In his article entitled “The Bug in the Rug: Notes on the Disaster Genre”, author Maurice Yacowar details the disaster genre (specifically its types and conventions). Often the disaster genre is mistaken for or incorrectly associated with the science fiction genre (as if disaster only occurs in science fiction films) – and while the conventions of the disaster genre is seen in many sci-fi films, disaster can happen outside of the science fiction realm as well. The disaster genre is actually a very versatile genre of film as its conventions can work harmoniously with the conventions of many other film genres to create a truly unique and effective story. According to Yacowar at the heart of the disaster genre is a “situation of normalcy [that] erupts into a persuasive image of death” (261) – an idea that can unsurprisingly be associated with other film genres. Thus, what makes the disaster genre so distinct is perhaps also the reason why the conventions of the disaster genre tend to be mistaken for other genre(s) it is interacting with (especially from an audience’s perspective). 

In his article, Yacowar details the eight different types of disaster films.  Yacowar then proceeds to delve into the numerous conventions found within the disaster genre. While there are many different types of disaster films and while this diversity in types or subgenres of the disaster genre only reconfirms the disaster genre’s ability to work hand-in-hand with many other film genres, the conventions of the disaster genre are what bind the disaster genre together. Of all the conventions that Yacowar writes of, one could argue that the first two (and especially the second) conventions are the most important to the areas of sound and sound design within the disaster genre, and even perhaps more broadly within the general field of filmmaking.  The first convention that Yacowar details is that there is that, “except in the historical/fantasy type, no distancing in time, place or costume” in the disaster genre so that the audience of the film consider themselves the threatened society. This convention connects to the second convention that Yacowar details, which says that:

“given this immediacy (between the film and the audience found through the first convention), it is difficult to define an iconography for the disaster film as one can do for the Western, the gangster film, even the musical…more than by its imagery, then, the genre is characterized by its mood of threat and dread” (268).

If this is true, if the disaster genre is characterized by the mood it creates more than the imagery it shows, one could then argue that the sound design of a disaster film is more important to the conventions of the disaster genre than the production design of a disaster film. 

Film has four core components:  Mise-en-scene, cinematography, film sound, and film editing. However, sound as a core component of film was a development that came after the establishment of its counterpart components of mise-en-scene, cinematography and film editing. At the turn of the 20th century, the combination of the three visual core components made film what it was - a new and revolutionary technology and art form. When studying the history and art of cinema, one of the first notions that a person may learn about is the concept of medium specificity, or idea that any specific art form can do certain things that are central to its nature, but not central to any other art forms’ nature – thus giving that particular art medium some specificity.  The idea of medium specificity in relation to film refers to the qualities of film that make it (the results of the filmmaking process) film (or a result that is only found through the medium of film). There have been many arguments throughout the history of cinematic academia concerning medium specificity in the context of film. Some argue that sound is either not specific to film (as it is experienced in many other art forms like music, theater, performance art, etc.), or is less specific to film than cinematography or editing. On the other hand, popular film theorists, like critic André Bazin, have argued that sound gave films the opportunity to maximize the utilization of the medium of film as it helped to build the film’s meaning through sound’s ability to evoke certain moods or highlight visual aspects or aesthetics of a shot or scene. Other theorists, like filmmaker Vsevolod Pudovkin, have made some good indirect arguments for the importance of sound to film. Pudovkin is known for his theory on editing, stating that editing is not just structural, but is also (and most importantly) a method of guiding the emotional response of an audience. If one were to put Pudovkin’s theory in the context of sound design, then one could argue that sound mixing is as important to film as the visual editing of a film, and thus sound becomes as important to film as its visual components as the editing of those individual components and the marrying of both those components are what create the final product – the art itself.

It is thus interesting to note the timeline of sound and its role in as well as its perceived importance to the art of cinema. It seems as though at the beginning of the 20th century sound started as a component of film that was secondary to visuals components of cinema, and then as the decades of 20th century progressed, sound would eventually become as important to filmmaking as those visual components. The turn of the 20th century, however, has brought about the notion that sound may even be more important to certain film genres than its visual components - which is basically what Yacowar is stating when discussing the conventions of the disaster genre. Towards the end of his article, Yacowar states that “the main purpose in defining a genre is to establish a context for the approach to an individual work”.  That is perhaps to say  that the concept of a “genre” exists to categorize the common visual or sonic elements found between certain films in order to organize cinema, which from a psychological perspective make sense as humans begins find a certain comfort in organizing things for two reasons: 1) to feel like they better understand the thing being organized, and 2) to feel like they have some power over the thing being organized. In other words, “genre” represents the “generic” (this is not to say that the generic is bad, it’s just established). Even the creation of new genres is generic in itself as genres are defined by their conventions – conventions must already exist and be common to a set of films (and thus already be generic to a degree) before those films can be categorized into a genre. That being said, if “genre” is generic, and if sound is an important convention of the disaster genre, then sound has without a doubt become a generic (or established) aspect of film. Thus, it can be stated for certain, through the careful analysis of film genres like the disaster film, that sound has become a core component of the art of cinema. 

In my opinion, one must know a genre - its conventions, tropes, aesthetics, etc. - in order to break it or reverse it or go against it.  In other words, to create something truly revolutionary one must create something new, but in order to create something new one must understand the what is already established. Thus, it is important to understand genres and their conventions as key aspects of critical cinema studies.  It is possible that the argument of “what is generic to film can be found through the study of film genres” could be applied to filmic components other than sound in order to establish them within the field of cinema, especially in the face of future cinema and new cinematic forms such as cinema 4D, AR/VR technologies, and other immersive technologies  (should these forms eventually become a common practice in filmmaking).  Though only time will reveal what new and revolutionary components of film may be created and establish, the journey to these new components seems film seems promising and exciting. 

Bibliography

Yacowar, Maurice. “The Bug in the Rug: Notes on the Disaster Genre.” Film Genre Reader II, edited by Barry Keith Grant, University of Texas Press, 1995, pp 261-279.