For the second exercise of the AHRC-funded project, I have created an experimental voiceover video that combines an unrelated audio recording with scenes from a horror film, in this case Amanda Nell Eu’s It’s Easier to Raise Cattle (Lagi Senang Jaga Sekandang Lembu, 2017).
Amanda’s film is excellent for this exercise; it’s largely devoid of dialogue, and much of the diegetic sound is derived from the non-human environment. It’s an unusually quiet film about a pontianak, a supernatural figure in the Malay-speaking world known for her shrieking laughter.
The soundtrack is the inner monologue of a distracted spectator that fills the relatively ’empty’ audiosphere of the film. What does it mean to watch a film about a self-assured young pontianak from a place of self-loathing and doubt?
Alicia Izharuddin 