History of International Film
  Oklahoma State University
  Spring 2004
  Dr. Hugh S. Manon
 
 
 
   >  >  >  >   e m a i l
   >  >  >  >   s e l e c t e d  l i n k s
   >  >  >  >   f i l m  g l o s s a r y
   >  >  >  >   o s u  h o m e
   >  >  >  >   f i l m  h o m e

 
week five -- M [1943] -- essay due february 13

lang’s vision and resonance: M as sight and sound extravaganza at the nickelodeon
response by THE ENCAPSULATABLE FRASER 'FUZZY' McGUFFIN

The combination of striking visuals and sudden bursts of silence or sound create a minimalistic, almost abstract “reality” in Fritz Lang’s M, its expressionism rising from the richly detailed and yet simplistic mise-en-scène; it is almost felt and heard more than seen.

For example, the first true realization of the meaning of the children’s song about the “nasty man in black” is driven home in the scene in which Frau Beckmann repeatedly yells for “Elsie!” She goes into the hall to check the stairs for her daughter, calling Elsie’s name in tandem with a birds-eye shot of the stairs, the empty flights circling and receding endlessly down. It implies that Elsie is far beyond her mother’s reach, further than the stairs, and that Frau Beckmann could just as easily tumble into those depths. To modify that: since Frau Beckmann is not seen in the shot, it may be presumed that this is her perspective; in this case, it seems that she (and the viewer) is being pulled into the concentric rings created by those stairs, much like a whirlpool or the magician’s classic rotating “hypnotizing” spiral. Shots of the empty yard and other desolate locales are interspersed and again overlaid with Beckmann’s call for her child. Her daughter has been pulled to her death, and the repeated shot of the vacant stairs (with the repeated cry of “Elsie!”) emphasizes that she also will be pulled down, but to despair and possibly obsession with her dead daughter. Frau Beckmann's legacy, and possibly her life, is destroyed.

M is self-reflexive in its use of sound as a plot device. Lang seems to say, “Do not trust your eyes, for they are apt to trust too much. Instead, trust your ears.” This, from a visually lovely film and its director. The murderer cannot be discovered through sight. The police have many conflicting “eye-witness” statements, and Franz Becker looks harmless enough, for being played by Peter Lorre. His landlady is near deaf literally, and so must rely on the lying eyes instead of “hearing” his true nature. Even the distinctive tune that Becker whistles hints at his inner demons and turmoil. Only through the hearing and memory of a blind beggar is the murderer found out. The third scene (everything comes in threes!) in which Becker whistles “In the Hall of the Mountain King” is the one in which the beggar puts two and two together to get not seven, but four! The beggar is wise enough to use what he has, i.e. his ears, and it is interesting that the focus of the scene is the beggar himself, and that the shot does not waver from him. It seems almost as if the camera would like to turn, witness Becker, and run for the authorities, but it too is restricted to only what it can hear, helplessly observing only what the beggar can perceive. This forced immobility of the unseeing eye creates tension in the audience. Becker might well be sneaking up on us, to kill or just stare with his creepy gaze, but he is certainly lurking beyond our vision, almost as if a fog has crept in to distort our normal perception of reality.

Fritz Lang’s 1931 film, M, uses sound in a wide variety of ways, but mostly as a means to express emotions and sentiments.

Two particular scenes use sound to convey the feelings of the characters in the scene, but also break the boundary that separates the audience from the film narrative. One such scene is of the police chief conversing with the Minister about the manhunt for the child-killer, how it’s progressing, the procedures of the search, etc. The lines are accompanied by visuals of search parties and dogs scouring forests, the radii of the police searches, the questioning of various townspeople, and the discovery of a candy wrapper, used by Becker to lure the children into his trap.

Upon first glance, the scene appears to simply be the police chief’s fervent explanation to the Minister of what is being done to retrieve the killer and his attempt to pacify an angry supervisor. If you look a little more closely, though, it seems that the police chief, rather than trying to appease his boss, is breaking the “fourth wall” and desperately trying to explain to the viewers what he is doing to apprehend this cruel child killer who has caused great fear and anxiety, even in the audience. This expository scene uses the chief’s detailed explanation of the manhunt with quick cuts of images of the hunt, outlining his plan to get the whistling fiend and to let the viewer know he is working for their welfare.

Another scene that uses sound in an expressionistic way occurs a little later into the film. A shabby drunk is guzzling beer when someone starts tinkering with an old hurdy-gurdy. The sound is scratchy and wretched as the antique instrument is cranked and in response the drunk covers his ears in pain (displaying an expression straight out of the Histrionic Code). Immediately the music stops. Slowly, the man uncovers his ears but the shrieking continues and he quickly recovers his ears, again stopping the music. After a few moments the shabby drunk uncovers his ears one last time to hear the soothing, calm sound of the cranking instrument. It lasts but for only a few moments, yet, like the search procedure scene, this scene breaks the fourth wall, this time allowing the audience to hear what the man is hearing.

May there be a deep meaning to this scene? Does it allow the audience to feel the inner torment of a drunkard who is tortured by the demons of the bottle?! Nah. Given that the man is scruffy, tattered, and soused, its seems much more likely that its nothing more than a comic relief scene, letting the audience get a hearty laugh or two from the visual and the accompanying sounds the drunk experiences from the hurdy-gurdy.

Upon the release of M, the sound effects must have been marvelous and magnificent, not to mention revolutionary. Fritz Lang certainly uses them to benefit many of the scenes and the overall picture. His reasoning for the manner in which he used particular cues in particular instances may never fully be understood and may continue to be studied for years. But now I sure as hell will not ever be able to listen to Grieg’s “Peer Gynt Suites”; and in terms of visuals, Peter Lorre now haunts my dreams as the most dreadful face in history, replacing post-Thriller Michael Jackson.

Thanks a lot, Fritz.

Before making the film M, Fritz Lang had already spent years making silent films. During his this time he perfected the use of the visual image to get across his ideas. He did not need sound to tell the viewer what they were seeing. So when sound came along, he used it for other purposes. Instead of reiterating what the viewer was seeing, he used off-camera sound to add to the scene.

This idea of using sound to give additional information can be seen in M in the changing condition of all the players in the story. The first of these incidents is in the arrival of the killer into the real life of the film. In the beginning he is only the boogie man in a child’s playground song. His first appearance is marked by nothing more than a shadow creeping up on the girl, coupled with the song he whistles throughout the film. We need not see his face nor hear him talk to recognize the threat. The sum of these two pieces of information gives us a whole picture.

Next is the child or victim. Done by most directors, the film would have showed us the mother yelling for her child. In Lang’s hands we are given a piece of visual information paired with different audio information. So in his version we still hear the mother yelling for her child, but we do not need to see it. Instead we get shots of empty room and the child’s ball left in the park. These two different pieces add up to the fact that the child has been taken.

This scene is followed shortly by one in which we see a change in the second player in the film, the parents. We see a shot of the missing person poster for the girl, while off screen we hear the rising hysteria of a frighten crowd worried for their children. We need not see the parents’ faces when we can see the poster looming down over them.

Last is a long montage of shots of the police. We see them in the station, out at the scene of the crime, and trying to interview possible witnesses. We don’t need to hear an uncooperative witness. We can be given this information with just a shake of the head. Instead we get an interview with a police spokesman assuring the public that they have it under control. This audio works well with the visuals because we can see that police clearly do not have it under control. They are simply trying to maintain the public’s confidence in them.

Ultimately what Lang has done in much of M is given us a silent film. He then went back and asked himself what else could be conveyed in these scenes by the audio. If we see a man walking, we do not need to hear his footsteps.

Throughout his film M, Fritz Lang frequently uses off-screen diegetic sound to give the story a detached tone, and make the film seem as if it is a newspaper story adapted for the cinema. By showing scenes that visually enact the events that a diegetic and unknowing narrator describes, Lang makes the audience believe that the film's plot is very realistic, because it is presented in the same fashion as any modern-day news story.

Near the beginning of the film, when the graphologists are trying to decipher the murderer's handwriting, Lang cuts to a shot that shows the murderer examining himself in the mirror. The graphologist explains that the murderer is a very disturbed man who is clearly capable of heinous crimes, yet he probably looks like an average man walking down the street. As he says these words, we see Franz Becker manipulating his facial expressions in the mirror, validating the graphologist's description of his insanity and portraying him to be a corrupted individual. Lang overlays the graphologist's voice off-screen so the audience can see he is clearly correct, and to set up the manhunt that will soon commence. With the graphologist speaking simultaneously with the murderer's actions, Lang makes the audience feel as if the actions of the whole city are happening in the present time, and the success of the police will affect even those watching the film. In this sense, the film seems more like a developing news story than a movie.

Perhaps the scene where M most closely emulates the news is when the police commissioner and the minister are arguing over the phone. As the commissioner describes the difficulties his men face, Lang cuts to multiple shots that visually recreate his words. Here, it seems as if the commissioner is unknowingly acting as a news anchor, describing the efforts of the police as a newsman might, while the camera validates his declarations. This movie could almost be considered a precursor to modern-day news segments that film crime scenes as the news correspondent narrates the action. By using the off-screen narration, Lang gives the film a more realistic and truthful interpretation of the events unfolding. Instead of just filming the commissioner as he complains, Lang feels he must validate his words through visual pictures. In doing this, he creates a more realistic film.

Many of the off-screen narrations in M serve to give it a feel similar to the news segments that are popular today. By utilizing a detached and off-screen narrator, Lang creates a realistic film that seems to provide a foundation for today's news industry.

M portrays Berlin’s police force as ineffectual and corrupt, drawing resemblances to Germany’s emergent Nazi regime. This depiction emphasizes similarities between the law and the criminal underworld through specific uses of off-screen sound in relation to an accompanying image. Instances of this device occur twice within a particular scene near the film’s middle. Lang crosscuts between a police meeting and a gangster gathering, in which each group suggests subversive, illegal methods to catch the child murderer Becker. Clearly, Lang wishes to place the officers and the criminals on an identical plane, which he achieves through mirroring dialogue and mise-en-scène; but he takes this message much further. Throughout the scene, Lang cuts to the gangsters prematurely, i.e., before a policemen finishes his line, and vice versa. But Lang does not cut off the dialogue, only the shot, resulting in an overlap of sound. The effect disorients the viewer, for it often appears the individual groups are in the same room, having one conversation. Thus Lang blurs the lines between lawfulness and criminality, suggesting they are one and the same.

The scene’s denouement relies upon additional use of off-screen sound, as heard over two principle shots. The first depicts the policemen’s meeting, with the room’s left side shrouded in black shadows. The audience hears, but does not see, an officer suggest the force investigate clinical records detailing past instances of pedophilia, then interrogate and/or search the property of those reports’ subjects. Cops within the frame listen intently, facing toward the left, indicating the man speaking resides somewhere amidst the shadows. Lang then cuts to the gangsters, who plan to enlist beggars as silent watchdogs of the city’s children, hoping to catch Becker and then kill him. As before, while the conversation remains audible, Lang conceals its source, shooting instead the gangster’s shadows on the wall. Consequently, in each instance, the audience hears a corrupt plan of action, but does not witness the utterance; they do not see human beings, but rather distorted, shadowy figures. With this effect, Lang implies the individual plans are both essentially inhuman, and are criminal regardless of their source.