Last updated on June 9, 2025
A film by Oliver Hermanus
With: Paul Mescal, Josh O’Connor, Molly Price, Alison Bartlett, Michael Schantz, Chris Cooper, Raphael Sbarge, Hadley Robinson, Peter Mark Kendall, Emma Canning
Two young men during World War I set out to record the lives, voices and music of their American countrymen.
Our rate: (*)
This curiosity by Olivier Hermanus was intriguing enough to be selected for the official selection at Cannes 2025. However, it seems that the film was chosen more to tick a few boxes than for its cinematic uniqueness. Overall, The History of Sound is unconvincing, irritating us with its constant silences, its falsely soothing tone, its supposedly sensitive perspective, its insipid and overly meaningful dialogue (isn’t the primary function of cinema to convey meaning through images?), and its unremarkable subject matter. The slow narrative pace is reminiscent of Ang Lee‘s Brokeback Mountain, but without any real secret other than a relationship to music (in this case, the quest for folk songs, perfect pitch extended to a concept that would summon the other senses in listening to music). The romance doesn’t take hold, as Hermanus films the field, disregarding the reverse angle, choosing ultra-linearity and a direct relationship with the viewer. He tells us a story, a romantic journey that leaves room for eternal regret. It’s a very unpassionate romance, not to say extremely cold (and ordinary).
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