[UPDATE: the original of this post suggested using the “Dean Scream” in entertainment projects, and failed also to credit and link to a fellow from whose page I obtained a copy of the “Wilhelm Scream”. I’ve learned that the “Dean Scream” most probably is not necessarily in the clear for use in entertainment projects - which is too bad :) ]

(Close your eyes when it turns black and white with Uma Thurman slashing a sword, and when someone pulls out a knife. Unless you aren’t squeamish or don’t hate gratuitous violence.)

This is another of at least a few videos posted at YouTube showcasing the myriad uses in films of a stock sound originating at Warner Bros. in 1951, eventually dubbed by Ben Burtt the “Wilhelm Scream”.

Yes, it is actually used in all those shows and films. This isn’t some weird dub-over of them (I was really surprised and amused to learn it was used in THE LORD OF THE RINGS films two and three).

I found a wave file of the “classic” Wilhelm Scream apparently directly copied from the original take :) Here it is. Click. Click. Click.

(That’s an mp3 burn of the sound)

You can also hear the sound at sound designer Steve Lee’s web site, hollywoodlostandfound.net (this is where I grabbed the sound from), and read a detailed history of it there.

At that page and in an interview with a director (in addition to Steve Lee) in this YouTube video, I’ve learned that the man who popularized the sound, Designer Ben Burtt, will no longer be using the sound (he used it in all six Star Wars films). My blunt take: the public has caught on to the “secret” of its use - previously, mostly an in-joke between many sound designers - so now, it’s, like, popular. And the first rule of hard-core Nerddom is that if it’s popular, it isn’t “cool” anymore.

I think that’s a silly decision on Ben Burtt’s part (I only speculate, perhaps unfairly, on his reasons).

I emailed Steve Lee about the legality of using the Wilhelm Scream - in a nutshell no one knows for sure who the original artist is, and while technically it is owned by Warner Bros., it has been used very abundantly (by people from all kinds of other studios and networks, etc.), and no known squabbles or legal issues have been raised over it.

Lee also added:

By the way, Ben is indeed working on “Indy 4″ and I
would be very surprised if there isn’t a Wilhelm in it.

An interesting aside - I’ve noticed a certain recording of a hawk cry appears almost pedantically in many desert and wilderness scenes in films, and it turns out it is in fact an often used recording - it’s mentioned in this Wikipedia page as “..a certain recording of the cry of the Red-tailed Hawk.”

A tradition of people who know the in-joke of the Wilhelm Scream is to shout “Wilhelm!” whenever they hear the sound effect in a movie. But if it isn’t cool to use the Wilhelm Scream anymore, how about something else?

This scream of Howard Dean, the “Dean Scream”, famously baffled and alienated the public to Howard Dean (arguably in part because the press replayed the “Scream” a lot - which.. I dunno.. it’s pretty funny and may deserve press).

I pulled that flash video out of YouTube, dumped its audio to a .wav file, made a sample of the audience cheering noise in the background of it, and then used that noise in a noise removal tool to isolate a very good approximation of Dean’s Scream without the audience cheering in the background.

(There are technical reasons this sound may not be “perfect”, but I doubt I’d hear much or any difference without those factors - also that’s an mp3 burn of the .wav file).

I wish, oh how I wish, that the “Dean Scream” was legally a for-sure “in the clear” sound to use in any entertainment project. For informational / educational / news use (such as this post), it’s in the clear under “Fair Use” - but it isn’t necessarily in the clear for use in entertainment media.

If another actor imitated the Dean Scream however, and released it to the Public Domain - hey, we could have us the basis of something new.

Wait a bit - I think I’ll do just that. :)