Letterboxd
I found the beginning of this film off putting as there seemed to be no music at all where I expected it.
It is interesting to experience that, as you realize how often you are actually using the music to sort of judge the emotions of the characters. There were some scenes at the beginning, around where Ruggles first gets drunk at a posh Cafe, that I was not sure were supposed to be comedy or tragedy. Is this a man whose mask has fallen and who is in despair at his position in life, or is this a man whose mask has fallen and who finally gets to comically interact in the world on his own terms?
It was similar to the feeling you get when you watch a sitcom without the laugh track. In that I couldn't trivially tell what people were feeling without the additional music to inform me. Strange sensation, to realize that some input other than the acting is actually informing your understanding of the emotional state of the characters. It is a deficiency/codependency I have developed through years of watching film I suppose. Someone who had never seen a movie would of course be looking intently at the characters to judge emotion, they wouldn't listen to the music! Why would that have anything to do with what someone is feeling?
It is a convention, that you hardly even notice it is so common, that sits like a sore thumb when it isn't present.