‘Berberian Sound Studio’ is a feast for the ears and eyes
Starting this weekend at the TIFF Bell Lightbox is the film that caused quite the stir at the formal TIFF 2012 festival, Berberian Sound Studio. The film features the always dependable and engaging Toby Jones as the proverbial fish out of water, his character traveling from his home in Surrey England to work in the Italian film business during the heyday of the Italian ‘Giallo ‘ film. The film is an exercise in style, atmosphere and tone and delightfully hearkens back to the Italian thrillers it bases itself in the midst of.
Berberian Sound Studio
Starring: Toby Jones, Cosimo Fusco, Antonio Mancino, Fatma Mohamed, Salvatore Li Causi, Chiara D’Anna, Tonia Sotiropoulou
Written and Directed by Peter Strickland
Summoned to an Italian studio to record the audio effects for a bloody horror opus, meek British sound engineer Gilderoy (Jones) quickly finds his genteel disposition clashing with that of his alternately boisterous, genial and hostile Italian hosts. As Gilderoy becomes unhealthily submerged in his work, the simulated aural violence (snapping celery stalks standing in for cracking bones, pulverized watermelons for squishing craniums) starts to take on a cruel edge. As tension in the claustrophobic studio mounts, it becomes clear that the film is corrupting Gilderoy’s fragile psyche.
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