Sound design for "the rule of Jenny Pen" #4 the puppet

A series of posts on the sound design for “The Rule of Jenny Pen” (4 of 5).

James preferred a less-is-more approach to sound design for the puppet. The film is psychological, not supernatural; making it into Chucky would have been counter-productive.

As such, the foley team did a lot of the heavy lifting for the puppet’s eerie presence. The knocks on the poor old lady’s head are just a little too hard to be comfortable; the creepy shuffling of the hands as it climbs across the residents’ bodies says more than any amount of ‘spooky tones’ ever could; the uncomfortably close cavity sound as the puppet inspects their mouths lends a grotesque cruelty to it.

As such, this was a perfect illustration (to the sound effects team) of the concept that: "sometimes the best thing you can do is to shut up”. Hard as it was for us sound designers and effects editors to step back and mute our work, by letting the foley speak, we came to agree that doing this was some of our best work!

In terms of the puppet, sound-fx-and-design-proper was very subtly and gradually introduced into the soundtrack. As Stefan’s nightmare deepens, he begins to hear the presence of the puppet permeating his sleep and dreams. Via antagonist Crealy (John Lithgow), it prowls the corridors late at night, terrorising the residents in their rooms; the warping bleeps of their doors unlocking echoing down the corridors. As the puppet grows larger in Stefan's consciousness, its presence swells onscreen, becoming larger and heavier, occupying too much space in his tortured mind.

This was the time where sound and music joined forces to overtly introduce heavy, dissonant tones and rumbles, all inspired by (in the case of fx) the rumbling and groaning of the various parts of the building itself. With Lithgow’s swirling dialogue and the perfectly weighted picture editorial, the puppet became something much more horrific than a hand puppet has any right being.