M OT I O N P I CTU R E S O U N D E D I TO R S 45
SL: YES.
MM: And that became a signature
attack sound for the evil gremlins. I
played that to the puppeteers and
they just went crazy! Like, "What is
THAT?!? That can't be a dog!"
SL: I'm glad you pointed that
out—I actually use a clip from that
very scene with the sound of the
pit bull for some of my lectures,
because the vocals that Frank did
just matched it perfectly! Like the
microwave scene. You cut from the
pit bull to the human vocals and
it matches seamlessly. It's really
nicely done.
MM: Well, I had sent Frank some of
those animal sounds so that there
would be that connectivity.
SL: On 48 Hrs., I know you did ADR
… but the guns in that film were
GREAT.
MM: Even though I was the ADR
editor, Richard Anderson, Stephen
Hunter Flick, and I were a team of
sound editors that encompasses all
disciplines. So, through that entire
project, we were constantly in the
field recording. We especially wanted
fresh new guns—which we recorded,
and then designed.
SL: They're really good on that one.
MM: We recorded vehicles, authentic
atmospheres in San Francisco …
we were really dedicated to making
movies sound fresh.
SL: I learned that from you guys!
Let's talk about Poltergeist (1982).
MM: Here's a fun story… I was
still so young in my career, I just
wanted to be a part of everything,
just wanted to make a contribution.
My wife at that time was seeing a
therapist to help her stop smoking,
and it turns out he was a leading
parapsychologist and was doing
ghost hunts…
SL: Oh, you've told me this story!
Please.
MM: …And so, I had this great idea—
this is why I'm not in marketing—if
I could capture the sound of a real
ghost, they'd put it in the movie,
and they'd put it on the poster!
"Poltergeist! With the sounds of
REAL GHOSTS!"
SL: Brilliant.
MM: So I followed this gentleman
around for three months, all over
Southern California…
SL: …And got a great library of
white noise!
MM: Yeah! Got a great library of
NUTHIN'. All I recorded was a lot of
real scares, literally—being in dark
rooms, with paranoid people, being
perfectly quiet until somebody
bumps you by accident! "AAAHH!"
So that didn't come to
fruition.
SL: But you gotta keep that frame
of mind. You gotta think of the big
picture. Sometimes it won't pan
out, but you have to keep that
whole attitude.
Whenever I have you for a talk, I
always bring up Explorers (1985).
Because it's such a charming film.
And I loved it so much. I know that
Joe (Dante) is conflicted about
it, but there are so many really
great things in it. And I always
recommend it to people who like to
really listen to movies.
MM: It was one of my first solo
supervising and designing projects.
Everything prior to that, we were
doing as a team. At that point, we
were seeing the value of doing films
individually and I was really ready
to take on a film and Joe and I really
wanted to work together again. It
was a really good film that was/is
deeply loved, but it was marketed
poorly and it never found an
audience. But it had a cult following.
SL: I loved it. I saw it several times,
in 70mm with the split-surrounds!
MM: I'll take credit for a set of
"roadshow '70s"—that were the first
to have Dolby-SR Noise Reduction
on a 70mm film print. That was
the first to do that. It took a whole
lot of twisting arms at theaters
and exhibitors to put SR Noise
Reduction in their processing chain.
Before, 70 was a noisy analog
format—and I wanted it to sound
great.
SL: And the split-surrounds!
There's a moment, I think Dave
Stone cut it, where Wak the alien is
adjusting his antenna, and you hear
Jack Benny and Dennis Day from
an old radio show in the separate
surround speakers! "Oh, hello,
Dennis." "Hello, Mr. Benny!"
MM: Yeah. That is such
a Dave Stone moment, in split-
surrounds. It was sublime.
SL: Just brilliant.
"
I wanted the Probe
utterances to have a
linguistic connection
to actual whale
vocalizations, as if
the civilization the
Probe came from had
taken a Berlitz course
in Humpback.
"
