Activity And Project

Music in Movies: You Pick the Soundtrack

Grades
7 - 12
Activity Time
Two hours, not counting the time needed to rehearse and film a movie scene (Can be done over several days)
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Activity Description

In a movie, music can ramp up the tension or make a happy moment explode with joy. In this activity, teens are invited to consider how music contributes to a movie scene. Does it succeed or fail in making the viewer feel something? By taking on the role of director, teens will gain an increased understanding of how many decisions go into a movie scene. In addition to music, there's the dialogue, plus the setting, the lighting, the camera angles, and more. By considering all that, your teen will begin to analyze (and appreciate) movies the way reviewers do.

Why This Is Helpful

Teens love the movies, but few think of film as the art form that it is. Examining a movie scene can improve a teen’s ability to analyze what’s going on and consider all the artistic choices that the director and others made along the way. Removing music from a scene will show teens how powerful music can be in film. Finally, by writing their own movie scene and filming it, teens put into practice what they learned about the art of movie making. This exercise also may spark an interest in seeing some famously well done films – from Lawrence of Arabia to Rocky.

This activity was modified from the ReadWriteThink lesson plan “Lights, Camera, Action...Music: Critiquing Films Using Sight and Sound.”

Here's What to Do

1. Talk with the teen about favorite movies, especially those that include great music. Ask the teen to think about songs from movie soundtracks that he or she owns. If you can’t come up with any, do an Internet search of your teen’s favorite songs to see if any have been used in films. The Internet Movie Database has a searchable soundtrack database.
 
2. Identify a movie scene that includes music the teen likes.
 
3. Watch the scene together. Afterward, talk about how the music contributes to the scene. Does it make it more intense, like the foreboding music in Jaws? Music also can deliberately contradict what the viewer sees. For example, in Good Morning Vietnam, violent images of war flash by while Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World” plays.
 
4. After watching your selected scene, watch it a second time mute or turn down the volume so you can view it without music. Talk about how the lack of music changes the scene. What’s the impact now?
 
5. Together, take a look at the Scene Analysis Framework handout. Use it to further your discussion of the scene without music.
 
6. Build upon your previous discussion to prepare your teen to write, direct, and film an original scene. The scene can be imagined from your teen’s own idea for a movie or from an existing film, as long as it’s an original take on a scene.
 
7. As the scene’s starting point, your teen will use the song from the movie scene that you watched together. But the teen should try to use the music in a different way.
 
8. The teen can use the Script Guidelines to get ideas on how to construct the scene outline. FilmSound.org’s Designing a Movie for Sound might also be helpful in understanding the roles music can play in a film. Here’s a to-do list your teen can use while drafting the outline:
 
  • First, summarize the movie that contains this scene. Is it a "day-in-the-life" documentary film, a horror film, a romance or comedy?
     
  • Write a summary of the scene explaining what is happening
     
  • Describe the mood you are trying to convey in the scene
     
  • List the objects or characters that will be included in the scene and what they are doing
     
  • Choose the camera angles to be used and explain why they were chosen.
9. Now for the really fun part: Encourage your teen to draft some actors (family and friends) to rehearse and film the scene. Cue the music. Lights! Camera! Action!

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