Synchronization and Title Sequences

5Songs and Voice-Over

Synchronization of language—in the various forms of title song and voice-over narration—adds lexical connotations to the synchronization created by the sound::image statement. Quite apart from ‘lip-sync,’ the use of verbal language complicates the semiotics of sound::image synchronization, especially in the development and organization of title sequences. In synchronizing text-to-speech, this ideological content is explicit. In the uncredited title sequence for The Big Broadcast of 1937 (Paramount, 1936) (Figure 5.1), the statements created through this linkage demonstrate how the connotative meanings associated with language entangle the relationship of illustrative and naturalistic synchronization precisely as described ...