accompanied by the equally memorable music from
the second movement of Franz Schubert’s Trio no. 2
in E-flat Major (D. 929, op. 100) for violin, cello, and
piano, the instrumentalists are nowhere to be seen;
furthermore, we do not expect to see them. We
accept, as a familiar convention, that this kind of
music reflects the historical period being depicted
but does not emanate from the world of the story.
Nondiegetic music is used comically in Alfred
Hitchcock’s North by Northwest (1959; sound:
Franklin Milton; music: Bernard Herrmann) when
we see Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) and Eve
Kendall (Eva Marie Saint) climbing across the pres-
idential faces sculpted on Mount Rushmore and hear
Bernard Herrmann’s fandango score, music that is
not only nondiegetic but also completely absurd
given the danger facing these two characters.
The standard conventions of diegetic and
nondiegetic sound may be modified for other
effects. In Bobby and Peter Farrelly’s There’s Some-
thing about Mary(1998; supervising sound editor:
Michael J. Benavente), for example, the “chorus”
troubadour, Jonathan (Jonathan Richman), exists
outside the story, which makes him and his songs
nondiegetic even though we can see him. The Far-
rellys play with this concept by having Jonathan
get shot accidentally in the climactic scene and
thus become part of the story.On-screen versus Offscreen
On-screen soundemanates from a source that we
can see. Offscreen sound, which can be either
diegetic or nondiegetic, derives from a source that
we do not see. When offscreen sound is diegetic, it
consists of sound effects, music, or vocals that
emanate from the world of the story. When
nondiegetic, it takes the form of a musical score or
narration by someone who is not a character in the
story. Note that on-screen and offscreen sound are
also referred to, respectively, as simultaneous and
nonsimultaneous sound. Simultaneous soundis
diegetic and on-screen; nonsimultaneous sound
occurs familiarly when a character has a mental
flashback to an earlier voice that recalls a conver-
sation or a sound that identifies a place. We recog-
nize the sound too because its identity has
previously been established in the movie.
Somewhere between on-screen and offscreen
sound is asynchronous sound. We are aware of it
when we sense a discrepancy between the things
heard and the things seen on the screen. It is either
a sound that is closely related to the action but not
precisely synchronized with it or a sound that either
anticipates or follows the action to which it belongs.21Incongruous nondiegetic sound emphasizes an
incongruous sceneInappropriate and out-of-place things
are responsible for much of the comedy in Alfred Hitchcock’s
extremely lighthearted thriller North by Northwest(1959;
sound: Franklin Milton). Mount Rushmore provides one of
the movie’s most incongruous——and therefore comic——
settings as the expensively dressed and perfectly coiffed Eve
Kendall (Eva Marie Saint) and Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant)
attempt to escape their pursuer and defy death by climbing
all over the national monument. Bernard Herrmann, who
wrote scores for seven Hitchcock films and is considered the
quintessential Hitchcock composer, uses lively Spanish
dance music here. (The same music provides the “Overture”
under Saul Bass’s title sequence.) Perfectly irrational in this
setting, the music seems to come from some other world
entirely, signaling that the situation’s improbability is part
of the fun.
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