I don’t recall doing it earlier, so I’m going to run through what my project is, my proposal essentially. I know it is late but I thought it was worth discussing. I will also go over some of the final elements of this project.
This is a follow up to a proposal I started on the 29th of October 2023.
I will be recreating the sounds of a scene from the 2016 thriller, ‘Don’t Breathe’. Directed by Fede Álvarez, the film follows 3 delinquents Rocky (Jane Levy), Alex (Dylan Minnette) and Money (Daniel Zovatto) who break into houses in Detroit. Money gets a tip that there is a war vet (Stephen Lang) who has 300,000 dollars stashed in his house, a settlement fund that he received after his daughter was killed. Rocky is eager to take the score as she wants to leave Detroit and start fresh with her little sister. Alex rejects the idea at first, but later agrees.
When scoping out the house, they realise the man is blind and go through with the job. After getting inside Alex gets a bad feeling and opts out after discovering Money has a gun, informing the pair of the repercussions they could run into if they are caught not only robbing the man, but armed as well. The Blind man figures out there are intruders in his home and manages to kill Money. Alex returns to the house upon hearing the gunshot and that’s where my scene begins.
I had not seen the film before, I just remember hearing about it when it came out, so it was an experience watching it as well as planning and recreating the sound of it. The original plan was to make a foley track but as the weeks went on and I realised I couldn’t be at the studio often, I began developing a score with inspiration from the 1979 film The Warriors to go along with the foley.
I did create some foley at home but it wasn’t until November 21st that I was able to get into the studio. I had a my friend Samir come in to do some foley for me. it was his first time to doing foley and he is a game design student from escape studios. We had some issues getting set up but eventually we were ready.
I had him focus on individual characters and specific actions. He had different types of shoes for the characters. We started with Alex then the Blind man, getting the steps right as well as the breathing. I had him do breathing throughout which at first I didn’t like, but after hearing it back, I liked the way it built tension alongside the score.
Getting close to the end of the session I wanted to wrap up Rocky’s movement in the closet. She crawls around on hard floor but the foley room has carpet. We had to improvise and use a piece of the piano to get a somewhat authentic sound.
We did a few takes with the board, I wanted it to sound authentic and the last one was near perfect to me.
I was sold with the second half but I really wanted to go back and adjust the first half movement wise so I had him do a final take with no shoes. It sounded a lot better than the takes with shoes and so we ended it there. I was unable to get some of the Blind mans actions so I had to use the original sounds. For example when he locks the door and moves the objects to access the safe.