ZOUND – feature

On the stage of a Concert Hall, a Female PIANO PLAYER is performing on a grand piano; only the acoustic, muted sounds of piano hammers are heard and not the normal keyboard sound.
On a Call Centre Aula, over 200 seated call operators are framed, communicating with headsets and microphone put on, a messy amalgam of phrases, sentences or chats are heard simultaneously, increasing this robotic, confusing and depressing way of communication, leading on a climax after which comes… a short break from that work that shows us the FEMALE OPERATOR kissing and hugging passionately with her BOYFRIEND; no word to say, not a single sound is heard until… an alarming, brutal buzzer makes her back to the harmful noisy work of the Call Center.
We’re on a taxi who’s DRIVER tries talking with his GIRLFRIEND concerning a possible abortion, dealing on and on with her and the traffic noises, messy road workers, old used buses, scooter’s loud exhaust, shouts, horns, and cornets honking, police officer whistling and finally with a stopped ambulance with the sharp sound of its siren which stops close to them leading the soundtrack of this scene to a high-pitched climax, on crazy stopped traffic.
We’re in the same taxi as before but this time as a deaf-mute GIRL’s P.O.V. who sees the TAXIDRIVER and his GIRLFRIEND’s relationship as lovable; she gets off the taxi and the same scenes are crossed and revised from her Point of View, as soundless video; kaleidoscopic visions, trees rustling, an airplane passing over our heads or a foggy road, a wild black dog barking “soundless”; we see her as a pedestrian at the kissing sequence from the Call Center, as a spectator on the auditorium of a strange Piano Concerto with Orchestra and Working Tools where she seems to find her twin soul, another deaf-mute BOY; they seat together for the second part of the concert when suddenly we hear… ”CUT, very good one” and we see the film’s shooting team.
Follows a backstage documentary that testifies how this film is made, despite the noises, messy surroundings, real-life cacophonies; the footage is untouched; the sound is not elaborated or mixed, thus adding another veracity layer to the film’s subject.
For the last time, we’re back at the stage of the Concert Hall where the Female PIANO PLAYER is performing Handel’s “Minuet in G Minor”.

Director Statement

The main theme of the film ZOUND is an international problem, something that most countries fight against, not so obvious but still very dangerous and harmful – acoustic pollution.
It’s a project undergone several re-writings, developments, and transformations through its 6 years of life. Inspired by true events its context could be seen as a fable with an artistic resolution at the end.
Through the timeline and the unfolding of the story, we experience the difference between points of view, between different categories of people confronting themselves, the suffocation of individuality from the mass society pressure, the absence of responsibility towards the others and above all an alternate view through the eyes of a deaf-mute character, who’s the absence of sound makes her see the beauty in an otherwise messy, cacophonic world.
The title, ZOUND is also the core concept; visually and graphically speaking, the letter Z provokes uneasiness, an uncomfortable state, is more offensive, more aggressive than the curvy, delicate, innocuous, soft letter S; so, SOUND has become ZOUND in English, ZON in French, ZUONO in Italian.
A key challenge of the film was to find a tonal balance between grotesque and realistic, subjective and objective, imaginary, and grounded because ZOUND is a drama in which realistic narrative and naturalistic techniques are combined with surreal (magical) elements of dream and fantasy.