[finder83]

I would buy your argument if it were true that the sound wasn't muffled and unintelligible in theaters. But that's not the case. The recent Nolan films are almost as unintelligable in theaters as they are on a stereo home system, even on IMAX.

Nolan himself has tried to make this argument, he's trying to invoke sub-bass frequencies, that his goal was never for movies to be understandable, and that it was an artistic choice that maybe the audience doesn't have to understand everything.

I'm all for artistic integrity and him being able to do whatever he wants, but I'm also ok with calling Nolan wrong on this one. I have no interest in seeing his films if audio clarity is not one of his goals in film-making. It breaks immersion (real life isn't unintelligible and mumbled), it isn't an enjoyable experience for me, and frankly I think is poor decision making on his part. I'm ok with calling Nolan wrong, hand-wavy artistic stuff aside.

[psychphysic]

You make a good point. I found Tennet to be easy to hear but I know there were meme reviews about it being too quiet.

So I looked one up

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/sep/03/tenet-dialogue-...

Interestingly in the case of Tenet the claim is that cinemas intentionally were playing the movie too quiet.

It brings up the usual issues of audio mixing and cinema and home is vastly different. But puts Tenet down to cinemas turning it down to avoid loud explosions.

So is this a case of cinemas turning down well mixed movies because movies are coming out too loud?

But really this is just the same problem over again. Sound engineer mixes audio intending for a high end cinema. Some cinemas plays it poorly, people watching at home have no chance to play it properly...

[finder83]

Sure, that may be the case that they turned it down. It seemed to be a widespread issue though across a lot of reviewers and opinions.

The sound engineer interviews in that article are interesting though, and they seem to be blaming Nolan and the mixing as well.

I also get wanting to turn them down. I've been in theaters so loud that my ears were ringing after the movie, or were actively hurting during certain scenes. The Dark Knight was one of those. It could also just be poor settings at the local cinema in that case as well though.

Given the vast majority of movies are understandable, I just wish Nolan would mix with that goal in mind given I would actually enjoy his movies most of the time if it just weren't for the muffled speech and sound.