Sam Esmail Quotes

I'm really into the way sound works in film, and I did a little bit of sound design for theater in college.

For me, the sound design and the musical score is a big part of what makes scary movies work.

The atmosphere defines the environment of sound.

With a lot of action scores, you're competing with a lot of noise. Say there's a big explosion: the music would conventionally have a lot of Hollywood-style percussion or brass, because that's the only thing that will cut through.

My dad's a sound designer, and he used to take me to work with him.

One of the rules of the road is that if you want to create the sense of silence, it frequently has more pungency if you include the tiniest of sounds. By manipulating what you hear and how you hear it and what other things you don't hear, you can not only help tell the story, you can help the audience get into the mind of the character.

I love doing film soundtracks and working with directors on how they want the scene to be portrayed on audio as opposed to visual. I like the collaborative effort of working with people.

When people think of a Hitchcock movie, it isn't just the visual, it's the sound.

Aame' is a new attempt. The entire film was shot using live sound technique.

I always relish the idea of collaborating with the director on creating the sound world, the sound spectrum, and the sound environment of the film. I use every means at my disposal to create a score that is as strong and powerful to enhance the director's vision for the film.

With a huge storm, you need a lot of volume, but it can't become one loud noise. Dolby Atmos helped a lot because it gave us the separation of those elements.

When you listen deeply to a song, you find all the little sounds they use and subconsciously learn how to produce and mix.

I always like to do sound design, and in movies, you have more leeway with that, but I don't really notice that sound design is being used in TV other than just location sound.

I like films where the music and the sound design, at times, are almost indistinguishable.

When the picture was finished, they took me into the sound room and then I screamed more for about five minutes just steady screaming, and then they'd cut that in and add it.

When we were making KONG, I went into the sound room and made an aria of horror sounds. I was in charge of it; there was no one there to listen to me. I was totally in charge of what I wanted to do.

Every story needs an element of suspense - or it's lousy.

People used to always complain that horror films have no stories, that it's all just about kills and stuff like that.

Nobody understands what a producer does.

I think crafting a new, effective horror movie is not just about when night falls and things get scary. It's about setting a tone and mood that permeates throughout the entire movie. So even during the daytime, things are never quite safe-feeling.

The key to a good horror movie is what happens between the scares. The scares aren't the tricky part. If you're involved in what's going on in between, the scare is going to trick you. If you're not, the best scare in the world will not be scary.

For me, suspense is always harder and better than going for the quick, outright scare.

I've been making movies a long time. I'm a professional at it. I'm not a professional at making soundtracks - that's not my job. My job is to put the right songs in the movie so the movie works the best it possibly can.

I've always said if I had to pinpoint what's more important in a scary movie, the soundscape or the visuals, I'd pick the sound.

'The Conjuring' is incredibly effective and scary without the use of blood, gore, and death. It's a horror film that emphasizes atmosphere and suspense in the tradition of classics like 'Psycho' or 'The Others.'