Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1448505
M OT I O N P I CTU R E S O U N D E D I TO R S I 73 CM: Who were the people you involved to develop the soundtrack of Son of Saul ( from production to finishing the final mix), also, did you work inside a facility sound department or as an independent sound artist? TZ: The whole sound post process took more than four months. Everything was done by us at SAINT Audio Studio: production sound editing, Foley, music recording, sound design, and 5.1 premix. And finally, due to the 35mm film material and the Dolby Digital license, we went to the Mafilm Audio Studio's mixing stage for the final mixing, which was—I don't remember exactly—about 7-8 days. This production was a first film of a young director, so we had to face strong budget limits. That is why the sound crew was not too big either, and although several people contributed, I was the one who made the post-production recordings, sound editing and finishing mix almost alone with the continuous and close presence of László. It sounds funny but things turned out that each of my involved colleagues is called Tamás (Thomas): Tamás Beke, Foley artist, Tamás Székely, sound effects editor, Tamás Márkus, ADR recordist. They, depending on the task, contributed 4-8 days to the post-production. Oh, and so as not to forget my dear production-side friends: Tamás Devenyi, production sound mixer, and Samuel Csóka, boom operator, who is the only one not Thomas in this small team. CM: Given the story, were there emotional considerations to be involved with the film? Did these affect the practical execution of the soundtrack? TZ: NO and YES. It is not easy to talk about this either because of the story or because psychology has taught us: what we think of someone or something largely depends on how we feel about it. I remember when I first saw the rough cut of the film, only with a thin and poor on-set audio, I was very shaken, different feelings swirled inside me. However, when we started working on the material, everything fell into place; the emotional regulation came under the control of professional work. And it was okay, I think, because we didn't want to make an emotional or just an emotionally 'appealing' movie or sound. It got a lot more authentic and stronger with this bit of documentary dryness. At the same time, there was some phase of work where the emotional effects had a much stronger work and made my job more difficult in some ways. This was the case, for example, when we recorded group ADR (crowd voices) with amateur people, friends, family members, children, and the elderly. The sounds of suffering and pain then became almost real. It was difficult to instruct these recordings. It was hard to find the words. CM: During the course of the film, were you a part of the filming, and were you able to take advantage of any of the practical production resources for crowds, props and vehicles, or location sounds? I could only visit the set a few times, but we were in constant contact during filming. The whole shooting was 28 days and there was very little time for some wild track recordings. Thus, in addition to the dialogues, Tamas Zanyi recording production sound 20 years ago.