Oscar-Nominated ‘Sound of Metal’ Bears Imprint of Mexican Post-Production Artists

Praised for its immersive approach to mapping out a drummer’s confrontation with hearing loss, writer-director Darius Marder’s “Sound of Metal,” now contending for six Academy Awards, features a singularly story-driven use of sound.

Part of that sonic alchemy proudly bears a “Made in Mexico” stamp. The film is nominated for best sound, and three of the nominated artisans are Mexican re-recording mixers Jaime Baksht, Michelle Couttolenc, and Carlos Cortés Navarrete. Together they worked alongside fellow nominees Nicolas Becker and Phillip Bladh to fine-tune the sonic palette. The Mexican trio lent their seasoned skills, honed over many years working on homegrown productions and the occasional international job, across multiple stages of the film’s post-production journey.

Though all of them studied in Europe or the United States, given the limited availability of sound-focused education in their homeland during their formative period, they returned to Mexico to carve out their careers.

Baksht, the veteran of the pack, was instrumental in the modernization of the famed Estudios Churubusco in Mexico City. That’s where he eventually met a fresh-faced Couttolenc and developed a professional relationship now going on 14 years. One of their landmark collaboration was on Guillermo del Toro’s acclaimed “Pan’s Labyrinth,” for which the pair received a BAFTA nomination.

Cortés, on the other hand, was employed at a variety of film-related studios, including the renowned Labo Digital, until meeting idiosyncratic director Carlos Reygadas (“Silent Light,” “Post Tenebras Lux”) with whom he began an ongoing working partnership.

Reygadas would eventually bring these three sound artisans together to work on his most recent feature “Our Time” at his studio Splendor Omnia, located in the Tepozteco Mountain Range south of the Mexican capital. That relationship with the auteur led them to “Sound of Metal.”

The story of this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity began when Mexican musician Leonardo Heiblum met composer Becker, who would serve as supervising sound editor on the movie while recording an album with singer-songwriter Patti Smith.