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Music
Music ties The 39 Steps together from beginning to end. It is first introduced to the audience at the beginning of the film when Music Hall is lit up in lights, as seen below, foreshadowing its importance throughout the entire film.
Hitchcock begins the film to an upbeat tune playing in a music hall where a performer known as Mr. Memory is on stage. He claims to remember new facts every day and never forgets any of them. Throughout the film, Hannay can not get the tune out of his head and whistles it at various points. He even mentions that he can not remember where he initially heard the tune, prompting the audience to consider where they first heard the melody. At the end of the film Hannay enters a different music hall where the same song is playing, and he finally remembers where he first heard it, at Mr. Memory's first performance that Hannay attended. Hitchcock then reveals that Mr. Memory is the key to the entire story, and the music that played throughout the cinema was supposed to raise a flag as to where the solution to the conflict could be found.
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There are two different types of music that Hitchcock primarily used in his films: diegetic music and non-diegetic music.
DiegeticDiegetic music is sound that the characters in the film can hear. Examples of diegetic sounds include dialogue, footsteps, and instruments that can be seen on screen. The orchestra in The 39 Steps is an example of diegetic music.
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Non-DiegeticNon-diegetic music does not have a source on screen, or noises that have been edited in. Only the audience can hear this type of music. The music that plays during the intense Mount Rushmore scene in North by Northwest is an example of non-diegetic music.
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