The History of Sound

The History of Sound is a quiet, deliberately paced film about missed chances and unresolved lives. Directed by Oliver Hermanus and adapted by Ben Shattuck from his short stories The History of Sound and Origin Stories, the film traces one man’s journey through music, memory and emotional restraint. The story opens in rural Kentucky in 1910, where Lionel Worthing (Paul Mescal) grows up on a farm dutifully following in his family’s commitment to physical labour, finding release through song. “It never occurred to me that music was only sound,” Lionel reflects, a line that establishes music as something far larger than art. It is also a means of survival, a repository of memory, and conduit for connection. When a local teacher recognises his singing ability and helps him secure a scholarship to the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, the opportunity briefly lifts Lionel out of a dead-end life.