The role of music within Apollo 13 movie clip - Essay Example

? The role of music within Apollo 13 movie clip; 00:45:02-00:47:31 The use of music clips in a movie has various functions. One function is to enhance the storyline or it acts as an emotion catalyst. It also helps reduce anxiety of scary movies. The music in a movie helps create a connection between the movie and the audience. This helps set up movie flow, and the audience easily follow the mood set by the movie. Apollo 13 is a movie that was released in 1995. Its set up is in spaceship where the three astronauts try to make moon landing. The three astronauts are Swigert, Lovell and Haise. The plot of this movie is delivered from the reality story that occurred in 1970 when NASA tried to land Apollo 13 on the moon (Jeffrey and Jim 2000, 10). The storyline has a mixed anxiety as it starts with the expectation of safe landing on the moon, but mid way, an explosion is heard. The oxygen starts to leak and astronauts’ life is in danger. The anxiety is heightened as Apollo 13 lands safely on water. This movie has approximately 20 soundtracks. A clip (titled; we have a problem) is discussed in this paper are delivered from Apollo 13 movie. This clip runs for 2.39 minutes. It starts by showing a happy crew opportunistic of success in this flight. At this moment, the sound track plays in the background. This type of soft background music track helps boosts the mood of the movie (Joey 2003, 62-64); of happiness at this particular time. The crew is shocked to learn that there is a problem in the plane. They wonder what may have gone wrong in the spaceship. The mood of panic engulfs the crew and the control room staff. They immediately report the problem to the control room staff. At the same time, the tone of the music track changes to a faster or speedy track with some increased beats. This track is associated with heightening the tension among the audience or viewers (Joey 2003, 102-105). The level of anxiety is high at this moment as the viewers are not sure what is going to happen next to the crew and the mission. Hence, the reason why the track used at this point had to be fast to heighten the anxiety thus makes the movie to be interesting. The other reason to use this kind of music track was; to enable push the imagination of each viewer to what may be happen in the next point in the movie. Due to the fact that the spaceship had gone out of levels where oxygen flow is natural, the viewers are treated to a situation where they do not know what may happen next if the crew is not help immediately. The clip shows crew panicking as they seek the help of the control room staffs. They are in a hurry to fix things even as they try to explain the problem to the control room staff. Then in an instance, an explosion is heard and the oxygen tanks burst. The spaceship meters and indicators drop. This immediately shows that the problem is bigger than any viewer could have imagined. The tempo of the music track, though playing in the background, increases its beats. This implies is supposed to heighten the imagination and anxiety of the audience. The audience must be kept guessing what may happens next to the crew (Jeffrey and Jim 2000, 88-97). The tension is reflected in the control room too. The crews members are trying get enough information from the crew members. The track at this point starts to slow down its tempo. This is due to the fact that, at this point, the viewers and the audience may have started to be assured that the direct communication between the crew and control room was about to yield results. The music track’s sped and tone must be regulated to break the monotony and help reduce the levels of anxiety (Joey 2003, 105-108). The music use in the movie must flow as per the expectation of the viewers and help them await the outcome with ease. At this point, the crew is directed to the point where they can find crucial apparatus. The music seems to soften as they compose themselves as communicate with the control room staffs. The control room staff directs them on the safety measures to take to ensure that they are in a stable state. The sound track is playing smoothly at this point. The smooth flow is an assurance that links the sense of confidence between the viewers and the actors. The crew is seen to have got hold of the crucial apparatus and the control room staff is in a state of satisfaction. The smooth music helps in the transition of the movie to the next level (Jeffrey and Jim 2000, 126). The movie is transitioning to the next level of helping the crew land safely, now that they have got enough oxygen. The clip ends as the clip plays smoothly in the background. This helps create a memorable scene in the viewer’s mind. The clip has to create a permanent picture in the viewer’s mind so as the ratings of the movie are high (Joey 2000, 198). In conclusion, one can easily associate the use of music tracks in a movie to the mood and imagination level transferred to the viewers. A good movie should select music that rhymes with the happenings in the movie. This helps the viewers to flow with the occurrence and concentrate in watching the movie to the end. It also helps heighten the anxiety of the viewers and the audience. The music must also help decrease the tone and mood of the movie. This clip regulates the music well to help meet this point home and helps the audience to relax as they await the next scene. Reference Lott, Joey. 2003. ActionScript cookbook: solutions and examples for Flash developers. Beijing :O'Reilly. Jeffrey Kluger, and Jim Lovell. 2000. Apollo 13. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Read More