There is virtually no dialogue, but the film is far from silent: the rustling of trees, the sounds of agricultural labor, the barking of a dog and in particular the cries of goats supply a meaning that transcends words, while Mr. Frammartino's eye for both comedy and mystery produces compositions that are so strange and memorable that they seem to reinvent the very act of perception.
Take note of all the things you're experiencing, including the sun or breeze on your skin, the texture of the sand or soil beneath your feet and drawing stick and notice sounds about you such as bird song, the sound or water or waves, the distant babble of human beings experiencing living and the rustling of trees.
When you stop to listen, you can hear the rustle of trees and tires crunching on gravel.
The calling of birds and the rustle of trees provide most of the commentary, and the effect is somehow to make history more mysteriously distant and more concrete — a matter of stone and weathered plaques inscribed with the records of half-forgotten deeds.
This is the background sound to a scene such as in a wood it might be the rustle of trees and birdsong, it is used to give continuity to a scene which may have been filmed in different locations.
There's another sound, barely perceptible among the rustling of the trees in the breeze and the other birds, but it gradually becomes clearer – a continuous metallic whirr, like a fishing reel spinning.
The flag atop the Foreign Office stiffened, and the two-minute silence was broken by the rustling of the trees as a few stray leaves blew down past the great white bulk of the Ministry of Defence.
Listen to the sounds of the birds, the rustling of the trees or the distant hum of the city.
In this case a boy, in whispered voice-over, speaks directly to God, whose responses are characteristically oblique, conveyed by the rustling of wind in trees or the play of shadows on a bedroom wall.
As you find the papers, the buzzing of crickets and the rustling of the photorealistic trees changes to a steady pounding.
