Sound of Metal is directed by Darius Marder, who has bounced around the filmmaking business in various roles, most notably as a writer on Derek Cianfrance’s The Place Beyond the Pines. The script is credited to him and his brother Abraham and is their first narrative feature, though the techniques of documentary (Marder had previously made one called Loot, about buried treasure from World War II) show through. The film is extremely grounded, shot rather clinically, and largely structured like any doc about a person learning to cope with a sudden diagnosis, disability or life-altering situation. The only difference is the brazen subjectivity. This is a movie about a very complex personal experience, but framed often with impartiality and presented with subdued tenderness. Ahmed’s Ruben Stone is not an avatar for people who suffer hearing loss, he has very specific anxieties, priorities, and faults that are exacerbated by his growing deafness. And yet it’s this that makes him all the more emblematic of the deaf community in illustrating the innately unique way such a thing effects people on an individualistic level. The movie’s documentary choices emphasize how Ruben is just like everybody else in his situation, he’s not special, while likewise showing us how his story matters.
It’s no surprise, the cause of the hearing loss: we see early on that he plays very loud, very rough music most nights sitting at his drum set quite close to the amplifiers. And it is fairly elaborate drum-work too, that Ahmed learned from scratch for the purposes of this film to acutely convey Ruben’s passion and why it is so devastating a thing for him to have to give up. His disbelief at this and his denial is extremely palpable –one scene where he’s talking with a doctor, it’s clear behind his attempt at a cool demeanour that his world is shattering. And we’re made to understand just how.
One of the films’ obvious but nonetheless impressive technical choices is how it adapts the effects of hearing loss into its auditory language. At significant junctures when we have to be in his point of view, we hear what Ruben hears, and this fluctuates over the course of the movie with the deteriorations and adjustments in his sensitivity. At first, everything is merely muffled, discernible but distant, like having water in ones’ ears; as in an early scene where he has to abruptly walk out of a performance and admits to his girlfriend and bandmate Lou (a wonderful Olivia Cooke) that he can no longer hear what they’re playing. Later in the film, even the muffle is gone, everything is very faint and the world itself seems silent. And then he gets surgical implants, something he has his mind set to from as soon as he’s made aware of his condition, desperately attached to the idea that it could restore his hearing –and its’ sounds upon activation are garbled, noisy, eclectic: intelligible yet distracting and uncomfortable. Only here does Ruben fully realize the permanence of his deafness –he will never hear the way he used to again.
And that’s okay. There’s an educational purpose to Sound of Metal on top of its immersion as it strives to destigmatize hearing loss. Beyond its first act, the film relaxes conventional action and drama for more of a slice-of-life, meditative air –literally, given much of it takes place at a rural commune for people learning to live with their hearing impairment. All of the people in this section of the film, including Paul Raci’s community leader Joe and Lauren Ridloff’s teacher Diane, are deaf performers, and Raci especially is excellent as the calming yet stern authority in Ruben’s new life –exactly what he needs. And as the film follows Rubens’ journey in this environment it keeps true to Joe’s core precept that “deafness is not a handicap.” It doesn’t take long for the warm and welcoming atmosphere of this place to become normal, even softly idyllic; for Ruben to grow and find a home in this community, learning sign language, befriending kids, and it’s all extremely heartwarming. Subtlety may be Marder’s greatest strength, Ahmed’s too, as so much is communicated here with nary a word being spoken. And it has such a wholesome effect on Ruben that it feels like a genuine betrayal when he leaves, in the most quietly devastating scene of the movie between him and Joe.
It cannot be overstated how much Riz Ahmed carries this movie through this immensely intricate odyssey. Ruben is very insular and guarded, a recovering drug addict who at any moment seems liable to relapse. Maybe he knows this, he remains extremely concerned about his work, his girlfriend, and the life he knows to the point of making some rash decisions even at his highest moments of personal growth or enlightenment (nirvana, whatever you want to call it); but every one of them is relatable and genuine. To single out moments would be futile, because Ahmed outdoes himself at every turn, but the ending feels particularly breathtaking –where everything in tandem with his performance (the storytelling, direction, cinematography, sound design) comes together for one moment of perfectly articulated bliss.
But Sound of Metal is a star-making vehicle for its director as much as its’ lead, and I think Darius Marder has earned the right to come out from the shadows of others and embark on a bountiful career. I don’t think anything I’ve seen this year has been as inspiring, and I hope the Academy remembers whenever awards season begins to loom.
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