Further Thoughts on Sound of Metal

I had some additional thoughts I wanted to write up on a few of the Best Picture nominees from this past year. I meant to do it shortly after the ceremony, but I got distracted by all the non-Oscar-related subjects I hadn’t been writing about during the run-up to the awards. So, I’m back now, digging a little deeper into Sound of Metal beyond the scope of my original review. In particular, I want to explore some of the facets of the film’s depiction of Deafness (spoilers.)

I won’t get into my full spiel on hearing actors playing Deaf characters again, so just a quick summary: 1) I get why Riz Ahmed was cast as Ruben, and I did think he was very good in the role, though I maintain that a hard-of-hearing or late-deafened actor definitely could have performed that part, and 2) there was absolutely no reason that Paul Raci should’ve been playing Joe. (Side note: at the Oscars, there was a comment about how much Paul Raci “taught us all” about Deaf/hard-of-hearing inclusion that made me want to scream.) Rather, I’m going to focus more on the film itself, the story.

As I said in my review, there are a lot of things, both large and small, that the film does really well in bringing hearing viewers into the Deaf world. Its Oscar for Best Sound was incredibly well-deserved. There’s a scene early in the film of Ruben going about his ordinary morning routine, and all the little sounds of him bustling around his trailer turn into its own miniature symphony, which then of course gets flipped on its head when he goes through the same routine after his hearing loss and everything sounds fuzzy and dampened. I appreciate that the film depicts the nuance that Ruben’s Deafness doesn’t mean “Ruben’s world is now completely silent.” There are these faraway, underwater-esque distorted noises that he hears, which maybe causes even more frustration than not being able to hear at all, since he’s straining to listen but can’t make sense of what he’s hearing. Similarly, the film does really well in showing what having a Cochlear implant “sounds” like. So many hearing people think of it as a miracle cure, but the way sound is processed through an implant isn’t the way it’s processed through a human cochlea. In the film, this is obviously Ruben’s very rude awakening, spending tens of thousands of dollars on metallic-sounding “hearing” that’s a far cry from what he used to have. The film also shows how an implant works best having face-to-face conversations in a quiet environment. When Ruben is out walking on the street, or later, at Lou’s dad’s party, he’s disoriented by the confused jumble of noise all around him and he can’t follow what people are saying. I really felt for him as he retreated into the background of the party, slowly coming to grips with the fact that his implants will never be a ticket back into the world as he experienced it before his hearing loss.

Then there’s the plethora of day-to-day aspects of Deaf life incorporated into the narrative. I appreciate seeing the various assistive devices employed at the Deaf/hard-of-hearing sober house, such as Joe using transcriber software to caption his words when he and Ruben first meet, and Ruben later uses a captioned phone (if I recall correctly, we don’t see anyone making calls on a video phone or using a video relay services to make calls through an interpreter.) And on a much more basic level, there are all the little things that Deaf people do to make life more accessible to them, like flashing the overhead lights on or off or pounding a table to get someone’s attention. The meal table at the sober house doesn’t feature any spoken communication, but much like Ruben’s hearing, it too is far from silent – the residents’ signed conversations around the table are exuberant and boisterous, punctuated by the sounds of hands impacting in emphatic signs and the noises of their cutlery clanging and chairs scraping. We see how much value the community places on their school, in raising Deaf/hard-of-hearing children who are well-informed and sure of themselves, and how they prize their language and recognize the honor of having a part in teaching it to the younger generation.

However, while watching the film, I was really bothered by Ruben’s lack of equal communication access early on. During his time at the sober house and among the Deaf community, he comes along well in learning ASL, but when he first arrives, he’s both bewildered and overwhelmed. He can’t understand what these Deaf people are signing any more than he can hear what Lou or other hearing people are saying. And there are times when his communication access is taken into account – like I said, Joe initially communicates with Ruben through transcription software, and there’s a scene where another resident types on an open Word document to give Ruben a quick one-line summary of what Joe is addressing the group about. But until he gets to the point where he can communicate well in ASL, his equal communication access is pretty lacking.

It’s most egregious during Ruben’s first NA meeting at the sober house. When Joe asks Ruben to introduce himself, Joe reads Ruben’s lips to interpret his spoken words for the rest of the group, but then the rest of the meeting proceeds in ASL, which Ruben doesn’t know yet. And look, I get that part of the reason Ruben is there is to be immersed in the Deaf community and start to learn how to function as a Deaf person. But he’s also there as an addict during an emotionally-volatile time in which he needs the support of the program. What’s he going to get out of that meeting if he doesn’t know what anyone is signing? His sponsor specifically researched and sought out this program for him, realizing that it wouldn’t do Ruben any good to someplace where everyone was speaking and he wouldn’t be able to hear them – but how is this any different? There should have been a live captioner there, probably working in tandem with an interpreter (the interpreter voices what the participants are signing, and the captioner types out that interpretation in English for Ruben to read.) Given how vital communication access is within the Deaf community, it feels like a massive oversight for them to neglect his communication needs like that.

Sound of Metal (2019, R)

On my third Best Picture nominee, doing pretty well. This film has a lot going for it, but it also has a major demerit that makes it hard for me to like it as much as I otherwise might have. That being said, it’s a strong story well-told.

Ruben is a heavy metal drummer, touring across the country with his girlfriend/music partner Lou. Their plans are thrown for a loop when Ruben suddenly experiences a severe hearing loss. In the wake of such a major upheaval in his life, Lou worries about Ruben’s sobriety and reaches out to his sponsor, who finds a Deaf/hard-of-hearing rehab to get Ruben plugged into. Ruben is immediately focused on solutions, thinking about how he can scrape together the cash for Cochlear implants, and so he initially resists the community around him and the possibility of what it means to be Deaf.

Before anything else, we need to address this: from what I can tell, all the Deaf characters in this film are played by Deaf actors… with the exception of the two who got nominated for Oscars. I can pretty much understand Riz Ahmed as Ruben, since the whole point is that he’s playing someone who’s only just lost his hearing and is still very much in a hearing mindset. However, 1) that continues the Hollywood trend of mostly just wanting to explore disability as a crisis point, the moment of become disabled and the fallout therein. And 2), I hesitate to say that Ruben had to be played by a hearing actor. Given the fact that a Deaf person won Dancing with the Stars, who am I to say what a hard-of-hearing actor could’ve done in the role?

And regardless, you can’t argue an excuse for Paul Raci as Joe, a late-Deafened Vietnam vet who runs the rehab and serves as Ruben’s mentor. It’s nice that Raci is a CODA (a hearing Child Of Deaf Adults) who signs well, and I get that Joe is supposed to speak fluently and serve as kind of a go-between for Ruben in his early days in the program. But again, why couldn’t a hard-of-hearing or late-Deafened actor play this? There’s no reason, and it’s shady that a movie about exploring the richness and value of the Deaf community places hearing actors in both of the most prominent Deaf roles.

Okay, soap box moment accomplished, onto the rest of the movie. Even if the premise is kind of been-there-done-that as far as disability narratives are concerned, it’s a well-crafted story within that, and the film also scored a Best Original Screenplay nod. Ruben and Lou are both really well-drawn characters, and their flaws and personal damage come through loud and clear individually and in their relationship with one another; we see how they care for and protect one another, but also how they get in too deep with one another at times instead of focusing on their immediate problems. Ruben is a very likeable character who’s fairly screwed up and makes a lot of mistakes. It’s interesting to see how much he tries to deal with on his own, how much he resists letting people in and forges ahead as if he can make himself hear again through sheer force of will. Through his situation, we also see how isolating it can be to be without language access. In the early days of his experience, he’s alone on both the hearing and Deaf sides of the spectrum. Lou loves him and only wants to help him, but he has to constantly remind her to write down what she’s saying so he can understand her, and the bustling, vibrant Deaf recovery community is brimming with chatter in a language that he doesn’t know yet.

The dive into the Deaf community, hearing actors aside, is lovely. So many touchstones of that culture are present: the vital importance of schools, little things like flashing the lights or banging the table to get someone’s attention, accessibility tools like transcription software or telecommunications, Deaf games (I remember playing Elephant in college during interpreting classes,) and the debate over Cochlear implants, along with a depiction of what implants are really like and how they work. We also get heavily into the medical vs. cultural models of Deafness.

I will say that Riz Ahmed does an excellent job as Ruben, and I get why he’s up for Best Leading Actor. I appreciate that the character work is front and center at least as much as the whole “playing Deaf” aspect, with Ahmed depicting Ruben’s tumultuous inner life really well. He does well with his ASL, and his progression of signing is realistic for someone in Ruben’s situation. Personally, I’m less convinced of Paul Raci’s Best Supporting Actor nomination. Not that he isn’t good, but I feel like his nomination is more reflective of the “playing Deaf” thing, and I’m still admittedly salty about his casting. Most of the Deaf characters played by Deaf actors have much smaller, less-defined roles, but I did recognize Lauren Ridloff as a teacher at the Deaf school. She broke onto the scene a few years ago in the Broadway revival of Children of a Lesser God, and I’m super pumped to see her as Marvel’s first superhero with a disability when Eternals comes out.

Warnings

Language, smoking, drug/drinking references, sexual references, and strong thematic elements (including references to suicide and self-harm.)