In This Debate, Actions Speak Louder Than Words

If ever there were an aptly titled film, it’s “Sound and Fury” (with apologies to William Faulkner). Seldom have audiences been treated to such a raw demonstration of invective between family members as in this film. And it has the added benefit of being true.

“You have a new relationship with the hair on the back of your head,” says the film’s director, Josh Aronson. “In the fight at the afternoon barbecue, where Marian and Peter go at it, what we have [on film] is 10 minutes, but the fight went on for 45 minutes. It was just amazing. I remember feeling, ‘Oh, my God, we’re shooting something that’s so real, so powerful.’”

The subject of “Sound and Fury,” which airs tonight at 9 on PBS stations KCET and KVCR, might not seem incendiary. The documentary, which was nominated last year for an Academy Award, examines the controversy raging in the deaf community over the cochlear implant, which enables deaf people to hear. A good thing, yes?

Some deaf people are not so sure; other interested parties, primarily the hearing, find this attitude bewildering, even appalling. Perhaps the dispute would have remained as arcane as it appears (at least to those with no stake in the issue) had Aronson and producer Roger Weisberg not had the good fortune to find a family on Long Island, the Artinians, that passionately embodies both sides of the argument.

In one corner is Peter Artinian, who, along with his wife and three children, is deaf. When his youngest daughter, Heather, wants an implant, he initially entertains the idea but increasingly becomes resistant to it. In the other corner is Peter’s hearing brother, Chris, who fathers a child who is deaf. When he decides to get this child an implant, the battle is joined.

Kibitzing from the sidelines are Peter and Chris’ opinionated (and not at all conflicted) hearing mother, Marian; Peter’s wife, Nita, who at first wanted an implant herself; Chris’ hearing wife, Mari, whose parents are deaf; and assorted members of the deaf community.

One of Peter’s objections is that the implant is invasive, requiring a half-inch penetration of the cochlea. Normally, only one ear is implanted; the other is left alone to accommodate technological advances. According to Aronson, of the 2 million profoundly deaf people in this country, 18,000--mostly children--have received the implant (it doesn’t work so well on adults who’ve been deaf all their lives). He compares the hazards of the procedure to a tonsillectomy, although Peter has doubts about its safety and the morality of subjecting a child to it without advocates understanding what it’s like to be deaf.

So there is fear in the deaf community, fear of the procedure and also, perhaps more to the point, fear of losing their children to the hearing world. Heather would go to a hearing school and develop hearing friends, to the exclusion of her family. The movie provides a fascinating glimpse of the world she might give up, a world unto itself, complete with its own language, American Sign Language, used by about 400,000 people (the rest of the profoundly deaf lip-read and speak). In fact, as Peter and others in the deaf community make clear, they feel that their culture is in many ways richer than that of the hearing world. And, like any minority, they are afraid that the mainstreaming of its members would destroy that culture.

As compelling as these arguments are, it’s hard for a hearing person to agree that the sanctity of the family and the preservation of a culture are worth the price, especially when Marian notes that deaf children are often developmentally behind hearing children. Consequently, their employment and economic prospects are dimmer. Is Peter really looking out for Heather’s best interests, or his own? To his way of thinking, Heather won’t miss what she never knew, and she’ll be amply compensated for this deficiency by the deaf community, some of whom don’t consider deafness a deficiency anyway.

Ultimately, as in all arguments, the winner is the person with the last word. The filmmakers were mindful of that.

“The intent was always to be absolutely balanced, to walk the line between the two and let both sides have their voice,” Aronson says. “For instance, that moment when both Marian and her husband more or less accuse Peter of being abusive and the audience is feeling, ‘Sure, this is a ridiculous thing to do,’ we cut to Marian at the end in tears saying, ‘I’m just trying to get him beyond his fear.’”

“We had to go back to the dailies to find something equally strong for Peter to come back with because we felt we were tipping our hand in Marian’s favor,” Weisberg says.

These balancing acts were not the only thing found in the editing room--the whole documentary was. Originally, the filmmakers intended to profile five people who represented the conflict (both sides were initially wary). Some of these stories were extraordinary, like the cochlear implant recipient who had the process reversed and the lawyer who’d deceived her fiance and law partners into believing she could hear (she was an artful lip reader). Then they found the Artinians. The family’s saga began to make the other subjects seem dramatically inert.

“We didn’t realize that at first,” Weisberg says. “We held on to the notion that, OK, we found a great family and there’s a drama here and we’ll weave them with these other subjects. The other subjects had life experiences and opinions that could help inform this story. But as we got further into the editing process, the other subjects one by one were dropping off.”

In fact, Aronson and Weisberg had vehement arguments of their own over which of the subjects was going to make the cut. Ultimately, of course, none of them did, although that was not the end of the filmmakers’ problems. They decided that rather than subtitle the scenes in which the characters speak in American Sign Language, they’d have the lines dubbed, which would allow the film, among other things, to cut away from a speaker and not confuse the audience. To this end, they used members of the crew for a temp track and then cast voices to “play” Peter and Nita and even Heather. Because Peter could easily be seen as the heavy in this drama, his voice was the toughest to cast. Test audiences found him a trifle too objectionable with the first voice they used, so they had to find another one.

At least voices are a controllable element. At the end of the film, the filmmakers were allowed to shoot the occasion on which Chris’ child, having received the implant, hears his first sound. It was either a moment of high drama or a bust.

“Often in those switch-ons, not a lot happens and it’s not real evident that a child is experiencing” sound, Weisberg says. “Or sometimes the actions are really negative, so we got the best reaction we could hope for.”

“Well,” says Aronson, “the kid could have started saying algebraic formulas. That might have been better. They warned us. A lot of the kids just cry. I remember telling the cameramen [Brian Danitz, Gordy Waterman], ‘Now, [the doctor] is going to go, “One, two, three,” bang,’ and you’ve got to get to that kid. This is one moment in his life that you can’t miss.’”

And to Aronson and Weisberg’s everlasting relief, the cameramen didn’t. On the child’s face is a look of surprise and, maybe, wonder.

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“Sound and Fury” airs tonight at 9 on KCET and KVCR.