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Exclusive Interview: Duncan McRae and Jeff Pitts of 'They Will Kill You' · The BSB Podcast

• 0:00
  They will kill you open in theaters earlier this year.
• 0:02
  And today we're talking with Duncan McRae and Jeff Pitts, who served as re-recording mixer and supervising sound editor respectively.
• 0:08
  Thank you two for being here.
• 0:10
  Thank you, Brian.
• 0:10
  Good to be here, mate.
• 0:12
  Before we dive in, obviously possible spoiler warning as we will be talking about they will kill you so you've been warned.
• 0:17
  um If you don't want spoilers, please avoid the rest of this and come back when you've seen it.
• 0:22
  First off, I just want to say congratulations to both of on the release of this film.
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  Duncan, how does it finally feel to have a release to the public?
• 0:28
  It's pretty awesome.
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  It's been really interesting when people ask us, what are you working on?
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  How do you explain it?
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  Well, you're to have to see it to find out.
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  and now we can really talk about it, so it's awesome.
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  Jeff, how does it feel to finally just have it out?
• 0:43
  It's nice to get it out in the wild, man.
• 0:45
  It's great to get your projects out, you you work on them for so long and then to see them go out in the wild is great.
• 0:53
  you know, everybody who's seen it, it seems that they're having really a fun time with it and that feels good.
• 1:01
  I was gonna say the moment I saw this trailer in theaters, and I actually was with my nephew as well, my 17 year old nephew I should say, we were both just like gobsnecked by
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  how cool this movie looked.
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  And it honestly lived up to the hype of the trailer.
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  This is such a cool film that you don't always see nowadays.
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  I feel like that maybe is a bold statement, but it's true that you have not seen a lot of films like this nowadays.
• 1:23
  Yeah, I think, you know, when I read the script, I was super into it.
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  And when the first curveball happened, I was reading the script and I was like, wait, what?
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  Because you're so primed for these plot arcs to happen the way that they normally do.
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  And then when this one shifts it a little bit, it was definitely a very cool thing um for me, just even reading the script, not even watching it.
• 1:49
  So that was great.
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  What was it like when you got your hands on that script and you read it and saw what was going on?
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  By this point,
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  I had seen the enthusiasm in Jeff's face and the way that he talked about this film.
• 2:02
  So, you know, if you can spark Jeff's interest to the level of this film, you're really doing some unique, cool things.
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  And that's a lot.
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  Yeah, yeah, that says a lot.
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  The level of excitement coming from Jeff was very contagious.
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  And I loved every moment of that.
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  Yeah, I fell in love with this movie early on.
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  I know it was very fun to work on.
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  So like when you kind of looking at like the sonic vision of the film, Jeff, where do you kind of begin?
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  Or like, how does it take shape in that early process?
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  So early, obviously we have conversations with the director about, you know, what we want to achieve.
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  And we see, you know, stills from the film and, you know, reading the script and kind of having some understandings of things that you want to achieve.
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  But when you see the actual
• 2:55
  film is kind of when you're going to make those major decisions about what it's going to sound like.
• 3:00
  But we did a lot of work with swords and fight sounds and uh things like this.
• 3:07
  uh the way that the film sounds now is definitely a deliberate choice.
• 3:13
  ah know, Correll made a lot of choices like it's okay to go the anime route.
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  It's okay to do like a really Kung Fu ish kind of thing.
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  But it's also got to sound modern in a lot of ways.
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  So, you know, we've kind of wrapped all these things up and hopefully delivered in a package that people go, oh, you know what?
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  That's cool.
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  I recognize some of this stuff.
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  You know, the concepts of this thing.
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  And I like how it's all kind of jiving together.
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  That that that would be the goal.
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  Absolutely.
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  And Duncan, so when you're coming into the project, what did you kind of see the vision of bringing it together as you're kind of mixing the re-recording?
• 3:56
  By the time I joined the project, um I had already had a number of conversations with Jeff about the intent, the direction, and just the scope of we're going to speak a few
• 4:11
  different languages within the same film.
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  sonic languages.
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  each character fight sequence, for example, feeling differently in its aesthetic and playing in different ways.
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  So we knew that we were going to have a mixed bag of challenges and tools that we needed to use to really accomplish that.
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  And that came with a lot of collaboration.
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  So a lot of talking to each other, a lot of trial and error.
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  lot of good time on the mix stage and getting our hands on it for the first time on the first temp mix was a really cool experience and we really learned how far we were going to
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  go with things.
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  We got a taste of it then and we knew that there was going to be a lot more to come.
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  So it continued to grow, is the beast of a soundtrack.
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  So do you feel like there's specific references, either films or real life, real world sounds that influence kind of the sound palette of They Will Kill You?
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  I would say as far as, um, like, like film choices, I'd say like going back to like the early, you know, seventies Kung Fu stuff.
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  And then, um, you know, we, we did a lot of like recording of swords and things like that.
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  And then, you know, hit letting those, taking those recordings and then, and then recording them back again on tape to get them to, you know, feel more, more in that world.
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  So I would say that definitely we were we were pushing ourselves to get for some of this stuff pushing ourselves to get into that mindset of Well, what would this happen?
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  What would this be like if it was?
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  done Back in the day, you know back in the 70s back in the 80s.
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  How would how would this how would this play out?
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  and I definitely think we That was the goal.
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  So you guys tell us what we did if we achieved it or not
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  I I would say that you have.
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  Yeah, thank you.
• 6:08
  Thank you.
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  But we did want to elevate it some too.
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  know, there's this like, you know, back then they had mono basically, and, uh you know, the recording was very rudimentary.
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  And they did some really cool stuff.
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  Like a lot of the kung fu sounds are just like people's making sounds with their mouths and, and, and sitting there and doing stuff like that.
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  And it's just wild to think about that.
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  That's how they did things.
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  uh
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  So it's cool to try to achieve that stuff.
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  But also, we're working in Atmos, and we have all of this technology available to us.
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  So it's like, how do we respect that and carry it forward, but then let there be some modern imprint that can be on the track as well?
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  Do you feel like that?
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  And, Duncan, I guess I'll start with you.
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  Do you feel like with
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  the improvements in technology such as like Atmos and stuff like that, does that actually make it harder then to almost capture the sound of like the 70s and 80s or does it help to
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  better create that?
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  Well, I think, you know, when it comes to capturing that sound for those elements that we wanted to for sure be like that, we had to literally go back and put them onto tape.
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  We have a lot of tape saturation plugins and things like that, but there's no fun in that.
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  Come on, we got to just send that stuff out and do it proper.
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  You get such a weird noise floor.
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  And I had one tape in the tape deck.
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  And I have a Tascam 4-track.
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  And I'm just recording on, I'm just doing stereo records at the same time.
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  But I kept hitting the exact same section of the tape with recordings.
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  it was like, there's a degradation that happens to that tape when you're using it over and over and over again.
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  That I was like,
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  totally cool with.
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  was like, yep, go back, we're gonna erase and re-record some more stuff right in that exact same spot that this other stuff was at.
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  So yeah, think it helps.
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  And then being able to take that stuff and go, okay, now I have object-based panning and I have all the automation features that we have today.
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  And we have these really uh great high quality other sounds that were recorded exceptionally pristine.
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  and we're mixing all this stuff together.
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  I think it's definitely a very cool process.
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  Technology had no boundaries for us really.
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  We mixed it in Hollywood, in Dolby Atmos, at Formosa Group, theatrically, and there were no limits to that.
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  The technology has been able to open doors to us to do certain things.
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  doesn't necessarily mean we need to take those opportunities every time.
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  It may not be the right thing, but we have the ability to do so.
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  And there were times where we stretched as far as using every possible aspect of Dolby Atmos that we could.
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  And there were other times where it is much more of the right creative decision for a certain moment to not dive into that at all.
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  So we had amazing contrast at our fingertips.
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  You when you're talking about like the contrast and stuff like that, this has a lot of tension this film does, you know, how do you approach kind of building tension if you're
• 9:26
  through sound in this film?
• 9:29
  I would say, you know, like there's a lot of stuff where, you know, like the intro to the film, ah we went.
• 9:37
  like the storm and how big that storm is, was really, you know, guidance from Kirill as to like how big he wanted to push that scene.
• 9:45
  ah So, you know, a lot of these tension moments, he really wanted to have that push.
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  And it was like, okay, so you kind of get a barometer for every director you work with, as to like what their feel is, and where they want to go with things.
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  And so it's like, okay, all right, we can go we can go this far with this one.
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  And I think
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  having that like in the first, I think it was like the first temp mix where we were like just, just cranking it and the producers are coming in like, we gotta, we gotta bring that
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  down.
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  We can't have it be like, and it's like, no, we're gonna crank it.
• 10:19
  And so you learn what the director loves and then you can carry that forward a little bit, you know, so there's other moments in the movie where, you know, we have these really big
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  contrasty moments of tension that would build.
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  Yeah, audience.
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  an audience feeling a visceral reaction to the soundtrack is something that Kirill is as really strong direction and vision on where like, as Jeff was talking about the opening
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  storm provided a real strong sense of like fatigue and then relief.
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  So once you get inside, and then these, these character quirks are being revealed inside that immediately you're you're you're feeling, you know, suspense and it's
• 11:02
  and attention because you know how big we have gone and you're waiting for the next moment to happen like that.
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  And that dynamic range played a huge role in that in this film.
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  What I love about that is uh my day job is a psychologist.
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  So as a psychologist, I'm always kind of looking for things like that of like how you can almost control or direct people through something like mood, like through sound, you like
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  you said, like you have that intense moment, but then when you go to being almost still, you've hooked up, you got them right there on the edge of your seat, you know?
• 11:32
  Yeah, yeah.
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  There's a couple of contrasty moments like that throughout the film.
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  And, you know, we've talked about this where, you know, in the final fight scene, we kind of wanted to bring all these different elements that we had, or all these concepts that we
• 11:45
  had all together in this one fight.
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  you know, between, you know, once the pig head is on Patricia's character and is charging at Asia.
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  It's like that moment is huge, right?
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  It's like a giant lumbering creature is just charging you.
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  And like the intuition thing to do is to then have the next sequence, is, ah you know, it's swinging its sword and it's fighting you to be huge.
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  And we went the opposite.
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  We made it mono and we EQ'd all the sounds and made them really small.
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  And even the score, we brought the score in mono and EQ'd that really small and let it...
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  let it almost like have that homage to those early films that had to be in mono, you know?
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  And let it breathe like that just for a beat and then it comes back in again, you know?
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  Patricia kicks and then there's huge tentacles flying everywhere and all this stuff and all that happens.
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  And it's just, you know, it's all about the tension and release.
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  Absolutely.
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  What was perhaps the most difficult scene to get right?
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  And why did it feel like maybe that was a hard one to kind of find that balance?
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  um In editorial the hardest scene was um the pig everything else kind of clicked together really easily The the pig though because we we changed how that pig acted through temps so
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  It was a question like hey, is it is it a funny pig?
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  Is it you know, is it super mean is it?
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  um
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  Like how many jokes does it crack while it's talking?
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  You know, it's like that piece that set piece is all, you know, CGI.
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  So they can kind of go go anywhere with it.
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  um So that that that took the longest, honestly, to get right.
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  And it was really not that something was wrong.
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  It was just like we have to like find the right um the right voice for this character.
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  from the film and make sure that that's correct.
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  And that took the longest time in editorial.
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  Duncan, what about mix?
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  was it?
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  Mixing, each scene really had its different challenges where we're dealing with powerful fight sequences with bold music a lot of the time.
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  A really cool element of this track to mix was just really the character of the hotel itself where ah
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  at the moment where they're breaking into Asia's room and she's trying to find a way out.
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  And we have music that's increasing and building as we go.
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  So tensions rising there, the banging on the walls behind to try and break in.
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  And a really key story point is that there's a hollow escape hatch in the floor that she discovers and allowing each of those wooden banging elements, the right range to sit in.
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  directionality and real clear separation so that we know who was banging, what happened when, at what time, and from which wall were they.
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  That was a really cool use of Atmos as well, because we're just spreading things around and without trying to make things cluttered, they were clear in the end.
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  So that was a lot of fun too.
• 15:17
  That could have been really complicated to get.
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  It was.
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  really complicated, but you have the banging and all of this and you had to tell the story that she found a hollow section of the floor.
• 15:28
  You know, it's like, you're like walking a tightrope to get that to work.
• 15:33
  yeah.
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  There's a lot of moving pieces and everything has to go off perfectly.
• 15:38
  Yeah.
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  It doesn't make sense.
• 15:42
  Duncan, how do you use mix then to guide an audience's attention within a scene?
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  There's a lot of uh
• 15:51
  wouldn't necessarily say tricks, but the same kind of elements that a maybe a magician uses where they say, I know you're looking over here, but this is happening behind you in
• 16:00
  different ways.
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  So um we are sometimes telling the story through sound in ways that may be off screen or ahead of time to trigger an audience's reaction to think like, oh, that's coming from over
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  there.
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  then camera follows suit to follow.
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  what were we telling the story of reveal that and there were a lot of opportunities like that in this film and.
• 16:29
  Yeah, absolutely.
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  And so when do you feel, guess, feel like a mix is finished for you?
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  Like, when do you feel like, like, when can you finally like, okay, I'm feeling good about that?
• 16:38
  Does it ever happen?
• 16:40
  When they kick us out.
• 16:41
  Okay, so there's always kind of fine tuning going on.
• 16:45
  There's always, we always feel like there are ways that we can continue to be, you know, creative and elevate things.
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  And there's always the one, a few things that got away, but there is also a lot to be said for
• 16:57
  do a couple of passes on something and walk away for a while.
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  Work on something else or go take a walk, clear your head, come back and look at it and think, you know what, that probably is the best version of it or I had it better a few
• 17:10
  passes ago, let's revert back to what we had or you reveal to yourself when you have separation from the project for a while.
• 17:18
  And that's especially true when you're talking about, you know, when we're working on these really big
• 17:24
  set pieces and these really big scenes and they're really loud, Duncan will come over and just dim the room and we'll work and get things in place.
• 17:33
  Then we'll pop it back up.
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  And when I say dim, mean, it makes the volume of the room a little bit lower, but it's not muted or anything.
• 17:41
  And so when that happens, it helps you with the contrast of things because you can work on
• 17:51
  different elements without having to worry about like blowing your brain out or if things are so loud that you start to lose ah that connection to it in the way of like, we have to
• 18:02
  make it louder now because like we've been sitting in this room for 30 minutes and all we've been doing is listening to this super loud stuff.
• 18:08
  uh By taking a break from it or switching over to some other thing or hitting dim, ah it gives you that ability to keep things.
• 18:19
  in its space and know the reference that you want to hit of it.
• 18:24
  mean, that's also an awesome way to kind of reset, know, refocus.
• 18:28
  Sometimes you do, if you're in it too much and you're too close to it for that moment, it's hard to kind of separate yourself to be like, am I achieving what I want to achieve
• 18:35
  here?
• 18:37
  Yeah.
• 18:38
  Jeff, so how do you feel like maybe working on They Will Kill You differs from some of your previous projects?
• 18:42
  Um, you know, every project is, is unique.
• 18:46
  And that's one of my, one of the joys I have of working on film is that, you know, everything has its own challenges.
• 18:54
  Um, you know, the, specific challenges is on this film, you know, recording the different things I had to record for it.
• 19:02
  Um, you know, learning, um, how to, I have frequency shifters and I have lots of them, but like,
• 19:10
  how to create anime sounds, which is something I've really explored before in any of my work.
• 19:17
  I never had to do that before.
• 19:19
  And I thought that was really fun.
• 19:23
  Using the tape deck that I had bought years ago and be like, oh yeah, okay, cool.
• 19:27
  And when I was reading the script, there was the fire ax scene.
• 19:31
  And at my house, have this 350,000 BTU fire pit.
• 19:39
  Sure.
• 19:40
  And I was reading that, was like, oh, great, perfect.
• 19:42
  I get to record the fire pit now, finally.
• 19:45
  And so I like, it's a crazy fire pit.
• 19:48
  Like when it's on, you hear all the forced air, right?
• 19:51
  Like the gas is like, you hear that and the flame.
• 19:54
  But when you turn it off, there's so much gas in the line that it's like, there's like no forced gas sound at all.
• 20:02
  So it's just these huge flame wicks and belches of flame and stuff.
• 20:07
  And, um,
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  So I went out and like at 2 30 in the morning and like recorded the fire pit with like four different microphones.
• 20:14
  And it was like me.
• 20:16
  It was just, but I live in Santa Clarita and it's like just really nice and quiet out here.
• 20:21
  And it's like, it's like me.
• 20:23
  And then like I recorded for like, I don't know, like two hours or something like that.
• 20:28
  And then like towards the end, I was like, there's an owl out here.
• 20:31
  could hear an owl cause I'm on the headphones and it's like,
• 20:34
  I didn't even know an owl existed out here.
• 20:37
  Here I am like out here and I hear it hooting in the headphones.
• 20:42
  So, but it was, mean, it was super, you know, it gets super quiet, you know, even though I'm outside, it's not like being in the city where it's just going to be constant drum.
• 20:51
  Um, that was super fun.
• 20:55
  I had that sound in my head because I, I live with it and I didn't have a project for it.
• 21:01
  But then like this project happened and I was like, okay, great.
• 21:04
  This is awesome.
• 21:05
  Do you have lots of sounds like that that you like as you're picking up going through life, you're like, eventually I could use this for something.
• 21:11
  Yeah.
• 21:11
  Yeah.
• 21:13
  That's a lot of things like that, that you, you know, you kind of put it in the Rolodex of, you know, sound ideas that you're going to have.
• 21:22
  That's so cool.
• 21:23
  And Duncan, how about for you?
• 21:24
  of your previous projects?
• 21:28
  Just when you think you've faced every sonic challenge of fitting the jigsaw pieces together, you get another one comes along and they will kill you, gives you a lot more to
• 21:42
  play with.
• 21:42
  So we're fitting all these individually created or recorded sounds together is one thing, but we need to play that and mix that up against huge dialogue.
• 21:56
  Dialogue processing on this one was massive and really impressive.
• 22:00
  So we need to fit organically with that.
• 22:03
  And then on top of that, we're adding in different kinds of music, different genres, different layering in that regard.
• 22:10
  So it is a real sonic jigsaw puzzle to fit in and hit powerfully when we need to against huge other elements or fit subtly when we have to be in a smaller scale.
• 22:26
  but yet we need to be small against gigantic electronic music or something like that.
• 22:31
  So that's a real dance and a fun challenge.
• 22:35
  That's so cool.
• 22:36
  I I love a puzzle, but like that seems like an extravagant puzzle to put all the pieces together and to find it.
• 22:41
  I mean, that's brilliant.
• 22:43
  That's totally awesome.
• 22:44
  And it has to feel really accomplished when finally all the pieces come together and it feels like it's right there.
• 22:50
  Absolutely.
• 22:51
  Well, thank you both for being here today.
• 22:52
  It's been such a pleasure chatting with you about they will kill you.
• 22:55
  So thank you for being here.