Monday, November 13, 2017

Howard Dean Scream








Every day, and in every way, I am learning more and more about things that are of no use to me whatsoever. I learn most of it from that torrent of misinformation, the internet, and from YouTube in particular, just cuz it's such a great source of distraction.

I stumbled across the Howard Dean scream some time ago - I didn't even know who he was, and am still not sure, but that sound he made was enough to end his political career. But then I became aware of the Wilhelm Scream. A character in a Western (presumably named Wilhelm) from some time in the 1950s was shot, and gave off this sound, this highly-unlikely, high-pitched, strangled male scream, not unlike the squeal of an injured dog. Sound technicians across Hollywood must be in a special sort of union, because the Wilhelm Scream has been dubbed into countless other movies, and is still being used today as a sort of sly auditory in-joke.

But my theory is that Howard Dean somehow got rigged up to the wrong sound equipment, so that a  Wilhelm Scream issued involuntarily out of his own capacious, seemingly-sincere, highly political mouth.

Sounds a bit like a rebel yell to me, but being a Canadian, how would I ever know?