O
ne of the simplest demonstrations that a film studies instructor can under-
take in the classroom involves familiarizing students with the difference
between film and video projection. From 2004 to 2006 I taught an introductory
film history course in the School for the Contemporary Arts at Simon Fraser
University covering cinema’s first five decades. While approximately twenty-five
percent of the students taking this course were enrolled in the department’s film
production major and were actively creating their own 16mm films, the remain-
ing students were largely taking the course out of personal interest or to fulfill
requirements for other degrees. As such, the majority of students were not nec-
essarily familiar with the technical differences between film and video, nor their
variability in image quality. In order to demonstrate this distinction, a compari-
son was undertaken using the German expressionist film The Cabinet of Dr.
Caligari (Germany, 1919, Robert Weine). Starting from the beginning of the film,
a DVD print was shown on screen via a data projector, which ran for about five
minutes. The same opening scenes of the film were then projected via a 16mm
projector, and this is the format through which students viewed the entire film.
This demonstration subsequently led to discussions in tutorials about the differ-
CANADIAN JOURNAL OF FILM STUDIES • REVUE CANADIENNE D’ÉTUDES CINÉMATOGRAPHIQUES
VOLUME 17 NO. 2 • FALL • AUTOMNE 2008 • pp 77-98
BLAIR DAVIS
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS: SCREENING
SILENT CINEMA WITH ELECTRONIC MUSIC
Résumé: Les diverses circonstances qui entourent le visionnement d’un film dans
un cours de cinéma influencent profondément la réaction des étudiants face à l’œu-
vre en question. Que ce soit l’information fournie au sujet du film avant sa projec-
tion ou la qualité de la copie utilisée, les choix de l’instructeur peuvent avoir un
impacte déterminant (et parfois imprévu) sur la réception du film. Cet article retrace
les expériences d’un instructeur qui a tenté d’identifier les divers effets sur les étu-
diants de la musique d’accompagnement des films muets. Au cours d’un vision-
nement en particulier, une musique d’accompagnement électronique a été très

efficace au près des étudiants. Cela a mené à une série d’expériences pédagogiques
visant à déterminer si les étudiants répondent aux films muets plus favorablement
si l’accompagnement est moderne plutôt que traditionnel. Cette recherche a été
entreprise non seulement pour répondre à mon propre besoin d’améliorer mes
méthodes d’enseignement, mais aussi pour fournir un modèle à d’autres instruc-
teurs qui veulent diversifier leurs façons de présenter des films muets.
ences between the film and video image, with many students noting that they
had not necessarily been aware of the difference in image quality until it was
pointed out to them.
One problem with this teaching demonstration, however, was the fact that
the 16mm print of Caligari had no musical soundtrack, something that the stu-
dents had become accustomed to having with their silent films during the semes-
ter. This factor would ultimately lead to subsequent demonstrations testing the
notion of whether modern electronic music could be used to enhance student
engagement with silent films in the classroom. I decided to fill the silence of the
Caligari print by synching up a CD during the screening (a senior colleague at
another institution occasionally played jazz albums in such a situation). The
album selected to accompany Caligari was Songs of a Dead Dreamer by DJ
Spooky, featuring music that might be generally described as “electronica” by
some, or “trip-hop” by others (my students used both of these terms to describe
the music, for example). The terms largely refer to music that has been created
by a Disc Jockey (DJ) through combining pre-existing musical samples together
and/or crafting electronic tones into rhythmic structures–criteria that informs the
definition of electronic music for the purposes of this essay.
1
With its dream-
like/surreal soundscapes, Songs of a Dead Dreamer was well suited to the expres-
sionist imagery presented in Caligari, and the album’s title served as a thematic
link to the film’s depiction of somnambulism. The music was an overwhelming
success with the students, who noted that the music and imagery often became

synchronized, whereby when the scenes in the film changed so too did the music
similarly change in its beat or tempo.
2
The success of the screening led to others of its kind in the same semester.
The Soviet montage film Man With a Movie Camera (Soviet Union, 1929, Dziga
Vertov) was accompanied by a new score from The Cinematic Orchestra (which
had been specifically composed by the group for the film in 2001).
3
This was fol-
lowed later in the semester by the short French surrealist film Ballet Mechanique
(France, 1924, Ferdinand Leger), accompanied by the first two tracks from elec-
tronica artist Amon Tobin’s Chaos Theory album. Anecdotally, the feedback I
received from both my students and my teaching assistant indicated that they
actually preferred to hear modern music while watching silent films, because it
allowed them to engage with the films more fully than if a more traditional
piano, organ or orchestral score had been used. This strong anecdotal feedback
ultimately led to the need for more objective evidence regarding students’ musi-
cal preferences for silent films in subsequent semesters.
This type of positive student response to a silent film is certainly ideal, but is not
always achieved in the classroom. Jan-Christopher Horak observes, for example,
that students do not always fully appreciate silent films, particularly when
shown a poor print:
78 BLAIR DAVIS
Teaching silent film courses on a regular basis, I’m one of the first to
admit that the advent of DVDs has made my job easier. Trying to con-
vince students that the film they are watching is not only a cinema clas-
sic, but also as sophisticated and modern as any film made in the sound
era, is a particularly hard sell when the print in question is a ‘dupey,’
fifth-generation 16mm reduction from the 35mm nitrate original, and
dead silent to boot. When shown DVDs produced from restored master

materials, and including a full orchestral score or at least piano accom-
paniment, students are much more willing to give silent films a chance.
4
Here the issue is that students will respond differently to a silent film depending
on a variety of factors, such as the quality of the print selected. Instructors make
numerous choices concerning the way in which the class is conducted and mate-
rials are integrated. Many of these choices, such as which print of a film to use,
may seem relatively simple, but they can often have larger, unforeseen implica-
tions. One illustration of this involves Edward T. Hall’s notion of proxemics—the
relationship of social space to culture. In The Hidden Dimension, Hall defines
proxemics as the “use of space as a specialized elaboration of culture,”
5
noting
for instance that the arrangement of furniture in a room is typically determined
by cultural preferences. Hall examines in particular how fixed seating arrange-
ments will create a remarkably different social dynamic than when individuals
are able to move their seats, with conversation being more prevalent in the latter
case.
6
Instructors will typically notice a difference in the quality of discussion in
a room with fixed seating, such as rows of desks or tables, as opposed to sitting
around a table with moveable chairs where eye contact is readily accessible. If a
simple choice like seat arrangement can affect classroom dynamics, instructors
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 79
Amon Tobin performing a live DJ set.
must also be aware that the decisions they make in terms of how films are pre-
sented can also have important consequences for students.
Since viewers regularly respond to films emotionally as well as cognitively,
it is only natural that a student’s emotional response can occasionally overwhelm
their interpretations of a film. As an instructor, I have noticed that those students

who describe being bored by a given film often cannot offer much in the way of
interpretation of that film during group discussions, and that consequently they
often perform poorly when writing about the film. Torben Grodal argues in
Moving Pictures: A New Theory of Film, Genres, Feeling and Cognition that “cog-
nitive and perceptual processes are intimately linked with emotional processes
within a functionally unified psychosomatic whole.” He sees a “systemic relation
between the embodied mental processes and configurations activated in a given
type of visual fiction and the emotional ‘tone’ and ‘modal qualities’ of the expe-
rienced affects, emotions and feelings in the viewer.”
7
Grodal’s theories concern-
ing the interrelationship of cognitive and emotional responses to visual stimuli
can be extended to auditory cues, as the act of perception is rarely unconnected
to other bodily senses–hearing typically being primary among them. This combi-
nation of visual and auditory stimuli serves to create an environment in which the
act of perception normally occurs, hence emotional responses may be activated
by one or more elements of that environment.
Such conceptions of spectatorship are indicative of what Joseph D. Anderson
and Barbara Anderson describe as an ecological approach to film in their anthol-
ogy Moving Image Theory: Ecological Considerations. Described as a “theory
about everyday perceiving in the world,” this ecological approach “takes into
account routine, everyday selection on the part of the perceiver [examining
what] information we choose to gain and how we gain it from a plethora of mov-
ing images.”
8
Again, given the largely inseparable nature of image and sound in
cinematic spectatorship, auditory information may be included in considerations
of audience perception when analyzing the effects of any given audio-visual
environment on individual viewers.
9

Such tenets are in keeping with the larger
tradition of media ecology, which Neil Postman describes as “the study of media
as environments.” A main concern of the field of media ecology, says Postman, is
about “how media of communication affect human perception, understanding,
feeling and value The word ecology implies the study of environments: their
structure, content and impact on people.”
10
With these notions of “understanding”
and “feeling” paralleling Grodal’s conception of “cognitive” and “emotional” responses
to cinema, this ecological framework may be seen as vital to an understanding
of how the environment created by an instructor’s myriad of choices, concerning
both the visual and auditory components of a classroom film screening, can affect
the impact that silent films have on students.
The act of replacing traditional forms of music with contemporary ones to
accompany silent films is a process that is not unfamiliar to the majority of mod-
80 BLAIR DAVIS
ern students. Dominique Russell argues that film music currently exists within a
changing “soundscape,” whereby “there has been a change in our sound envi-
ronment through the proliferation of ‘private sound bubbles,’ created through
compact music players. Headphone technology creates private soundtracks to
common images Insulated from room tone and ambient noises, two head-
phone wearers become spectators to two very different scenes, depending on
what they are listening to.”
11
Students have become accustomed to recontextu-
alizing visual phenomenon by selecting alternative auditory cues to experience
privately via iPods, mp3 players and other such devices. As Russell suggests,
when the spectator changes the soundtrack that accompanies visual stimulus,
the very scene itself changes due to the resulting environmental shift created by
the new relationship between sight and sound.

It was the desire to create such a shift that led Anna Siomopoulos, Patricia
Zimmermann and their colleagues at Ithaca College in New York to commission
a new score by Fe Nunn in 2004 for a screening of Within Our Gates (USA, 1920,
Oscar Michaeux) as a part of Black History Month. Combining a jazz quartet,
African drumming and spoken-word performance, Siomopoulos and
Zimmermann describe this new score as an attempt to “destabilize the film text,
reanimate film reception, and complicate film spectatorship through music, spo-
ken word, and multiple voices.” The project was motivated by the need to
“rethink the exhibition of politically significant silent films” in order to “create a
new reception context” for them.
12
The act of incorporating modern music into silent film screenings is also not
without precedent outside of academia. Since 1982, Pordenone Italy has hosted
Le Giornate Del Cinema Muto, a silent film festival that has regularly featured
contemporary scores written and performed by such composers as Wim Mertens
and John Cale.
13
In 1984, Giorgio Moroder compiled a modern rock score for a
theatrical re-release of Metropolis (Germany, 1928, Fritz Lang). Within Canada,
the Vancouver-based theatre The Blinding Light (operating from 1998-2003) reg-
ularly ran screenings of such silent films as Metropolis, City Lights (USA, 1931,
Charlie Chaplin) and Man With a Movie Camera featuring live musical accompa-
niment by the group Eye of Newt, which incorporates sampled music into their
performances. The Blinding Light also hosted screenings with the Vancouver
group Deep Blue Funk Films, which paired the music of Massive Attack with
Cabinet of Dr. Caligari in a performance labeled “Massive Caligari Attack.” Deep
Blue Funk describes this approach as a “synchronicity experiment,” an idea they
see as borrowed from Carl Jung’s concept of the “harmony of two otherwise unre-
lated events that occurs at a particular moment in time and space.”
14

Furthermore, DJ Spooky has himself created a new electronic score for Birth
of a Nation (USA, 1915, D.W. Griffith). Titling the performance Rebirth of a
Nation, it has been commissioned in recent years by festivals in the United
States, Paris and Vienna, including a festival held by The Lincoln Center for the
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 81
Performing Arts.
15
Spooky states that he created the new score in an “attempt to
draw the viewer into a direct relationship with the work, to draw the viewer into
a kind of self-critical standpoint which encourages reflection on one’s own
responses to the work,” particularly in relation to one’s own responses to Birth
of a Nation itself.
16
With the increasing frequency of experimentation with elec-
tronic music used to accompany silent films in cinematic, musical and artistic
communities, the reasons for transporting such approaches towards reconceptu-
alizing silent film screenings into academia become particularly cogent.
METHODOLOGY
My methodology consisted of multiple approaches towards determining student
response to the various screenings. Immediately after each of the three screen-
ings (Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Man With a Movie Camera and Ballet Mechanique),
the entire class of approximately ninety students became a large focus group.
Students participated in dialogues with one another and myself about the posi-
tive and negative effects of the use of electronic music and its implications for
film spectatorship, and I documented their comments. In each case this large
group dialogue was followed the next day by the use of a smaller focus group
made up of the members of a class tutorial session consisting of eighteen students.
Here, students were able to elaborate on their opinions from the day before, dis-
cussing the demonstration in more detail. Comments were again documented
and compared with those of the larger group. While no personal information was

gathered, the age range of students appeared to be predominantly eighteen to
twenty-four years, although several students appeared significantly older.
82 BLAIR DAVIS
DJ Spooky on the turntables.
These focus groups were triangulated with the use of a survey (see
Appendix A) conducted with the entire class at the end of the semester, allow-
ing several weeks for reflection on the demonstration as a whole. The survey did
not seek to document audience effects, but to record the self-reported effect of
enhancement and/or distraction created by the total aural/visual experience dur-
ing screenings. The survey was completed anonymously and consisted of nine
questions, divided into three sections for each of the three respective screenings.
Students were asked to indicate which of the given statements they felt best
described their own viewing experience in each case by circling the most appropriate
choice. The survey asked what effect the modern music used to accompany each
respective film in class had on their engagement with the film, as to whether it
A) strongly enhanced; B) somewhat enhanced; C) neither enhanced nor detracted
from; D) somewhat detracted from; or E) strongly detracted from their engage-
ment with each film.
The survey then used the same five criteria to determine what effect an
organ or piano score would have had on students’ engagement with the same
film, and then also asked what effect a symphonic or string instrument score
would have had. These three questions were asked for each of the three films.
While the survey therefore asked respondents to imagine the use of organ/
piano/symphonic music with films they had not seen with such musical accom-
paniments, students had been exposed to numerous other silent films featuring
all of these different forms of instrumentation throughout the semester, and were
therefore familiar with each musical variation asked by the survey. While the use
of control group screenings of these same films using these other types of music
would have proven ideal (and would have undoubtedly yielded different results
than questioning students about the hypothetical use of such music), such a

structure was unfortunately not permitted under the institutional confines of the
course at the time. The survey also invited respondents to include any additional
written comments they wished to make about the demonstration. Completion of
the survey was encouraged but not mandatory, and seventy-two responses to the
survey were received.
At the start of the survey, the word engagement was defined as “your atten-
tion to/interaction with each film.” The term engagement was chosen because it
signified the degree of student interest involved, and the ultimate goal of this
demonstration was to determine strategies to increase students’ overall interest
in silent films. This notion of “engagement” was reiterated before the survey was
distributed, in order to remind students that they were to respond to each spe-
cific act of classroom spectatorship and not just to their own general preferences
about the various musical genres as a whole. While there is a risk that person-
al musical tastes may have influenced student reactions, focus group responses
seemed to indicate that this was not a significant problem. Many students
described how they were able to separate their own musical preferences from
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 83
their considerations of how the chosen music affected their overall experiences
of watching these films.
The results of the survey (see Appendix C) were quantified in order to deter-
mine how many students objected to a given score, and how many felt that a
given score added to their experience of watching each film. The demonstration
and survey were then repeated in a subsequent semester in another introducto-
ry film course (see Appendix B and C), using a different group of students, a dif-
ferent film and a different choice of electronic music in order to further test the
validity of the hypothesis that an electronic score can enhance student engage-
ment with silent cinema in a diverse set of circumstances. The film Haxan:
Witchcraft Through the Ages (Denmark/Sweden, 1922, Benjamin Christensen)
17
was shown to a class of approximately forty students. A musical playlist con-

sisting mainly of tracks by both Amon Tobin and DJ Spooky was selected to
accompany the film, with the attempt to match the tempo and rhythm of indi-
vidual musical tracks to the mood or pace of specific scenes from the film. While
the variables of this second demonstration are different from those of the first (in
that the film and music were different
18
) the fact that the survey results were
highly similar to those of the first demonstration supports the hypothesis despite
the change in variables.
RESULTS, PATTERNS & OBSERVATIONS
In the initial demonstration using music by DJ Spooky to accompany Cabinet of
Dr. Caligari, 72.2 percent of students felt that the music enhanced their engage-
ment with the film. Additionally, 19.4 percent found that the music detracted
from their viewing experience and 8.3 percent felt that it neither enhanced nor
detracted. Alternatively, these statistics point out that 80.5 percent of students
had no objections to the use of a modern score. In contrast, 47.8 percent of stu-
dents felt that a symphonic or string instrument score would have enhanced
their engagement, but only 9.8 percent believed it would detract, with 42.2 per-
cent remaining neutral towards such music. Furthermore, if a piano or organ
score had instead accompanied Caligari, only 26 percent of students felt that it
would have enhanced their engagement, with 31.8 percent believing it would
detract, and 42 percent of students remaining neutral. While the data may indi-
cate that 90.1 percent of students had no objections to a symphonic score, it also
indicates that nearly half of those students might have found a non-symphonic
score to be more engaging.
The response to the modern score by The Cinematic Orchestra to accompa-
ny Man With a Movie Camera was even more encouraging. The survey found
that 82.8 percent saw the new score as enhancing their engagement, with only
2.8 percent seeing it as detracting and 14 percent remaining neutral. These num-
bers indicate that 94.5 percent had no objections to the modern score, the highest

response to any of the musical choices in the entire survey. Comparatively, only
84 BLAIR DAVIS
24.2 percent of students felt that an organ or piano score would have been ben-
eficial, and 39.1 percent believed that a symphonic/string score would have
aided in their engagement. The use of Amon Tobin’s music to accompany Ballet
Mechanique drew the lowest amount of support, with only 49.2 percent respond-
ing favorably. However, only 13 percent saw the music as detrimental, with 36.9
percent being indifferent. Furthermore, the acceptance rate of the electronic
music is still higher here than that of other musical forms for the film, with only
36.5 percent of students preferring a symphonic score, and 20.6 percent favoring
a piano or organ score.
The subsequent survey in the second demonstration, regarding the use of
electronic music in a screening of Haxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages, yielded
similar results. The survey found that 78.1 percent of the new group saw the elec-
tronic music as enhancing their engagement with the film. A further 18.7 percent
found that the music detracted, while only 3.1 percent remained neutral. In con-
trast, only 50 percent of these students would have found a piano or organ score
beneficial, while only 46.8 percent would have benefited from a symphonic score.
The survey results indicate that the majority of students in almost all of the
scenarios preferred the modern electronic soundtrack. Furthermore, in each case,
regardless of whether a majority was reached, the positive response to this music
outweighed the negative response. Focus group comments for the Caligari
screening, for example, noted that the DJ Spooky music was “more effective”
and allowed for a “better experience” for students. At the Man With a Movie
Camera screening, students made similar observations regarding the Cinematic
Orchestra score: “It made the film feel more contemporary;” “It allowed me to
connect with the film more;” “It gave the images more resonance.” Such state-
ments also appeared in the anonymous survey comments. “The addition of con-
temporary music is an interesting idea. I liked the choices, the [sic] improved the
films quite a bit,” wrote one student. “Loved the modern music, it put things in

OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 85
T
he Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
(
Robert Weine, 1919)
a modern, more relatable context for me,” wrote another.
What became most striking about the survey results, however, was the pat-
tern that emerged when comparing the preferences of individual respondents for
one screening to that same respondent’s preferences in other screenings. In so
doing it became evident that those who disliked or were neutral about one
choice of electronic music were likely to be enthusiastic about another such
choice. Ninety seven percent of respondents in the initial survey that were neu-
tral towards one or more of the electronic choices were enthusiastic about at
least one of the other electronic accompaniments. Similarly, 95.6 percent of
respondents that disliked one or more of the electronic musical choices reacted
favorably to at least one of the other electronic choices. In many cases, students
who felt that one electronic score strongly detracted from their engagement with
a film noted that a different electronic score strongly enhanced engagement for
another film. Therefore, instructors who may be worried that an electronic score
could alienate a significant portion of their students during any given screening
should be comforted by the fact that those who do not enjoy one particular piece
of electronic music will very likely respond favorably to other choices during the
course of a semester. In so doing, the odds become much higher that instructors
may instill interest in those students who might otherwise tend to dismiss silent
films entirely.
Many students in the surveys singled out organ music as being particularly
detrimental to their viewing experiences. Overall, 43 percent of respondents in
the initial survey were neutral towards a piano or organ score, with an addition-
al 33.3 percent noting that such music detracted from their engagement with the
films. The consensus of the large focus group for the Ballet Mechanique screen-

ing was that there would have been diminished interest in the film if an organ
score were used. “Organ music would be so distracting, esp.[sic] today, because
we rarely hear that,” said one anonymous survey comment. This statement
points to the fact that organ music falls outside of the common musical frame of
reference of most contemporary students, with one student noting that such
music is rarely heard outside of a religious context. While organ music is cer-
tainly in keeping with the historical context of original exhibition practices of
silent films, the fact that it may be detrimental from a student’s perspective in
classroom screenings should give instructors cause to consider alternative musi-
cal choices.
While they did not appear to enjoy organ music, the survey results do indi-
cate that most students are generally not opposed to symphonic scores. Only 11.3
percent of respondents in the initial survey felt that a symphonic or string score
would detract from their engagement with the films, with 41.1 percent believing
that such music would be beneficial. While 47.3 percent remained neutral, these
results point out that students are perhaps more comfortable with symphonic
scores than organ scores precisely because the former is more familiar to them
86 BLAIR DAVIS
than the latter.
19
“Symphony music if well synchronized is nice,” noted one
anonymous respondent, “but doesn’t really affect things as much negative or
positively as the others” (i.e. organ/piano or electronic music). Other respon-
dents had specific demands of symphonic scores, with one noting that the suc-
cess of such scores “partly depends on how well it captures the mood of the
film.” Another noted that a symphonic score would have strongly enhanced
engagement with Caligari, but “only if Expressionist,” and would have strongly
enhanced engagement with Man With a Movie Camera, but only “if rhythmic.”
Such preferences seem to indicate an acceptance of symphonic scores created
specifically to suit a particular silent film, and an aversion to simply adding pub-

lic domain classical music to a film without much regard for synchronization or
compatibility.
A recurring notion among focus group participants was that using modern
electronic music served to make silent films feel “more modern” or “contempo-
rary.” At the same time, many noted that electronic music also allowed the silent
films screened to feel more “artistic” or “avant-garde,” stating that the films
seemed as if they could have been created fairly recently as opposed to being
eight or nine decades old. Such comments are particularly encouraging for two
reasons. Firstly, as Horak describes, they show that students can consider silent
films to be as “sophisticated and modern as any film made in the sound era.”
Secondly, these comments signify not only an appreciation of silent films by
these students, but also a consideration of the aesthetic qualities of the films
themselves. To label something as avant-garde is to make an evaluative compar-
ison between a work of art and its predecessors or contemporaries. If electronic
music can inspire a greater degree of reflection among students as to the artistic
merits of silent films, then instructors should strongly consider integrating this
music into classroom screenings.
In turn, students classified piano, organ and orchestral scores as being
“older” forms of music, forms they considered more “traditional” and “old fash-
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 87
The Man With a Movie Camera
(
Dziga Vertov,1929).
ioned.” One student also described such “older” forms of music as seeming
“romantic” in so far as it was “overly melodramatic” at times, or even “clichéd.”
Some also described such older forms of music as being highly “distracting” in
that the music did not convey the emotions that these students felt should be
reflected in the film’s score.
However, some focus group participants also found the use of electronic
music “distracting.” Several students who disliked the use of DJ Spooky’s music

accompanying Caligari noted being distracted by the modern drum loops and
electronic sounds, claiming that they didn’t “suit” the film. Another student
anonymously described having seen the film before, and feeling “far more
removed from the film” because of the electronic music: “the experiment created
an unconscious focus on where the film and the contemporary DJ track ‘synched’
up. Every time the beat/tempo changed accordingly with the action on the
screen there was an ‘ooohh!’ from the audience in reaction to the success of
the experience.”
The implication here is that audiences should not be overly conscious of
film music, at least to the extent that it begins to overwhelm the visual imagery.
Jeff Smith argues in his essay “Unheard Melodies? A Critique of Psychoanalytic
Theories of Film Music” that there is a “conventional wisdom” at work regard-
ing “film music’s subservient relation to the image.”
20
Smith chronicles several
historical approaches to film music, such as the pervasive belief that audiences
should engage with cinematic scores on a largely subconscious level. In chal-
lenging this idea, however, Smith argues that “the immediacy of the music’s
modality, tempo, timbre, and dynamics often encourages spectators to make
hypotheses and draw inferences about a scene’s structural features and expres-
sive qualities,”
21
therefore implying an active rather than passive engagement
with the music.
This active engagement with the electronic music was addressed in anoth-
er anonymous respondent’s comments, and offers a counterargument of sorts to
the student who found the DJ Spooky score distracting. The demonstration,
wrote the respondent, “engages us in the same way that some music videos do.
I found I was looking for pace and rhythm in the image. I was more aware of the
editing because I was anticipating moments where a cut would match a beat in

the music. The juxtaposition of modern with old breaks down the temporal bar-
riers and makes the diegesis more tangible, no matter how long ago it was
filmed.” Once again it is seen how the electronic music allows students to con-
centrate more intensely on the film’s aesthetics–in this case, its editing–and to
impart a contemporaneous quality to the film.
22
The notion of “tangibility” in this last statement was also hinted at by
another student during a large focus group session for Caligari, in which he
recounted the physical effect that the demonstration had on him. He described
how the combination of the new music with Caligari’s expressionist imagery cre-
88 BLAIR DAVIS
ated a sort of “out of body experience” while watching the film. The student fur-
ther explained during a small focus group session that he experienced a kind of
physical “buzz” from the demonstration, which he described as “a heightened
state of mental awareness and lack of physical awareness” regarding his sur-
roundings in the classroom. Interestingly, this same student had only the week
prior complained of how uncomfortable the chairs in the classroom were, and
that he had previously been constantly aware of his physical discomfort during
the earlier films. While this student’s reaction was certainly the most extreme
response, it nevertheless signifies that the use of modern music can have a pow-
erful effect on how students watch silent films, creating an increased level of
engagement.
THEORETICAL IMPLICATIONS
The very act of reframing silent films with electronic music is in accordance with
the tenets of what DJ Spooky (in his academic work, using his real name Paul
D. Miller) refers to as “rhythm science.” Described as using an “endless recon-
textualizing” as its “core compositional strategy,” Miller sees rhythm science as
“a forensic investigation of sound that goes from the physical to the informa-
tional and back again.”
23

Rhythm science creates parallel soundscapes because it’s music that says,
“there could be another way.” Rhythm science makes possible a music of
permutation that tries to convey a sense of how conceptual art, contem-
porary technology, and timeless idealism might function together today.”
24
Here electronic music is capable of attaining a theoretical value in addition
to its aesthetic qualities, linking questions of art and technology to the extent
that the combination of sounds often takes on a dialectic quality, becoming as
much about the ideas that they raise as it is about any harmonious qualities they
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 89
C
aligari and Cesare in
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari
(
Robert Weine, 1919).
attain together. When this musical “recontextualizing” process is combined with
the additional context of the silent film, ideas about the relationship between art
and technology raised by the multiple combinations of sounds and imagery
become manifold.
Despite the academic possibilities of electronic music for silent film screen-
ings, the practice of combining the two has met with resistance. David Gasten
writes: “By far the strongest point of contention within the silent film commu-
nity concerns the recent phenomenon of setting silent films to scores consisting
of electronic, rock and avant-garde music styles. Many silent film enthusiasts,
especially those of the older generations, consider this to be nothing less than
sacrilege.”
25
Film critic David Edelstein describes, for example, how Moroder’s
1984 rock score to Metropolis drove him “frothing with rage from the theater
after half an hour.”

2
6
Gasten notes two reasons as to why modern music is typ-
ically added to silent films:
One is that some people desire to see how the addition of contemporary
sounds will enhance the picture. As Italian composer Roberto Musci
says about his modern soundtracks, “I think the contrasts between old
images and electronic and experimental sounds can re-birth the original
fashion of the story.” The other reason is that it is hoped that the addi-
tion of a more contemporary soundtrack will expose the silent film to a
newer, younger audience.
27
This focus on bringing new audiences to silent films is also seen in an inter-
view with a member of The Cinematic Orchestra, who says of the band’s perfor-
mances for Man With a Movie Camera, “It’s more of an event than a gig because
people are encouraged to watch the film. People love seeing it with a contempo-
rary soundtrack and there’s a vast age range there. We’ve managed to transcend
the world of electronic music and clubs people normally place us in.”
28
Simultaneously, the silent film is able to transcend the world of cinematheques
and university classrooms with which these films are normally associated, bring-
ing silent films to audiences that normally would not otherwise watch them.
Media theorists increasingly point to a generation gap along technological
lines separating modern teenagers from their elders. In Growing Up Digital, Don
Tapscott describes the “net generation” as being inherently “interactive.” “They
want to be users–not just viewers or listeners,” he argues.
29
Similarly, in
Screenagers: Lessons in Chaos From Digital Kids, Douglas Rushkoff sees modern
popular culture as creating new sensory patterns in its younger audiences. MTV

in particular, he argues, “required that a new language–a language of chaos–be
developed. The kids watching MTV learned to speak like its natives.”
30
Rushkoff
states that modern youth “may indeed have a ‘shorter’ attention span as defined
90 BLAIR DAVIS
by the behavioral psychologists of our prechaotic culture’s academic institu-
tions,” but that this decrease in attention span has concurrently resulted in new
cognitive skills that have proven beneficial in their interaction with various
media:
[A] key viewing skill that kids have developed, which may be linked to
the so-called shortened attention span, is the ability to process visual
information very rapidly. A television image that takes an adult ten sec-
onds to absorb might be processed by a child in a second This is a
new language of visual information, and it depends as much on the rela-
tionship of different images within images as it does on what we gener-
ally understand as content. It suspends the time constraints of linear
reasoning in order to allow for a rapid dissemination of ideas and data,
as well as the more active participation of the viewer to piece it together
and draw conclusions for himself. If anything, this development would
indicate an evolutionary leap in the ability of an attention span to main-
tain itself over long gaps of discontinuity, either between channel surfing
cycles, or from session to session.
31
As a result of such differences, younger audiences typically do not see dis-
cord when various audio and visual stimuli are juxtaposed with one another.
Instead, they create their own unification and meaning out of this seeming
“chaos.” Rushkoff’s ideas are ultimately grounded in the aforementioned tradi-
tion of media ecology, particularly his statement about the rapid processing of
imagery being an “evolutionary leap.” Postman describes media ecology as

examining “how our interaction with media facilitates or impedes our chances
of survival.”
32
If younger audiences have developed a new perceptual skill-set as
a means of adapting to a changing media environment, then it is only natural
that they will view older perceptual habits as being outdated and even detri-
mental to their survival.
Therefore, if an “older generation” of silent film enthusiasts views the incor-
poration of electronic music into screenings as a sacrilege, modern youth see it
as a natural extension of a modern media environment that requires them to
actively intuit relationships between diverse forms of stimuli. Electronic music
should therefore be seen as an area for future experiment both for film music
composers and for film studies instructors. Thus far, this particular demonstra-
tion has shown that electronic music has complimented films that have either
been highly formalistic in nature (Man With a Movie Camera, Cabinet of Dr.
Caligari), or else feature imagery that is often surrealistic or fantastical (Ballet
Mechanique, Haxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages). Further research is suggested
in order to determine student musical preferences for silent films in other genres,
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 91
such as the comedy and the western, and other silent film movements or styles,
such as the Kammerspielfilm, and epic films, like Cabiria (Italy, 1913, Giovanni
Pastrone) and Intolerance (USA, 1916, D.W. Griffith).
My current work here represents the efforts of a part-time instructor seek-
ing to integrate his research into the confines of those courses available to be
taught at the time. For those with relative permanence in courses taught, future
work in this area is recommended over multiple semesters. This will better allow
for the use of control groups in testing the response to a given film’s accompa-
niment by multiple types of musical scores. It could also potentially allow an
instructor to design a means of testing (standardized or otherwise) whether a
particular type of musical score affects how students think and/or write about a

given film, in order to ensure that the basis of student appeal for modern scores
does not just lie in physiological stimulation alone. If electronic scores can
encourage a greater degree of student involvement with (and enthusiasm about)
silent films, as well as inspire a greater awareness of the mental and bodily
processes of spectatorship involved in watching films, an incorporation of this
music into classroom screenings of silent films could become a more regular
practice in how film studies classes are taught.
The application of electronic music to silent films is just one example of
research that should be undertaken in studying the ecological implications of our
modern technological environment for film spectatorship. At the same time, such
research is also significant to the study of film history itself. Film critics, schol-
ars and fans who “froth with rage” at the thought of altering the original exhi-
bition context of silent cinema display a preservationist instinct–certainly a vital
impulse towards ensuring that the cinema’s pioneering efforts remain screened
and studied. Most film studies instructors would have to admit, however, that
not all those who study cinema in an academic context are necessarily fans of
silent films, particularly when encountering them for the first time. Thomas
Sutcliffe describes how modern audiences often greet older films with a “know-
ing laughter” brought on by what he calls a “forgotten sophistication.”
33
Such
viewers have forgotten, in other words, how to watch a film while keeping in
mind its historical and social context. The study of silent film in its social, his-
torical and technological contexts is undoubtedly important, yet some students
can still find it difficult to appreciate the aesthetic innovations of the silent film
period (preferring instead more recent films, simply because their technologies
are newer). Ironically, by using anachronistic music that further removes the
silent film from its original exhibition context, I feel that students are able to
become self-reflexive regarding the very notion of historical context itself during
screenings. Simply put, when confronted with modern music during a silent film

screening, students contemplate the anachronism, which can inspire a more crit-
ical awareness of the film (and its aesthetics, social history, etc.) among those
who might otherwise be inclined to dismiss it.
92 BLAIR DAVIS
APPENDIX A: Demonstration #1 Survey
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 93
SPECTATORSHIP SURVEY
PLEASE ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS ACCORDING TO WHICH STATEMENT
YOU FEEL BEST DESCRIBES YOUR OWN VIEWING EXPERIENCE IN EACH CASE.
CIRCLE THE MOST APPROPRIATE CHOICE FOR EACH.
IN WHAT FOLLOWS, THE WORD “ENGAGEMENT” IS DEFINED AS YOUR “ATTEN-
TION TO/INTERACTION WITH” EACH FILM.
I) CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI
1.) THE MUSIC BY DJ SPOOKY ACCOMPANYING CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI IN
CLASS _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
2.) IF AN ORGAN/PIANO SCORE WERE USED INSTEAD TO ACCOMPANY THIS
FILM,
IT WOULD HAVE _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
3.) IF A SYMPHONIC/STRING INSTRUMENT SCORE WERE USED INSTEAD TO
ACCOMPANY THIS FILM, IT WOULD HAVE _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE
FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.

II) MAN WITH A MOVIE CAMERA
4.) THE MUSIC BY THE CINEMATIC ORCHESTRA ACCOMPANYING MAN WITH A
MOVIE CAMERA IN CLASS _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
5.) IF AN ORGAN/PIANO SCORE WERE USED INSTEAD TO ACCOMPANY THIS
FILM, IT WOULD HAVE _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
AP
PENDIX
A: Demonstration #1 Survey (continued from previous page)
94 BLAIR DAVIS
6.) IF A SYMPHONIC/STRING INSTRUMENT SCORE WERE USED INSTEAD TO
ACCOMPANY THIS FILM, IT WOULD HAVE _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE
FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
III) BALLET MECHANIQUE
7.) THE MUSIC BY AMON TOBIN ACCOMPANYING BALLET MECHANIQUE IN CLASS
_______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
8.) IF AN ORGAN/PIANO SCORE WERE USED INSTEAD TO ACCOMPANY THIS FILM,
IT WOULD HAVE _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED; C) NEITHER ENHANCED

NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
9.) IF A SYMPHONIC/STRING INSTRUMENT SCORE WERE USED INSTEAD TO
ACCOMPANY THIS FILM, IT WOULD HAVE _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE
FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
PLEASE FEEL FREE TO ADD ANY ADDITIONAL COMMENTS TO THE BACK OF THIS
PAGE. THANK YOU FOR PARTICIPATING!
AP
PENDIX
B: Demonstration #2 Survey
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 95
SPECTATORSHIP SURVEY
PLEASE ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS ACCORDING TO WHICH STATE-
MENT YOU FEEL BEST DESCRIBES YOUR OWN VIEWING EXPERIENCE IN EACH
CASE. CIRCLE THE MOST APPROPRIATE CHOICE FOR EACH.
IN WHAT FOLLOWS, THE WORD “ENGAGEMENT” IS DEFINED AS YOUR “ATTENTION
TO/INTERACTION WITH” EACH FILM.
HAXAN: WITCHCRAFT THROUGH THE AGES
1.) THE ELECTRONIC MUSIC ACCOMPANYING HAXAN: WITCHCRAFT THROUGH
THE AGES IN CLASS _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
2.) IF AN ORGAN/PIANO SCORE WERE USED INSTEAD TO ACCOMPANY THIS FILM,
IT WOULD HAVE _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM

D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
3.) IF A SYMPHONIC/STRING INSTRUMENT SCORE WERE USED INSTEAD TO
ACCOMPANY THIS FILM, IT WOULD HAVE _______ MY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE
FILM.
A) STRONGLY ENHANCED; B) SOMEWHAT ENHANCED;
C) NEITHER ENHANCED NOR DETRACTED FROM
D) SOMEWHAT DETRACTED FROM; E) STRONGLY DETRACTED FROM.
AP
PENDIX
C: Survey Results
NOTES
My thanks go out to all of the students who participated in this research. Special
thanks to Erin Maybin and Paul Heyer for reading earlier drafts of this essay, and
to the two anonymous readers for their comments and suggestions.
1. Thomas Holmes defines electronic music as being “electrically produced or modified,”
but makes a distinction between electro-acoustic music whose “heyday” was the 1950s,
and more recent musical genres such as ambient, illbient, techno and trance. It is the
latter forms of music that this essay is largely concerned with, as opposed to both elec-
tro-acoustic musical forms such as the theremin, as well as music created on electric gui-
tars, for example. Thomas B. Holmes, Electronic and Experimental Music: Pioneers in
Technology and Composition (London: Routledge, 2002), 5-6.
96
BLAIR DAVIS
Table 1: Demonstration #1 survey results. Total of 72 respondents.
Number Of Respondents
Question Strongly Somewhat Neither Some-what Strongly No
No. Enhanced Enhanced Enhanced Detracted Detracted Response
or Detracted
11
28 (38.8%) 24 (34.4%) 6 (8.3%) 9 (12.5%)) 5 (6.9%) 0

22
5 (7.2%) 13 (18.8%) 29 (42%) 18 (26%) 4 (5.7%) 3
33
10 (14%) 24 (33.8%) 30 (42.2%) 7 (9.8%) 01
44
39 (55.7%) 19 (27.1%) 10 (14.3%) 1 (1.4%) 1 (1.4%) 2
55
4 (5.7%) 13 (18.5%) 22 (31.4%) 22 (31.4%) 9 (12.8%) 2
66
9 (13%) 18 (26%) 33 (47.8%)) 7 (10.1%) 2 (2.8%) 3
77
14 (21.5%) 18 (27.6%) 24 (36.9%) 7 (10.7%) 2 (3%) 7
88
1 (0.15%) 12 (19%) 35 (55.5%) 10 (15.8%) 5 (7.9%) 9
99
4 (6.3%) 19 (30.1%) 33 (52.3%) 5 (7.9%) 2 (3.1%) 9
Table 2: Demonstration #2 survey results. Total of 32 respondents.
Number Of Respondents
Question Strongly Somewhat Neither Some-what Strongly No
No. Enhanced Enhanced Enhanced Detracted Detracted Response
or Detracted
11
13 (40.6%) 12 (37.5%) 1 (3.1%) 5 (15.6%) 1 (3.1 %) 0
22
3 (9.3 %) 13 (40.6 %) 8 (25 %) 7 (21.8 %) 1 (3.1 %) 0
33
4 (12.5 %) 11 (34.3 %) 10 (31.2 %) 6 (18.7 %) 1 (3.1 %) 0
2. In an email correspondence, I was informed by DJ Spooky’s manager that there was no
intent to make “Songs of a Dead Dreamer” a soundtrack to Caligari, and that they were
unaware of the synchronicity between the film and the album, but could see how it

m
ight occur (Stephen Cohen, October 30, 2005).
3
. While containing such traditional musical instruments as drums, piano, saxophones and
violin, this score by The Cinematic Orchestra is included in the “electronica” category
b
ecause of the work by musician Patrick Carpenter, who is credited as performing with
T
urntables/Electronics.
4. Jan-Christopher Horak, “Archiving, Preserving, Screening 16 mm,” Cinema Journal 45:3
(Spring 2006): 112.
5. Edward T. Hall, The Hidden Dimension (New York: Doubleday, 1966), 1.
6
. Ibid., 101-109.
7. Torben Grodal, Moving Pictures: A New Theory of Film Genres, Feelings, and Cognition
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), 1, 3.
8. Joseph D. Anderson, “Preliminary Considerations,” Moving Image Theory: Ecological
Considerations, Joseph D. Anderson and Barbara Fisher Anderson, eds. (Carbondale:
Southern Illinois University Press, 2005), 4.
9. Ed Wachtel incorporates such an approach into his essay, “How to Hear a Film.” He sug-
gests, for example, that “all sound has the power to evoke and symbolize human feel-
ing Sound is the modality of feeling and inner reflection.” (Explorations in Media
Ecology 4:1, [2005]: 50).
10. Quoted in Lance Strate, Echoes and Reflections: On Media Ecology as a Field of Study
(Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press, Inc., 2006), 17. See also the Media Ecology Association,
.
11. Dominique Russell, “Sounds Like Horror: Alejandro Amenábar’s Thesis on Audio-Visual
Violence,” Canadian Journal of Film Studies 15:2 (Fall 2006): 83.
12. Anna Siomopoulos and Patricia Zimmermann, “Silent Film Exhibition and Performative
Historiography: The Within Our Gates Project,” The Moving Image 6:2 (Fall 2006): 110-

111.
13. See for more information.
14. Deep Blue Funk Films, pbluefunkfilms.com/synchs.html (accessed March
2, 2007). In addition to these screenings at the Blinding Light, Canadian musician
Francois Houle has performed scores incorporating electro-acoustic and jazz elements
for live screenings of Buster Keaton films, such as for The General (U.S.A., 1925) at
Performance Works in Vancouver, BC with his quartet in July 2000.
15. Rebirth of A Nation was commissioned by The Lincoln Center Festival, Festival
D’Automne à Paris, Spoleto Festival USA and Wiener Festwochen (Vienna). “Sound
Unseen,” />(accessed February 12, 2007). A “Teacher’s Resource Guide” was also created for use
with the performance: “University Musical Society,”
(accessed February 12, 2007).
16. Paul D. Miller, “Notes for Paul D. Miller’s Rebirth of a Nation,” DJ Spooky,
(accessed February 12, 2007).
17. Originally released as Haxan in 1922, the film was retitled Witchcraft Through the Ages
for a 1968 American re-release featuring a new jazz score and narration by William S.
Burroughs. As one anonymous reader of this essay has pointed out, the 1968 version of
Haxan is perhaps the “grand-daddy” of utilizing contemporary music for silent film exhi-
bition.
18. Several of the DJ Spooky tracks used to accompany Haxan were repeated from “Songs
of a Dead Dreamer,” used in the Caligari screening. Furthermore, most of the Amon
Tobin tracks used for Haxan are highly similar in nature to those by the same artist used
with Ballet Mechanique. In this regard, the music used for Haxan in the second demon-
stration was not entirely different from the first demonstration’s music.
OLD FILMS, NEW SOUNDS 97
19. In fact, many of the electronic pieces of music used to accompany the silent films in
class incorporated elements of symphonic or string-instrument music. DJ Spooky sam-
ples unidentified orchestral music, for example, while Amon Tobin has worked directly
w
ith the Kronos Quartet. Such approaches serve to keep elements of symphonic music

a
live for younger listeners who would not ordinarily listen to such musical forms.
20. Jeff Smith, “Unheard Melodies? A Critique of Psychoanalytic Theories of Film Music,” Post
T
heory: Reconstructing Film Theory, David Bordwell and Noël Carroll, eds. (Madison:
U
niversity of Wisconsin Press, 1996), 230.
21. Ibid., 244.
22. This student’s comments about music videos raise the issue of whether students
respond to silent films with electronic scores precisely because they do resemble music
v
ideos. While some educators may decry this comparison, if similarity with a new media
f
ormat can stir interest in an older format then the question of pedagogic merit should
become a moot point.
23. Paul D. Miller, Rhythm Science (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Mediaworks/The MIT Press,
2004), 4-5, 21.
24. Ibid., 20.
25. David Gasten, “An Introduction to Modern Music in the Silent Film,” The Pola Negri
Appreciation Site, (accessed
January 27, 2007).
26. David Edelstein, “Radiant City,” Slate, 18 September, 2002,
(accessed August 10, 2008).
27. Gasten.
28. Paul Clarke, BBC, Collective No. 236, 23 May, 2003, BBC, />collective/A1057295 (accessed January 27, 2007).
29. Don Tapscott, Growing Up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation (New York: McGraw-
Hill, 1998), 3.
30. Douglas Rushkoff, Screenagers: Lessons in Chaos From Digital Kids (Cresskill, NJ:
Hampton Press, Inc., 2006), 36.
31. Ibid., 38-39.

32. Quoted in Strate, 17.
33. Thomas Sutcliffe, Watching (London: Faber and Faber, 2000), 53.
BLAIR DAVIS has a PhD from the department of Communication Studies at
McGill University and has been an instructor in film studies at Simon Fraser
University since 2003. He has essays featured in Caligari’s Grandchildren: German
Horror Film Since 1945 (Scarecrow Press, 2007), Horror Film: Creating and
Marketing Fear (University Press of Mississippi, 2004), Reel Food: Essays on Film and
Food (Routledge, 2004), and the Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television.
98 BLAIR DAVIS