Silence in film

This week, I’ve thought a lot about how silence is used in film. Since I didn’t use any music in my short film, I thought about how well I thought it worked and realized that a lot of films that I like play out extended sequences in silence.

I read an article earlier this semester about how film differs from television as a creative medium. According to the article, television is a medium that relies on a heavy dialogue and music in order to keep the viewer’s interest, whereas film is warranted the use of silence. A good example of this is the constant pace and dialogue of Grey’s Anatomy compared to the 15 minute intro to There Will Be Blood that consists of no dialogue at all.

I didn’t intentionally keep music out of my film, but I just never really felt it called for any music. There are a couple of scenes in my film where no one is talking, but the lack of dialogue is the story that is being told, so adding music in those parts would take away from the story. The final scene in my film shows the characters hanging up the wife’s clothes as a way to show the ambiguity of their future. This silence works well because it adds ambiguity. It makes you wonder what will happen next, whereas music would queue you in to the fact that the film is over.

Silence is a filmic tool that I feel is underestimated. There is a lot of silence in real life that I feel people either don’t want to convey or just don’t notice. It should be used, and appreciated, more often.