Song to Song: Ghost Rhythms and Memory-Making in Terence Davies’ Distant Voices, Still Lives

The article deals with Davies’ film that is a pared-down autobiographical account of his own family, and set in working-class Liverpool from the mid-1940s to the early 1950s. It takes much of its meaning from some of the popular songs of the period. More than merely pack his soundtrack with familiar studio recordings, however (though these are included too), Davies focuses a great deal of energy on those sequences in which in-film characters—and cast members—recite such songs unaccompanied by music, as part of a celebratory gathering in either the family home or a public house.

The integral version of this article can be found in the printed KINO!