Sarah's English class is Film - American Films and Literature. They have a textbook that could choke a pony. Not a horse, that would be her pre-calculus textbook. But this one is not lightweight and the teacher requires them to take copius notes.
Sarah has spent the afternoon taking notes on a section called "Tone".
There is implicit and explicit tone.
There are a lot of politics involved.
Things can be "campy" or presented from two different viewpoints.
Sometimes, the musical score helps you to decipher what the tone is.
For example, according to the textbook, "Music is a common way to establish a movie's tone. A music track consisting of rock 'roll will be very different in tone from a picture that's accompanied by Mozart or Ray Charles...."
Additionally, "voice-overs can be ironic". Or a narrator's voice can convey tone, like the "thug" narrating A Clockwork Orange.
I can tell that this might be a rather hard chapter for Sarah, or, at least the application of it.
What if the teacher wants them to determine the tone of a movie taking this into account?
Acording to the book, in Blue Velvet, a scene in which the character is presented visually as angelic, talking about ideal things and her hair lit as to create a halo effect, we are to understand the fact that her naiveté is being mocked because of the background organ music.
I mentioned the obstacles of understanding this to Sarah.
She replied that she knows the difference between Mozart and Rock 'n Roll.
"You do? What is the difference?"
"One is louder than the other."
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