Fasten Your Seatbelts and Prick Up Your Ears: The Dramatic Human Voice in Film

Abstract

your seatbelts, going to be a bumpy night! This is one of Bette Davis's finest lines of dialogue, from Joseph L. Mankiewicz's film All About Eve (1950). It is a line delivered by Davis with relish, style and supreme confidence. Her voice is firm and steady, sustaining a deep throaty resonance, husky (not quite croaky), suggestive of weariness, even cynicism. This is the voice of experience. The statement itself comes in two parts. The first advises caution and the second delivers a threat. Consequently, the first part is made up of three relatively long words, producing soft sounds with drawn-out vowels and fricative consonants (f, s), pronounced with a slight drawl and a snide inflection. Fasten becomes festen, the mangled, distorted vowel striking an off note, whilst the sibilance at the end of seatbelts produces a hiss, suggestive of a venomous snake. It is all just a little bit twisted, whereas the second part of the line is decidedly bitter. The tone is altogether harsher, the pronunciation more emphatic. Each word of it's going to be a bumpy night! is articulated with precision. It produces a more fragmented sound with a jerky (or bumpy) rhythm. Here Davis uses her trademark clipped pronunciation, her upper class New England accent lending her an air of superiority and sophistication. Each word is struck solidly and sharply, with shorter vowels and emphatic consonants, including labials (b, p) nasals (m, n) and a dramatic stop at the end (t or t!). The overall effect of this line is a slow sustained build (creating tension), answered by a dramatic pause (for suspense), and then swiftly followed by a staccato rhythm, punchy and percussive. When the threat is delivered it is rather like being repeatedly poked in the ear, the final emphatic t replicating a resounding sharp flick of a finger against the ear. Ouch! It is a magical movie moment: compelling and fascinating; totally unrealistic, totally theatrical, yet totally convincing. Whatever feeling of awkwardness might be caused by the sheer artifice (or, better still, phoniness) of this dialogue is swept away by Davis's commanding performance, her command of body and voice, her conviction in what she is saying and her ability to say it with style. It might not be naturalism but it is credible, pleasurable and most certainly dramatic. As such, it represents simultaneously one of the high points of the movie, of Bette Davis's film career and of classical Hollywood cinema. The ability to deliver a line such as this, in this way and with this affect, marks Davis out as a consummate screen performer: her vocal technique being as polished and pronounced as her physical gestures, bodily movements and facial expressions. All of these are artfully combined to make the line work.