Sound Of Violence: Murderous Absurdity
Writer/director Alex Noyer attempts to put drum-machine horror on the map with his feature film debut, Sound Of Violence. Frequently brutal and inventive but deeply flawed, the film’s intriguing premise gets obscured at every turn by its ever-mounting absurdity, creating an amusingly half-baked experience that can’t raise to the height of its ambitions.
A young girl recovers her hearing and gains synesthetic abilities during the brutal murder of her family. Finding solace in the sounds of bodily harm, as an adult, she pursues a career in music composing her masterpiece through gruesome murders.
Filmmakers are always looking for new approaches to the horror genre, and they’re all too eager to pounce once they find an untapped gimmick. With found footage thoroughly exhausted and techno-horror quickly wearing out its welcome, Alex Noyer tries to break new ground with his music-driven slasher, Sound Of Violence: the drum-machine killer. That’s right, it’s a film about a killer whose weapon of choice is a Jigsaw-designed drum pad (amongst other musical oddities). It sounds cool, sure, but all its innovations (which are pretty minor) are undercut by its derivative nature and ever-growing ridiculousness.
To be fair though, Sound Of Violence is heavily rooted in absurdity, dating back to Noyer’s equally absurd and silly 2018 short, Conductor, which features an unsuspected musical execution in a mall via Jigsaw-type contraption. Both the short and the feature aren’t shy about the gore, but don’t amount to much (narratively, emotionally, psychologically); Noyer’s efforts (along with Jacob Chase’s ludicrous techno-terror Come Play) essentially answer the question: Does a not-so-great short film make for a better feature? The answer to that really hinges on your personal sensibilities and your tolerance for irrational nonsense.
The film is framed around Alexis, an electronic composer and music teacher who recovered her hearing as a child when she killed her PTSD-afflicted father after he murdered her mother and brother. In a phantasmagoric burst of euphoria (a la MANDY) young Alexis’ hearing returns, and we flash forward to present day, where we find Alexis as an adult on a quest to craft a musical masterpiece. One day, the music awakens a bloodlust within her, leading toward a slew of equally asinine but entertaining bloodshed. If you can’t get over the silliness of its framing, chances are you’ll be able to rock with this bizarre-o horror flick the whole way through. Oddly enough, despite all of its overtly comedic aspects (say like exploding a dude’s head with a theremin, etc), Noyer goes with a straight-faced, serious tone, which makes the whole film an absolute stretch.
The film is competently shot and even features some lovely visuals; however, it heavily borrows from a myriad of other films (most of which are miles better) without really making its mark or doing anything new with the borrowed elements. It’s essentially Sound Of Metal meets Neon Demon, Bliss, MANDY, Saw, and Velvet Buzzsaw. As a low-grade midnight B-movie built around musically murderous absurdity, it’s OK — but this thing really would have really found its footing as a comedy. The serious tone doesn’t provide as much logical leeway as a comedy, and logic is Sound Of Violence’s main Achilles heels. There’s no explanation given around how Alexis is manufacturing these custom-built musical death machines (which reach the apex of absurdity in its unintentionally hilarious climax). Then there’s the issue of the very poorly handled police procedural that’s sprinkled throughout, and the on-again-off-again of Alexis’ hearing (neither of which really factor into the “plot”). We’re also not very connected to Alexis as a protagonist, since she’s a senseless murderer.
All in all, it’s difficult to really say what Noyer wanted us to take away from the film. It doesn’t really have a point or a message, and its overall experience doesn’t add up to much more than a smattering of lightly amusing scenes of murder. Based off the tone, Noyer didn’t intend for us to laugh at the film, but if you can divorce yourself from the stupidity, there’s loads of unintentionally hilarious bits (like its ending which may be the funniest closing to anything so far this year), which is primarily what kept us watching.
Recommendation: If story isn’t your first priority, and you’re looking for cool visuals and inventive kills, give Sound Of Violence a whirl when it releases on VOD Friday, May 21st.
Rating: 2 phantasmagoric euphorias outta 5.
What do you think? We want to know. Share your thoughts and feelings in the comments section below, and as always, remember to viddy well!