Thurs Mar 7 — 1:30 pm

1hr 37min
Documentary

Preceded by:

Listen

Getting us in the mood to listen, Cuore Piano Trio will perform prior to 32 Sounds.

32 Sounds is the greatest documentary you’ve ever heard. Sam Green’s free-form look at how sound shapes our perceptions of the world and triggers sense memories will completely change the way you listen — to art, the movies and life. Why only 32? The filmmaker was inspired by the 1993 hybrid film Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould, directed by François Girard, which had in turn been inspired by Bach’s Goldberg Variations, a signature piece for pianist Gould which itself consists of 32 pieces of music when played in its entirety. Green’s movie is all about audio—how we hear it, why it moves us, the different ways in which it can be heard.

Full to bursting with humour, emotion and curiosity, it’s a uniquely mind-expanding plunge into a dimension of the human experience so many of us take for granted, a rare and rewarding sonic journey with the potential to enrich our lives. Occasionally, Green will ask you to close your eyes, the better to hear something; he’ll let whatever audio he’s picked play over a blank screen as a back-up plan. You don’t have to shut off your other senses. He just wants you to give priority to your ears for 90-plus minutes.

32 Sounds is Green’s attempt to chart what sound means to us — how it shapes our perceptions, what it stimulates in our memories, the way it can bridge the gap between the past and the present. But more than anything, Green and his collaborator, Le Tigre’s multi-instrumentalist JD Samson, want to give you something immersive, that forces you to rethink something many of us take for granted on a daily basis.