Officials in Washington are still trying to make sense of the sudden resignation last week of CIA Director David Petraeus. More details are emerging about the extramarital affair that brought Petraeus down. It came to light following an FBI investigation, which was not focused originally on the CIA director but soon led to him.
In the new movie Lincoln, actor Daniel Day-Lewis is getting a lot of attention for his spot-on portrayal of the 16th president. But Ben Burtt, the sound designer, also deserves credit for the film's authenticity. You may not know his name, but you surely know his work.
Burtt is something of a legend in the movie sound world. He has won numerous Oscars, including for his work on Star Wars.
Burtt invented that iconic swoosh of the light saber, using the hum of an old projector and the buzz of a television set.
When it came to Lincoln, Burtt wasn't going to settle for recreating the sounds of Lincoln's life in some studio. He wanted to capture the real thing — sounds Lincoln actually heard.
So Burtt and his team set out, recording equipment in hand, to capture the sounds from actual objects that have survived the years since Lincoln knew them.
"I love American history and I've always been a student of it," Burtt tells weekends on All Things Considered host Guy Raz.
DreamWorks
Lincoln follows the president in the last few months of his life.
Host Rachel Martin talks with director Nikolaj Arcel about his new film, A Royal Affair. The movie focuses on an affair between the 18th-century queen of Denmark and her German physician, which led to a revolution. Arcel also wrote the screenplay of the Danish film adaptation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.