthem f heywerenot shown

the words coming

fromthe

lips

of the actors. 3

n

Lewis Jacobs'

account,

this

fear

on the

part

of the audience

of

being

cheated

is

one

of the factorswhich

nitially

imits he

deployment

f sonorous

material as

well

as

the

mobility

f the

camera).

From this

perspec-

tive, the use of voice-off

r voice-over

must be a late

acquisition,

attempted nly fter

certain breaking-in eriodduring

which

he

novelty

of

the sound

film

was allowed

to wear itself out.

But,

whatever he fascinationf thenew mediumorwhatevermeanings

attached

to it

by

retrospective eadings

f ts prehistory),here

s no

doubt

that

synchronizationin

the

form

f

lip-sync

has

played

a

major

role

n

the

dominant

arative inema.

Technology

tandardizes

the relation

through

the

development

of the

synchronizer,

he

Moviola,

the

flatbed editing

able.

The

mixing pparatus

allows

a

greater control over the establishment

f relationships etween

dialogue, music,and sound effectsnd, inpractice, he evel ofthe

dialogue generally

etermines

he evels of sound effects

nd music.4

3Lewis, Jacobs,

The Rise

of the

AmericanFilm:

A

Critical

History New York:

Teachers College

Press,

1968),p. 435.

4For

a more detailed discussion

f thishierarchy

f

sounds

and of otherrelevant

techniques

n

the construction

f the

sound-track

ee M. Doane,

Ideologyand the

34



4/19

Mary

Ann

Doane

Despite a numberof experimentswithothertypesof sound/image

relationshipsthose of Clair, Lang, Vigo and, morerecently, odard,

Straub, and Duras), synchronous ialogue

remains the

dominant

form

f sonorous

representation

n

the cinema.

Yet, even when asynchronous r

wild

sound

is

utilized,

the

fantasmatic ody's ttributef unitys not ost. t is simply isplaced-

the body n the film ecomes the bodyof the film. ts senseswork n

tandem,for he combination f soundand image sdescribedn terms

of

totality nd

the

organic. 5

Sound carries

with t

the

potential

riskof exposingthe materialheterogeneityf the medium; ttempts

to containthatrisk urface n the anguageof the deology

f

organic

unity. n the discourse of technicians, ound is married to

the

image and, as one sound engineer puts it in an article on post-

synchronization, one of the basic goals of the motion picture

industry s to make the screen look alive in the eyes of the

audience . . . .

6

Concomitant

with he

demand

for

life-like

epresentation

s the

desire

for

presence,

a

conceptwhich s not specific o thecinematic

soundtrackbut which acts as

a

standard o measure quality

n the

sound

recording ndustry

s a whole. The term

presence

offers

certain egitimacy o the wish forpure reproduction

nd

becomes a

selling point in

the

construction f sound

as

a commodity.The

television commercial asks whetherwe can tell the difference

between the voice

of Ella

Fitzgerald

nd

that f Memorex

and since

our representativen thecommercial-the ardentfan-cannot, the

only

conclusion to be drawn is that

owning a Memorex tape is

equivalent

to

havingElla

in

your iving oom). Technical dvances n

sound

recording such

as the

Dolby system)

re

aimed

at

diminishing

the

noise of

the

system, oncealing

the work of the

apparatus, nd

thus

reducing

the

distance

perceived

between the

object

and

its

representation.

he maneuvers

f the sound

recordingndustryffer

Practicesof Sound Editing ndMixing, paper delivered t MilwaukeeConference n

the Cinematic

Apparatus,

February

1978, forthcomingn

Conference

roceedings

(Fall1979).

5Ibid.

6W.A. Pozner,

Synchronization

echniques, Journal

f theSociety

f Motion

PictureEngineers,

7, No. 3 (September

1946),

191.

35



5/19

Yale FrenchStudies

evidence which upportsWalterBenjamin'sthesis inkingmechanical

reproduction s a phenomenonwith ontemporaryociety's estruc-

tion

of the

aura (whichhe defines s the unique phenomenon f a

distance, howeverclose it may be 7). According o Benjamin,

[the] contemporary ecay of the aura. . . rests on two circumstances, oth of

which re relatedto the ncreasing ignificancef the masses n contemporaryife.

Namely,

the desire

of

contemporary

masses to

bring hings

closer'

spatially

nd

humanly,which s ust as ardent s their ent oward vercoming heuniqueness f

everyreality y accepting ts reproduction.8

Nevertheless,

while the desire to

bring things loser

is

certainly

exploited

in

making

ound

marketable,

he

qualities

of

uniqueness

and authenticityre not sacrificed-it s notanyvoicewhich hetape

brings

o

the consumerbut

the

voice of

Ella

Fitzgerald.

The

voice is

not detachable

from

body which s quite specific-that of the star.

In

the cinema, cultvalue and

the aura resurfacen the star

ystem.

In 1930

a

writer feels the

need to

assure audiences

that

post-

synchronizations a technique oes notnecessarilyntail ubstituting

an

alien

voice for real

voice,

that

he

ndustry

oes notcondonea

mismatching

f

voices

and

bodies.9 Thus,

the

voice

serves

as

a

support

for

the

spectator's ecognition

nd

his/her

dentification

f,

as well

as

with,

he

star.

Just

s

the voice

mustbe

anchoredby

a

givenbody,

he

body

must

be anchored

n

a

given pace.

The fantasmatic isual

space

which he

film onstructss supplemented y techniquesdesigned o spatialize

thevoice,

to ocalize

t,give

t

depth

nd thus endto the haracters he

consistency

of

the real.

A

concern for room

tone,

reverberation

characteristicsnd sound

perspective

manifests desireto

re-create,

as one

sound

editor describes

t,

the

bouquet

that surrounds he

7WalterBenjamin, The workof

Art n the Age

of

MechanicalReproduction,

n

Illuminations, d. Hannah Arendt, rans.

HarryZohn (New York: SchockenBooks,

1969), p. 222.

8Ibid.,

p. 223.

9George Lewin, Dubbing

and Its Relation to Sound Picture

Production,

Journalof

the

Society f

Motion Picture

Engineers, 6,

No. 1

(January 931),

48.

36



6/19

Mary

Ann Doane

words, the presence on

the voice,

the

way

t

fits

n

with he

physical

environment. 10

he

dangers

of

post-synchronization

nd

looping

stem fromthe fact that the

voice

is

disengagedfrom

ts

proper

space

(the space conveyed

by

the visual

mage)

and the

credibility

f

that

voice depends upon the technician's

bility o return

t

to the ite

of ts

origin.Failure to

do so risks xposure

of

the fact hat

ooping

s

narration maskingas dialogue. '

Dialogue is defined

therefore,

not

simply n terms f the establishmentf an

I-you

relationship,

ut

as

the

necessary patializing

f

that

elationship. echniques

ofsound

recordingtendtoconfirm hecinema'sfunctions a mise-en-scenef

bodies.

Voice-off

nd

Voice-over

The spatial dimension

which monophonic

ound

is

capable

of

simulating

s

that

f

depth-the apparent

ource

of the ound

may

be

moved forward r

backward

but

the ateraldimension

s

lacking

due

to the fact

that

there

s

no

sideways pread

of reverberation r of

ambient

noise.

2

Nevertheless, ound/image elationships

stablished

in

the

narrative

ilmwork to suggest hat

ound does, indeed, ssue

from

hat

other dimension.

n

film heory,

hisworkto provide he

effect f

a

lateral

dimension

eceives

recognition

n

the term

voice-

off.

Voice-off refers

o

instances n which

we hear the

voice

of a

characterwho s not

visiblewithin heframe.

Yet

thefilm

stablishes,

by means of previous shots or othercontextualdeterminants,he

character's presence in the space of the

scene, in the

diegesis.

He/she

is

just over

there, just beyond

the

frameline, n a

space

which

exists but whichthe camera does

not choose to show.

The

traditional se of voice-off onstitutes denial of

the frame

s

a limit

'0Walter Murch, The Art of the Sound Editor: An Interviewwith Walter

Murch, interview y Larry Sturhahn, ilmmaker'sNewsletter,, no.

2

(December

1974), 23.

X

bid.

'2Stereo reduces this problem but does not solve it-the rangeof perspective

effects s still imited.Much of the discussionwhichfollows

s

based

on

the

use

of

monophonic ound, but also has implications or tereo. n bothmono and stereo,for

instance, the

location of the speakers s designed to insurethat the audience hears

sound which s

roughly oincident

with

he mage.

See

AlecNisbett, The Technique

of the Sound Studio

New York: Focal Press Limited,1972), pp. 530, 532.

37



7/19

Yale FrenchStudies

and an affirmation f

the unity

nd

homogeneity f the depicted

space.

Because

it

is defined in

terms

of

what is visible withinthe

rectangular pace of the screen, heterm voice-off as been subject

to

some dispute.Claude

Bailble,

for nstance, rgues hat voice-off

must lways be a voice-in because the iteral ourceof thesound n

thetheater s alwaysthespeakerplacedbehind hescreen.

3

Yet, the

space to which the term refers s not that of the theaterbut the

fictional pace of the diegesis. Nevertheless, he use of the term s

based on the requirement hat he two spaces coincide, overlap to

a

certain xtent.For the screen imitswhatcan be seenof thediegesis

(there

s

always more of the diegesis hanthe camera can coverat

any one time).

The

placement

of

the speaker behind the screen

simply

onfirms he factthat the

cinematic pparatus

s

designed

o

promotetheimpression

f

a homogeneous pace-the

senses of the

fantasmatic

ody

cannot be

split.

The

screen

s the

space

where

the

image is deployed while the theater s a whole is the space of the

deployment

f

sound.

Yet,

the screen

s

givenprecedence

over

the

acoustical

space

of

the theater-the screen

s

posited

s

the ite

of

the

spectacle's unfolding

nd

all

sounds must

emanate from t.

(Bailble

asks,

What would

be,

in

effect,

voice-offwhichcame from he

back

of the

theater?Poor

little

creen

.

. 14

in

other

words,

ts

effectwould be

precisely

o diminish he

epistemological ower

of the

image, to reveal its imitations.)

The hierarchicalplacementof the visible above the audible,

according

o Christian

Metz,

is not

specific

o

the cinema

but

a more

general

cultural

roduction.

5

And

the

term

oice-off

merely

cts as a

reconfirmation

f

that

hierarchy.

or it

only appears

to

describe

sound-what

it

really

efers o

is

the

visibilityor

lack of

visibility)

f

the source of the sound. Metz

argues

hat

ound s

never

off.'While

a visual

element

pecified

s

off

actually

acks

visibility,

sound-

off s alwaysaudible.

t3C.

Bailbl,

Programmation

e

1'6coute

2),

Cahiers

du Cinema, 93

(Octobre

1978),

9.

'4Ibid.

My

translation.

'5C.

Metz,

Le

perqu

et

le nommr,

in Essais semiotiques

Paris:

Editions

Klinckseck,

1977), pp.

153-59.

38



8/19

Mary

Ann

Doane

Despite the fact that Metz's argument

s valid

and

we tend to

repeat on the evel of theory he ndustry'subordination

f sound to

image, the term voice-off oes name a particular

elationship

e-

tween

sound and

image-a relationship

which has been

extremely

important istoricallyn diversefilmpractices.While

it is truethat

sound

is

almostalways discussed

with eference o

the

mage,

t does

not necessarily ollow hat his utomatically akes ound

ubordinate.

From anotherperspective, t

s

doubtful

hat

ny

mage in

thesound

film) s uninflected y sound.This scrucially o, given

hefact hat n

the dominantnarrative inema, ound extends rom eginningo end

of the,

film-

sound

is

never absent

(silence is,

at the

least,

room

tone).

In

fact,

he

ack

of

any

ound

whatsoever s taboo

n

the

editing

of

the

soundtrack.

The point

is not

that we need

terms

withwhichto

describe,

honor and acknowledge

he

autonomy

f a

particular

ensory

mater-

ial, but that

we must

attemptto

think the

heterogeneity

f the

cinema. This

might

e

done

more

fruitfullyy

means of the

concept

of

space

than

through

the

unities

of sound and

image.

In the

cinematic ituation,

hree

types

of

space

are

put

into

play:

1.) The space of the diegesis. This space has no physical

imits, t is

not contained or measurable. t is a virtual pace

constructed y the

film nd is delineated s

having oth udible and visible

raits as well

as

implications

hat ts

objects

can be

touched, melled,

nd

tasted).

2.) The visible space of the screenas receptor f the image. It is

measurable and contains the visiblesignifiersf the film. trictly

speaking,

the

screen is not audible although he placementof the

speaker

behind

the

screenconstructs

hat llusion.

3.)

The acoustical

space

of the theateror auditorium. t mightbe

argued

that this

space

is also

visible,

but the

film

annot visually

activate

signifiers

n

this

space unless

a

second projector

s used.

Again, despite

the

fact

that

the

speaker

is behind the screen and

therefore ound

appears

to

be emanating rom focused

oint, ound

is not

framed

n

the

same way as the mage.

n

a sense,

t envelops

the

spectator.

All of

these are

spaces for the pectator, ut the first s the only

space

which the

characters f the fiction ilm an acknowledge for

39



9/19

Yale French tudies

the characters here re no

voices-off). ifferent inematicmodes-

documentary, arrative,vant-garde-establish ifferentelationships

between

the

threespaces.

The

classical

narrative

ilm,

or

nstance,

worksto denythe existence f the

ast two spaces n order o buttress

the credibilitylegitimacy) fthefirstpace. Ifa characterooks at and

speaks

to the

spectator,

his

onstitutes

n

acknowledgment

hat he

character is seen and heard

in

a

radicallydifferentpace

and

is

therefore enerally ead as transgressive.

Nothingunitesthe three

paces but the signifyingractice f the

film tself ogetherwith he nstitutionalizationf thetheater s a type

of meta-spacewhich binds together he three

spaces,

as

the place

where unified inematic

iscourse nfolds. he cinematicnstitution's

stake

n

thisprocessofunification

s apparent. nstances fvoice-offn

the

classical film re

particularly

nterestingxamples

of the

way

in

which the three spaces undergo an elaborate imbrication.

or

the

phenomenon

of the voice-off annot

be

understoodoutside of

a

consideration f the relationships stablishedbetweenthediegesis,

the

visible

pace

of the

screen, nd

the coustical

pace

of

the

theater.

The place

in

which he signifier

anifests

tself

s the

acoustical

pace

of the

theater,

utthis

s the

pace

with

which

t s

east

concerned. he

voice-off eepens the diegesis,gives

t an extent

which

xceeds that f

the image, and thus supports he claim that there s a

space

in

the

fictionalworldwhich

he

camera does not

register.

n itsown

way,

t

accounts

for

lost

space.

The

voice-off s

a

sound which

s first nd

foremostn the service of the film's onstruction f space and only

indirectly

n

the service f the

mage. t validatesboth

what

he creen

reveals

of the

diegesis nd

what t

conceals.

Nevertheless, heuse

of

thevoice-off

lways

ntails

risk-that of

exposing

the

material

heterogeneity

f

the cinema. Synchronous

sound masks the

problem

and this at least

partially xplains its

dominance. But the more

interestinguestion,perhaps, s: how can

theclassicalfilm llow therepresentationf a voicewhose ource s not

simultaneously epresented?

s soon as the ound

s

detached

rom

ts

source,

no

longer

nchored

by

a

represented ody,

ts

potential

work

as a

signifier

s

revealed.

There

is

always omething ncanny

bout

a

voice

which

emanates from

source outside

the

frame.

However,

as

40



10/19

Mary

Ann

Doane

Pascal Bonitzer points out, the narrative ilm xploits he marginal

anxiety onnected withthevoice-off y incorporatingts disturbing

effects

ithin

hedramatic ramework. hus,

the

functionf

the

voice-

off

as well as that f thevoice-over)becomes extremelymportantn

filmnoir. Bonitzer akesas his exampleKiss Me Deadly, a filmnoir n

whichthe villainremains ut of frame ntil he ast sequences of the

film. Maintaininghim outside of the field of vision gives to his

sententiousvoice, swollen by mythological omparisons, greater

power

of

disturbing,he scope of

an

oracle-dark prophet f theend

oftheworld.And, in spite f that,hisvoice s submittedo thedestiny

of

the body

. .. a

shot,

he

falls-and

with

him in

ridicule,

his

discourse

with ts

prophetic ccents. '16

The voice-off

s

always

submitted

o the

destiny

f

the

body

because

it

belongs

to

a

characterwho is confined

o the

space

of

the

diegesis,

f

not

to the

visible pace

of the screen.

ts

efficacity

ests n

the

knowledge

hat

hecharacter an

easily

be made visible

y

a

slight

refraining hichwould re-unite hevoice and ts ource.The body cts

as an

invisible

upport

for the use of

both

the voice-over

during

flashbackand the interior

monologue

as

well.

Although

he

voice-

over

in a

flashback

ffects

temporal

dislocation

f the

voice with

respectto

the

body, the voice is frequentlyeturned o the body as

a

form

of narrative

losure. Furthermore, he voice-oververy often

simply

nitiates he

story nd

is

subsequently upersededby synchro-

nous dialogue, allowingthe diegesis to speak for tself. n Sunset

Boulevardtheconventions taken o ts imits: hevoice-over arration

is, indeed, linkedto a body thatof the hero), but t s the bodyof a

dead

man.

In the

interior

monologue,

on the other

hand,

the

voice

and the

body

are

represented imultaneously,

ut

the

voice,

far rom

eing

n

extension

of that

body,

manifeststs nner

ining.

The voice

displays

what s inaccessible

o the

mage,

what xceeds

thevisible:

he inner

life

of the

character.

The voice here

is the

privileged

mark

of

interiority,urning

he

body

inside-out.

16Pascal Bonitzer, Les

silencesde la voix, Cahiers u Cinema,

56

(FRvrier-Mars

1975), 25. My translation.

41



11/19

Yale French tudies

The voice-over ommentary

n

the documentary,nlike hevoice-

off, he voice-over uring flashback, r the nterior onologue, s, n

effect, disembodied oice.

While

he atter hree oiceswork o affirm

the homogeneity nd dominance of diegetic pace, the voice-over

commentary

s

necessarily resented

s

outsideof that pace.

It

is its

radical otherness

with

espect

o the

diegesis

which

ndows hisvoice

with certain uthority. s a form fdirect ddress, t peakswithout

mediation o the audience, by-passing he characters nd establish-

ing a complicitybetween itselfand the spectator-togetherthey

understand nd thus lace the mage. t is precisely ecause thevoice s

not ocalizable, because itcannotbe yoked o a body, hat t s capable

of

interpretinghe mage, producing ts

truth.

isembodied, acking

any specification

n

space

or

time, hevoice-over s, as Bonitzer oints

out, beyond

criticism-itcensors he

questions

Who

is

speaking?,

Where?,

In what

time?,

and

For

whom?.

This

is

not, one suspects, without deological implications.The first f these

implicationssthat hevoice-off'7epresents power, hat fdisposing fthe mage

and

of what

t

reflects,

rom

space absolutely

therwith

espect

o that nscribedn

the

mage-track.

bsolutely

ther

nd

absolutely

ndeterminant.

ecause

itrises rom

the

field of the

Other,

the voice-off s assumed to know: this s the essence of its

power....

The

power

of

the voice

is

a

stolen

power,

a

usurpation.

In the

history fthedocumentary,

his oice has been for hemost

art

that

of

the

male,

and its

power

resides n the

possession

f

knowledge

and

in

the privileged,unquestioned ctivity

f

interpretation.

his

function f the voice-overhas been appropriated y the television

documentary nd television

ews

programs,

n

which

ound arries

he

burden

of

information

hile he

mpoverishedmage imply

ills he

screen.

Even when

hemajorvoice sexplicitly

inkedwith

body that

of

the

anchorman

n television

ews),

this

body,

n ts

turn,

s

situated

in

the non-space of the studio. n film, n the otherhand, the voice-

over

s

quite

often

issociated rom

nyspecific igure.

he

guarantee

'7Bonitzer

uses

the term

voice-off

n

a

general

ense which

ncludes othvoice-

off nd voice-over,

but

here he

is referringpecifically o voice-over

ommentary.

'8Bonitzer, p.

26.

My translation.

42



12/19

Mary

Ann

Doane

of knowledge,

n

such a system,

ies

in

its

rreducibility

o the

spatio-

temporal imitations f the body.

The Pleasure of Hearing

The

means by

which ound

s

deployed

n the

cinema nplicate

he

spectator

n

a

particular

extual

problematic-theyestablish

ertain

conditions

for

understandingwhich obtain

in the

intersubjective

relation between

film

nd

spectator.

The voice-over

ommentary

and, differently,he interiormonologue and voice-over-flashback

speak more

or less

directly

o

the

spectator, onstitutingim/her

s

an

empty pace

to

be filled

with

knowledge

bout

events,

haracter

psychology, tc.

More frequently,

n

the fiction

film,

he use

of

synchronous

ialogue and

the voice-off

resuppose

spectator

who

overhears and,

overhearing,

s

unheard

and unseen himself.

This

activity

with

respect

to the soundtrack s

not

unlike

the

voyeurism

oftenexploitedbythecinematicmage. In anyevent, he use ofthe

voice in the cinema

appeals

to the

spectator's

esireto

hear,

or

what

Lacan

refers

o

as

the

nvocatory

rive.

In what

does the

pleasure

f

hearing onsist?

eyond

he

dded

effect

of

realism which

ound

givesto

the

cinema,

beyond

ts

supplement

of

meaning nchoredby ntelligible ialogue,what s the

pecificity

f

the

pleasure

of

hearing

voice

with

ts elements

scaping strictly

verbal

codification-volume, rhythm,imbre,

itch?Psychoanalysis

situates leasure n thedivergence etween hepresent xperience nd

the memory f

satisfaction: Between a (more

or less inaccessible)

memory

nd a

very recise and localizable)

mmediacy

f

perception

is

opened thegap

wherepleasure s produced.

9

Memories f thefirst

experiencesof the voice, of the hallucinatory

atisfaction

t

offered,

circumscribe he

pleasure

of

hearing nd ground ts relation o the

fantasmatic

ody.

This is not

simply

o

situate

the experiences f

infancy

s

the sole determinantna system

irectlyinking ause and

effect

ut

to

acknowledge

hat

he

tracesof

archaicdesires re never

annihilated.

According o Guy Rosolato, it s

the organization f the

19Serge eclaire,

Dimasquer

le

reel,p. 64, quoted

n

C.

Bailbl, Programmation

de

l'6coute

(3), Cahiers du

Cinema,

297 (Fevrier 1979),

46. My

translation.

43



13/19

Yale French

tudies

fantasm

tself

which mplies

permanence, n insistence f the

recall

to the origin. 20

Space,

for

he

child,

s defined

nitially

n

terms f

the

udible,

not

the visible: It is only n a

second phase that heorganization fvisual

space insures he

perception

f

theobject as external.(p. 80) The first

differencesre traced

long the xis ofsound: thevoice ofthemother,

thevoice of thefather.

urthermore,hevoice has a greater

ommand

over space than the

look-one can hear around corners,

hrough

walls. Thus, for the

child the voice, even before

anguage, s the

instrumentf demand. n the construction/hallucinationf

space and

the body's relation to

that space, the voice plays a major

role. In

comparison

with

ight, s Rosolato

points ut,

thevoice

sreversible:

sound

s

simultaneouslymitted nd

heard,by

the

ubject

himself. s

opposed to the ituationnseeing, t s as if an acoustical'

mirror ere

always

n function.

hus,

the

mages

of

entry

nd exitrelative o

the

body

are

intimatelyrticulated. hey can therefore

e

confounded,

inverted, avored ne over the other. p. 79) Because one can hear

sounds behind oneself as well as those

with

ources nsidethe

body

(sounds

of

digestion, irculation,espiration,tc.), two etsof

terms re

placed

in

opposition: exterior/front/sightnd

interior/back/hearing.

And

hallucinations

re determined

y

an

imaginary

tructuration

f

the body according to these oppositions... . (p. 80) The voice

appears

to

lend

tself

o

hallucination,

n

particularhehallucination

f

power

over

space

effected

y

an extension

r

restructurationf the

body. Thus,

as Lacan

points

ut,

ourmass media andour

technology,

as mechanical extensionsof the

body,

result n

planeterizing

r

even

stratospherizing he voice.2'

The voice

also traces the forms f

unity

nd

separation

between

bodies.

The

mother's

oothing oice,

n

a

particular

ultural

ontext,

s

a

major component

f

the sonorous

envelope

which urrounds he

child

nd is thefirstmodel of auditory leasure.An imageof

corporeal

20GuyRosolato, La voix: entre orps t angage, Revue

rancaise

epsychanalyse,

38 (Janvier1974), 83.

My translation.

My discussion f the

pleasure of hearing

elies

heavily on the work

of Rosolato.

Further eferences o

this article

will appear in

parentheses

n

the text.

21Jacques

Lacan,

The Four Fundamental

oncepts f Psycho-analysis,

d. Jacques-

Alain

Miller, trans.

Alan Sheridan London:

The HogarthPress

and the nstitute f

Psycho-Analysis,

977),p. 274.

44



14/19

Mary

Ann

Doane

unity

s derivedfrom he

realization

hat he

production

f sound

by

the voice and itsaudition oincide.The imaginaryusion fthechild

with the mother s supportedby

the

recognition

f common traits

characterizing he different oices and, more particularly, f their

potential for harmony.According

to

Rosolato,

the voice in

music

makes appeal to the nostalgiafor uch an imaginary ohesion,

for

veritable ncantation f bodies.

The harmonic

nd polyphonic nfolding

n music an

be

understood s

a succession

of

tensions nd releases, of unifications

nd

divergences etweenparts

which re

gradually tacked, pposed nsuccessive hords nly o be resolved ltimatelynto heir

simplest nity. t is thereforeheentire ramatizationfseparatedbodies

and

their

reunionwhichharmony upports. p. 82)

Yet, the maginary nity ssociated

with

he

earliest xperience

fthe

voice is brokenby thepremonition

f

difference,ivision,

ffected

y

the nterventionf the fatherwhose voice, engaging

he desire

of

the

mother, cts

as

theagent

of

separation

nd constitutes

hevoice

of the

mother as the irretrievablyost object of desire.The voice in this

instance, far

from

being

the narcissisticmeasure

of

harmony,

s the

voice of interdiction. he voice thus understood

s

an

interface f

imaginarynd symbolic, ulling t once toward he ignifyingrganiza-

tionof anguage nd itsreduction

f

therange

f

vocal sounds

o those

it

binds and codifies, nd toward riginal nd imaginaryttachments,

representable

n

thefantasm y hebody, r by he orporealmother,

the

child at her breast p. 86).

At thecinema,thesonorousenvelope providedbythetheatrical

space togetherwithtechniques mployed n the constructionf the

soundtrack

work

to

sustain he

narcissistic leasure

derivedfrom

he

image of a certain nity, ohesion nd, hence, n identity rounded y

the spectator'sfantasmatic elation o his/her wn body. The aural

illusion

of

position constructedby

the

approximation f sound

perspective nd by techniqueswhich patialize hevoice and endow t

with presence guarantees hesingularitynd stability f a pointof

audition,

thus

holding

at

bay

the

potential trauma

of

dispersal,

dismemberment, ifference. he subordination f the voice to the

screen

s

the

iteof

the

pectacle'sunfolding akesvision nd hearing

work

together

n

manufacturing

he

hallucination

f a

fully ensory

45



15/19

Yale French

tudies

world.

Nevertheless, he recorded

oice, which resupposes certain

depth, is in contradictionwiththe flatness f the two-dimensional

image.

Eisler and Adorno note thatthe spectator s always

ware of

thisdivergence, f the nevitable ap

betweenthe represented

ody

and its

voice. And

forEisler and

Adorno

thispartially xplainsthe

function f

filmmusic: first sed

in

the exhibition f silent

films o

conceal the

noise

of the

projector to

hide from he

spectator

he

uncanny

fact hathis/her leasure s

mediated ya machine),music

in

the talkie

takes

on

the taskof

closing hegap betweenvoice and

body.

2

If this

imaginaryharmony s

to

be

maintained,however,

the

potential ggressivity

f

thevoice

as

the ntrumnentf

nterdictionnd

the material

upport f thesymptom-hearing oices-in

paranoia)

must

be attenuated.

The

formal

erfection

f

sound

recording

n

the

cinema consists

n

reducing

ot

only

henoise

ofthe

pparatus

ut

ny

grating noise which s not pleasing

to

the

ear.

On

another evel,

theaggressivityfthefilmic oice can be linked o thefact hat ound s

directed t

thespectator-necessitating,n thefiction ilm,

tsdeflec-

tion through

ialogue which he spectator sgiven nly

obliquely,

o

overhear)

and,

n

the

documentary,

ts

mediation

y

the ontent fthe

image.

In

the documentary, owever,

the

voice-over

has come

to

represent n

authority nd an

aggressivity hichcan

no

longer

be

sustained-thus, as

Bonitzer

points

out,

the

proliferation

f new

docmentaries

which eject he bsoluteof

the

voice-over nd,

nstead,

claim to establish democratic ystem, letting heeventspeak for

itself. Yet,

what his

ype

f film

ctually romotes

s the

llusion hat

reality peaks and is not

spoken, that

the film s not a

constructed

discourse. In

effectingn impression f

knowledge , knowledge

which

s

given

and not

produced,

he film

onceals ts

own

work nd

posits

itself

s a voice without

subject.23

he

voice

is even more

powerful

n

silence.

The

solution, hen,

s

not

o banish he

voice

but o

constructnother olitics.

22Hanns Eisler, Composing or

the Films

New

York:

Oxford

University ress,

1947), pp.

75-77.

23Bonitzer, p.

23-4.

46



16/19

Mary Ann Doane

The Politicsof theVoice

The

cinemapresents

spectacle omposed

f

disparate

lements-

images, voices, sound

effects,music, writing-which

he mise-en-

scene,

in

its broadest sense, organizes

nd aims at

the

body

of the

spectator, sensory receptacle

of the

various

stimuli.

This is

why

Lyotard

refers

o

classical mise-en-scenein

both the theater nd

the

cinema) as a kindofsomatography,rinscriptionn thebody:

.

. .the

mise-en-scene urnswritten ignifiers

nto

speech, song,

and movements

executed by bodies capable

of moving, inging peaking; nd this

ranscriptions

intended

for

ther

iving

odies-the spectators-capable

of

being

moved

by

these

songs,movements,

nd words. t

s

this ranscribing

n and for

odies,

considered s

multi-sensoryotentialities,

hich s thework haracteristic

f

he

mise-en-scene.

ts

elementary nity

s

polyesthetic

ike the human

body: capacity

o

see,

to

hear,

to

touch,

to move.

. ..

The idea of

performance

.. even f

t

remains

ague,

seems

linked to the idea

of

inscription

n the

body.24

Classical mise-en-scene

as a stake

n

perpetuating

he

mage

of

unity

and

identity

ustainedby thisbody and

in

staving

ff the fear

of

fragmentation. he different

ensory lements

work n collusion nd

thisworkdenies the material

eterogeneity

f

the

body of thefilm.

All

of the

signifying

trategies

for the

deployment

f

the voice

discussed earlier re linked

with

uch homogenizingffects:ynchro-

nization

binds

he

voice

to a body n a unitywhose mmediacy

an only

be

perceived

s a

given;

thevoice-off olds the

spectacle

o a space-

extended

but

still

oherent; nd

the

voice-over ommentarylaces the

image byendowing

t

with

clear ntelligibility.n all ofthis,

whatmust

be

guarded

s a certain

oneness.

This

oneness

s themark fa

mastery

nd a control

nd manifests

itself most explicitly n the tendency to confine the

voice-over

commentary

n

the

documentary

o

a singlevoice. For, according o

Bonitzer, when one divides hatvoiceor, what mounts o the same

thing,multipliest,

the

ystem

nd ts ffectshange.Off-screenpace

24Jean-Franqois

yotard,

The

Unconscious s Mise-en-scene, n

Performancen

PostmodernCulture,

d. Michel

Benamou and Charles Caramello

(Madison: Coda

Press, Inc., 1977), p. 88.

47



17/19

Yale French tudies

ceases to be thatplace

of

reserve nd interiority

f thevoice

...

25

Thisentailsnotonlyornotmerely ncreasinghenumber fvoicesbut

radically hanging heir elationship o the mage,effecting disjunc-

tion between

ound

and

meaning, mphasizing

hatBarthes

refers o

as the

grain

f thevoice26 ver nd

against

ts

xpressivity

r

power

f

representation.n the contemporaryinema, he

nameswhich mme-

diately ome

to

mind re those of Godard (who,

even

n

an early ilm

such as VivreSa Vie which

relies

heavilyupon synchronousound,

resists

he

homogenizing

ffects f the traditional se of

voice-off y

means of a resolute voidance ofthe hot/reverse-shottructure-the

camera

quickly panning

to

keep

the

person

talking

n

frame)

and

Straub

for

whom

he

voice and sound

n

general

ecome

the

marks

f

a

non-progressive uration).

The

image

of

the body thusobtained s

not one of imaginary ohesion but of dispersal,

division,fragmen-

tation.Lyotard peaks of

the

post-modernist

extwhich

scapes

the

closure

of

representation y creating

ts

own

addressee,

a

disconcer-

ted body,invited o stretchtssensory apacities eyond

measure.

27

Such

an

approach,

which

akes

off rom different

mage

of the

body,

can be understood

s

an

attempt

o

forge politics

ased

on an erotics.

Bonitzeruses thetwoterms

nterchangeably,

laiming

hat

he

cission

of the voice

can

contribute

o the definition

f

anotherpolitics or

erotics)

of the

voice-off. 28

he

problem

s

whether uch an

erotics,

bound

to

the

mage

of

an extended

r

fragmented

odyand strongly

linked

with

particular ignifying aterial, an

found political heory

orpractice.

There

are

three

major

difficulties

ith

the notion of a political

eroticsof the

voice.

The

firsts that,relying s

it

does on the dea of

expanding

the

range

or

re-defining

he

power

of the senses, and

opposing

tself

o

meaning, political

rotics s easilyrecuperable s a

form of

romanticism r as

a

mysticism

which effectivelykirts

problems of epistemology, odging itself firmly

n a mind/body

dualism.

Secondly,

he

overemphasis pon

the

solated

ffectivity

f

a

15

Bonitzer,

.

31.

26See Roland Barthes,

The

Grain

of the Voice,

in

Image-Music-Text,

rans.

Stephen

Heath (New

York: Hill

and

Wang, 1977),

pp.

179-189.

27Lyotard,

.

96.

28Bonitzer,

.

31.

48



18/19

Mary

Ann

Doane

single signifyingmaterial-the

voice-risks a crude materialism

wherein he physical roperties f the mediumhave the nherent nd

finalpower of determiningts

reading.As Paul Willemen oints ut,

concentration pon the

pecificitiesf

the

various technico-sensorial

unities

of the cinemaoften

recludes recognitionhat

he

material-

ity f the signifiers a second orderfactor with espect o anguage

understood roadly s symbolic ystem) nd tends o reduce complex

heterogeneity o a mere

combination f different aterials.29Yet, a

film s not a simple

uxtaposition f sensory lements uta discourse,

an enunciation. his snotto mply hat he solation nd nvestigation

of

a single ignifying aterial

uch as

the voice

s

a

fruitlessndeavor

but

that

he

establishmentf direct onnection etween

he

voice

and

politics s fraught

ith

difficulties.

Thirdly,

he

notion f a

political

rotics f

the

voice s

particularly

problematic from a feminist

perspective. Over and against

the

theorization f the look as phallic, as the support f voyeurism nd

fetishisma

drive

nd a defense

which,

n

Freud,

are

linked

xplicitly

with the

male),30

the

voice

appears

to lend itself

readily

as

an

alternative o

the

image,

as a

potentially

iable means

whereby

he

woman

can make

herself eard.

Luce

Irigaray,

or

nstance, laims

that patriarchal ulturehas

a heavier nvestmentn seeing than

n

hearing.31 Bonitzer,

in the

contextof defining political erotics,

speaks

of

returning

he

voice to women

as a major component.

Nevertheless,

it

must

be

remembered hat, while psychoanalysis

delineates a pre-oedipalscenario n whichthe voice of the mother

dominates, the voice, in psychoanalysis,s also the instrument f

interdiction, f the

patriarchal rder. And to markthe voice as an

isolated haven within

atriarchy,r as having n essential elation o

the

woman, is to invoke the

spectreof

feminine

pecificity,lways

recuperable s another orm f otherness. A political roticswhich

posits

a

new

fantasmatic,

hichrelies

on images

of an

extended

29Paul Willemen, Cinema Thoughts, paper delivered t MilwaukeeConference

on Cinema and

Language, March 1979,

pp. 12 and 3.

30See

Laura

Mulvey,

Visual

Pleasure

and Narrative Cinema,

Screen, 16

(Autumn 1975),

6-18 and

Stephen

Heath, Sexual Difference nd Representation,

Screen,

19

(Autumn 1978),

51-112.

31For

a

fuller iscussion

f

the

relationship ome feministsstablish etween

he

voice and the

woman see Heath, Sexual Difference, 3-84.

49



19/19

Yale French tudies

sensorybody,

s

inevitably aught

n the

double bindwhich

eminism

always seems to confront: n the one hand, there s a danger n

grounding politicson a conceptualization f the body because

the

body

has

always

been the ite of woman's

oppression, osited

as

the

final nd undeniableguarantee f a differencend a lack; but,on

the

other

hand,

there

s a

potential ain

s

well-it

is

precisely

ecause

the

body

has been a

major

site of

oppression

hat

perhaps

t mustbe

the

site

of

the

battle o

be

waged.

The

supreme

chievement f

patriarchal

ideology s that t has no outside.

In light fthe threedifficultiesutlined bove, however,t would

seem unwiseto base anypolitics f

the

voice solely n an erotics.

he

value of thinking he deployment fthevoice n thecinemabymeans

of

ts

relation o

the

body that

of

the

character,

hat

f

the

pectator)

lies

in

an understanding f the cinema, from

he

perspective f a

topology, s a seriesof spaces including hat f the spectator-spaces

which are often hierarchized r masked, one by

the

other,

n the

service of a

representational

llusion.

Nevertheless,

whatever

the

arrangement

r

nterpenetration

f

the

various

paces, they

onstitute

a

place

where

signification

ntrudes.The various

techniques

and

strategies

or

the

deployment

f

the

voice contribute

eavily

o

the

definition f

the

form hat place

takes.

50

The Voice in Cinema

Documents

Transcript of The Voice in Cinema