Why is it so difficult to hear what’s going on in TV shows and films?
CINEMA projectionist Alan Ashton (Letters) highlighted the problem I have with the level of sound in TV shows. I turn up my hearing aids a notch and the TV volume, but it is still difficult to hear Jeremy Paxman’s questions on University Challenge because the audience claps while he is still speaking. I am sure it is not beyond a competent sound engineer to reduce the audience background noise. Just about every quiz TV programme other than Only Connect has
maddening jangles and clashes. In the name of auditory sanity, stop before it drives me round the bend!
TERRY KINGLAKE, Felixstowe, Suffolk. IN MY house, the mute button on the TV remote control is worn out because it goes on for every ad break. Subtitles are always switched on for modern movies. My theory is that today’s actresses had dental braces in their formative years and can’t break the habit of hiding them by not opening their mouths. Some male actors refuse to
articulate out of sheer laziness or because they think it’s macho. The one outstanding channel for audible quality is Talking Pictures TV, showing vintage movies made by sound engineers who were craftsmen.
JOHN BuGG, Fareham, Hants. MY WIFE and I have stopped going to the local Vue cinema because its Dolby adverts are just too loud. At Cineworld, I asked for the volume to be turned down, which meant the film was much more enjoyable. Don’t young people realise that continued listening at high volume to films, phones and music could damage their hearing?
DAVID MuMMERY, Gosport, Hants.
I KNOW it’s exciting to be shaken out of your seat by the noise in a film, but we never had that in classic movies such as The Cruel Sea or In Which We Serve. Those Forties and Fifties films had a more restricted dynamic compared with modern films and thus could be turned up so the diction was clearly audible. Unless we restrict the dynamics of all recorded sound, it is a problem we can’t get away from. Producers will use whatever tools that are at their disposal to stretch our enjoyment without thinking of the consequences for those who like to know what is being said.
DAVE TuTT, Chatham, Kent. THERE is also the problem of jerky,
swaying, darting camerawork. I want to scream: ‘Keep the camera still!’
C. LAWRENCE, West Chinnock, Somerset. THREE times in the past 18 months my wife and I have walked out of a theatre because the volume of a concert was so loud we couldn’t hear the words of the songs. Have the engineers gone deaf and turned up the sound?
MONTY KNIGHT-OLDS, Maidstone, Kent. THE worst offenders are TV shows with a voice-over and noisy background music. To my regret, I had to give up on the latest David Attenborough series because I couldn’t make out a word he was saying.
Mrs M. CHAMBERLAIN, Hereford.