Wednesday, 19 April 2017

Major Project: Thelma Schoonmaker Editor Research

The second successful film editor that I decided to research was director Martin Scorsese's go-to editor for 23 of his films since 1967; Thelma Schoonmaker. The 77 year old American film editor has worked with Scorsese throughout his career, editing famous films of his such as Raging Bull, Shutter Island, and The Wolf of Wall Street. She still continues to edit his films to this day, with her most recent editing credit for Scorsese's Silence, and his upcoming 2018 film The Irishman.



The Start of Schoonmaker's Career

For a female editor that's been working since the 1960s, I was intrigued to find out how Schoonmaker began her career 50 years ago, and how she began her life-long work only editing for Martin Scorsese.

A very useful article on the editor states that as a young woman: "she noticed a newspaper ad offering on-the-job training as a film editor. The job was far from glamorous. She assisted an editor, who would hack up classic foreign films to the appropriate length for TV ... That skill led her to Scorsese. Both were taking a six-week filmmaking course at New York University when the professor asked her to help Scorsese salvage his student film "What's a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Place Like This?," which had been butchered by a negative cutter." [6]

- I think that this is amazing, that a simple opportunity on a university course can lead to a 50 year long collaboration, creating extremely successful films together.

"Schoonmaker edited his first feature, 1967's "Who's That Knocking at My Door," and then they worked together as editors on Michael Wadleigh's 1970 Oscar-winning documentary feature, "Woodstock."

Despite earning an Oscar nomination as supervising editor on "Woodstock," Schoonmaker was told that if she wanted to become a member of the Motion Picture Editors Guild, she would have to go back to basics and work as an apprentice and an assistant. She refused.

So for a decade, Schoonmaker worked on various documentaries and small projects until Scorsese got her into the union for "Raging Bull." And they have worked together ever since." [6]

- I found this interesting as in my research I found that it's unknown how Schoonmaker was allowed into the union, so in this case it's an unusual way of starting a career path. However, I think that it's a testament to Schoonmaker's skill as Scorsese only wanted her as his editor and no one else.


Schoonmaker (left) and Scorsese (right)



Editor Credits

Since working on Raging Bull, Schoonmaker has only ever worked on feature films that were created by Scorsese. However, she has also worked on a number of documentaries, short films, and tv movies over her incredible 51 year long career. Below is the extremely impressive list of her editor credits:

  • 2018 - The Irishman (pre-production)
  • (Unknown) - Sinatra (announced) 
  • 2016 - Silence 
  • 2015 - Bombay Velvet 
  • 2014 - Learning to Drive 
  • 2013 - The Wolf of Wall Street 
  • 2011 - Hugo 
  • 2010 - Shutter Island 
  • 2007 - The Key to Reserva (Short) 
  • 2007 - The McCartney Years (Video documentary) (Rockshow Concert) 
  • 2006 - The Departed 
  • 2004 - The Aviator 
  • 2003 - Michael Jackson: Number Ones (Video documentary) (segment "Bad") 
  • 2003 - AFI Life Achievement Award: A Tribute to Robert De Niro (TV Movie) 
  • 2002 - Gangs of New York 
  • 2001 - My Voyage to Italy (Documentary)
  • 1999 - Bringing Out the Dead 
  • 1997 - Kundun 
  • 1996 - Grace of My Heart 
  • 1995 - Casino 
  • 1995 - Michael Jackson: Video Greatest Hits - HIStory (Video documentary) (video "Bad") 
  • 1993 - The Age of Innocence 
  • 1991 - Cape Fear 
  • 1990 - Made in Milan (Short documentary) 
  • 1990 - Goodfellas (film editor) 
  • 1989 - New York Stories (segment "Life Lessons") 
  • 1988 - The Last Temptation of Christ 
  • 1987 - Michael Jackson: Bad (Video short) 
  • 1986 - The Color of Money 
  • 1985 - After Hours 
  • 1982 - The King of Comedy 
  • 1980 - Rockshow (Documentary) 
  • 1980 - Raging Bull 
  • 1979 - Wings Over the World (TV Movie documentary) 
  • 1970 - Street Scenes (Documentary) 
  • 1970 - Woodstock (Documentary) (as T. Schoonmaker) 
  • 1969 - The Virgin President 
  • 1967 - Who's That Knocking at My Door 
  • 1966 - Passages from James Joyce's Finnegans Wake [1]



Awards

In 2007, 2005 and 1981 Schoonmaker won three Oscars (The Departed, The Aviator, and Raging Bull), along with winning 27 other film awards including a BAFTA, a Hollywood Film Award, and a Satellite Award for her editor credits on such films as Goodfellas, Gangs of New York, and Hugo. She has received 57 award nominations in total, all between 1971 and 2017 [2]. This is incredibly inspiring for me to learn how much an editor can achieve in a working life time, and if you love your work and have the right skill set and talent, there's never a need to step away from editing.



Skills & Experiences

When researching Schoonmaker's work in the industry, I found a number of sources that explore her thoughts on female editors, the areas she enjoys working in, her approaches to editing, and her time working with Scorsese over the years.

Firstly, in one interview Schoonmaker stated that "When I came into the business in the '60s, there weren't that many [female editors] ... Since then, it's grown quite fast — I think probably because women are good collaborators." [3]

"sometimes what I’ve seen in director/editor relationships is an ego battle about who thinks they’re right. I don’t think that’s necessary: what’s important is to do what is right for the film." [5]

- I think that the fact that since the 60s the number of female editors has risen is very encouraging for me, as I often feel that the industry is mostly male-dominated. But I feel like in modern times, I stand a very high chance of becoming successful in my work. The above quotes on Schoonmaker's thoughts on collaborations are also very useful in highlighting that collaborating shouldn't be a battle of who's opinions are correct, it should be about working together to create the best possible piece of work.


In another interview, Schoonmaker discusses her first area of work in the industry, and the influences it had on her: "I started in documentaries, and that was a great help to me with improvisation, because with documentaries you're handed a big lump of footage and you have to shape it and make it into a story - which I love doing." [4]

- I found this to be very relative to me, as during my time at university I have worked on a number of different types of productions - including documentary. And I think it's clear that even if there's only one specific area that you want to work in, working on all different types of projects will always be beneficial in learning new skills and discovering your strengths and favourite areas of work.


As Schoonmaker has almost entirely worked on Scorsese films over the years, a large amount of information that I found was based on their working relationship, and the ways that they approach his films. In on interview, she stated that: "every project is a different challenge ... it’s just constantly fascinating and ever-changing—and he has such high standards for himself and for everybody who works with him" [5]

"I didn’t know anything about editing when I met him, nothing! So he was always with me during the first cut. Now I do first cut, and then he comes in and we edit together for the rest of the post-production process very intensely." [5]

- In this area, I found it very interesting to learn about the ways that their collaborative dynamic changed over time, as once Scorsese was confident with Schoonmaker's abilities, she was able to traditionally complete the first cut alone. I think that this also confirms further information that I've found on professional practices in editing, as an editor almost always works alone in the begin, then works alongside the director to work hard on improving and mastering the film.


When asked in the same interview if she likes to be on set during filming or to edit on site, Schoonmaker stated: "I don’t have time, because I’m cutting the movie as he’s shooting it, and also, I also don’t want to have my eye prejudiced by what I see, how they are making something ... I don’t want know how it is made. Marty wants me to look at the footage cold on the screen the next day and react to it and tell him if anything’s wrong, which it hardly ever is." [5]

- I completely agree with this type of editing method, as it's typical practice to cut the footage together during production time to ensure that there is consistency and no issues. But in order to only focus on the cuts and performance, I feel that it's important not to be influenced by the dynamic or difficulties it may have taken to get certain shots.


Talking more about her editing process alongside Scorsese, Schoonmaker describes the typical steps that they go through when editing a film: "Over the years, our movies always start out much longer, so we screen, we preview, recut, screen again and so on." [5]

Similarly, Scorsese also stated that: "There are very few outside people ... We literally have the film there and struggle with it, create it, enjoy it, get confused, get tired, get happy, get upset and move on." [6]

- I found this very interesting, to learn that even on an big budget Hollywood film, the method of work can still be very particular with only the director and the editor working on cutting the film, in similar ways to cutting a short film - such as myself and the director of Double Exposure.


As Schoonmaker has worked as an editor since long before digital footage and software were created an introduced, she's had to adapt to modern techniques. When asked which software she uses, she answered: "I actually use an English system called Lightworks, which I was trained on during the early days of digital editing ... It has a controller that is like the old flatbed editing machines and I love that. So I’ve been editing on Lightworks ever since Casino." [5]

- As Lightworks is an older program that can often be used by a breadth of people, including people just starting out in the industry, I find it fascinating that Schoonmaker uses rather simplistic tools to create such incredibly cut films.


Lastly, I found an interesting insight on editing from Schoonmaker: "it takes years and years to really understand editing. The main thing is we often have to take out our favourite scene or half of it, or drop a line we love in order to make the film move and make the film the right length when it’s released." [5]

- I think that this is always true of editors, that we have to remove parts of a film that we love in order to allow it to flow and maintain it's excitement and entertainment when viewed by an audience.


 




Editing Example

Alongside finding an example of Schoonmaker's editing work and drawing inspiration from the clip, I also found an interesting online video that shows the collaborative dynamic between Schoonmaker and Scorsese from decades ago:




In a more modern example of Schoonmaker's editing techniques, I found a clip from a The Wolf of Wall Street scene. Although in comparison to the scenes of Double Exposure, this film is a lot more gritty, from the start of this clip until 1:08, the tone of the scene in the bedroom is a great comparison to that of Double Exposure:



The bedroom scene uses a number of editing techniques to slowly build the tension in a domestic argument. I found when analysing this scene that the pacing of cuts is actually quite slow, allowing most of the tension to be drawn from the way the characters are speaking to each other. The editor holds on a lot of two-shots, allowing us to gauge the character's reactions simultaneously. However in one moment, she uses matched close-ups of the characters for a powerful line, allowing us to be shocked by what she says. I learned from this that when approaching similar argument-styled scenes for Double Exposure, that the use of holding on two-shots to draw intensity from performance as opposed to quick cuts can be very powerful.

However, I did find a continuity error within this scene. As at 0:20, Leonardo DiCaprio's character is naked from the waist down, but once he sits up on the bed 8 seconds later, he's wearing trousers. This was encouraging for me to know that I have a good eye for continuity and consistency in film!



Why I Chose Thelma Schoonmaker & Influences

The reasons as to why I chose to research Thelma Schoonmaker are that she's an inspirational female editor, she's been working as an editor for over 50 years which I find very encouraging, her long-standing collaborations with a talented director, her editing techniques used in a number of drama and thriller films that I was able to draw inspiration from, and my 50/50 knowledge on her work - having seen some of her edited films but not others, before learning a large amount about Schoonmaker and her work.

Alongside researching and learning about another director (Kirk Baxter in my previous post), learning about Thelma Schoonmaker was very useful to me in learning about the approaches that a very experienced editor takes to her work, along with helping me with the ways to approach my own editing work for Double Exposure.



References



Tuesday, 18 April 2017

Major Project: Kirk Baxter Editor Research

With my career goal of becoming a film editor, I found it very inspiring and insightful to research and learn the facts, beginnings, skill sets, experiences and examples of two accomplished, and well-known film editors. As editors are typically less famous than directors or the cast of a film for example, I decided to search for editors that were suited to my current project. By looking through an online list of directors, I considered the ones that have made famous thriller films that could be relative to Double Exposure. My first choice was to go to David Fincher, the director of Se7en, Panic Room, Gone Girl and much more. My next step was to find out if he typically uses a go-to editor for his films, and I found that especially in more recent films, Fincher uses the talented Kirk Baxter.




Kirk Baxter is a 45 year old Australian film editor, as mentioned above he has been increasingly collaborating with director David Fincher through editing a number of his films, and has frequently edited alongside film editor Angus Wall, however he now seems to be branching out on his own, such as through solo editing the 2014 film Gone Girl.



The Start of Baxter's Career

When researching Baxter's career path, I was able to find out valuable information on how he broke into the industry, his areas of work, and how he made the connections with David Fincher that would lead to him becoming his go-to editor.


His first job in the industry was at Ross Wood Productions in Sydney, where in an interview he stated: "I did a little bit of everyone’s job, everything from being a basic runner to helping the camera department, filming casting sessions and editing montages for the cinematographers." [5]

"Like the military, where everyone has to serve their time and earn their stripes before they get there. With editing it was immediate, I was able to create something everyday instead of just lifting or delivering things. By the time I was eighteen I knew exactly what I wanted to do." [5]

- I find this incredibly inspiring as an aspiring professional film editor, to learn that an award-winning editor began at a young age, acting as a runner that was able to complete a lot of editing and production based tasks so early in his career path.


Baxter later began editing television commercials in Australia, before getting editing work in England: "I was in London for six years and then British directors would fly me into New York or Los Angeles, where they were doing American commercials and I got a taste for it." [5]

Within the interview, the article also states that Baxter co-founded a commercial editing firm called Final Cut, but in 2004 joined Angus Wall's company in LA called 'Rock, Paper, Scissors'. He states that: 
“Angus knew I always wanted to work on movies, he’d already been working with Fincher for about ten years. On Zodiac, he asked if I wanted to come on board. I’m glad he needed a hand!” [5]

- Since then, Baxter has worked with Wall and Fincher on a number of films and has been expanding his workload. Finding this research on the career path that Baxter followed was very interesting to me, to learn the ways to break into the industry and improve your skill set, the connections that can be made to break into the specific area of choice, and where these connections and opportunities can lead.


Angus Wall (left) and Kirk Baxter (right)



Editor Credits

Since his film editing career properly began in 2007 as an additional editor of Fincher's Zodiac, Baxter has racked up an impressive list of extremely popular drama and thriller films, along with two episodes of the acclaimed series House of Cards. Below is the list of his editor credits:

  • 2014 - Gone Girl (editor)
  • 2013 - House of Cards (TV Series) (2 episodes) (editor)
  • Chapter 2 (2013)
  • Chapter 1 (2013)
  • 2011 - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (editor)
  • 2010 - The Social Network (editor)
  • 2008 - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (editor)
  • 2007 - Zodiac (additional editor) [1]


Awards

Between 2008 and 2014, Baxter won two Oscars (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Social Network), a BAFTA Film Award, an EDA Award, an Eddie, an ACCA, a Critics Choice Award, a Hollywood Film Award, a HPA Award, and an ICS Award (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Social Network, and The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttonfor his editing work on these films. Along with 49 award nominations during this time [2]. For an editor that had been working on Hollywood films for only seven years at the time, that is an incredible accomplishment, and I feel that with enough talent, dedication and collaboration, an editor can achieve an incredible amount in even a portion of their career.


Kirk Baxter and Angus Wall with their Oscars for
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo


Skills & Experiences

When searching for first-hand information on Baxter's experiences of film editing and the approaches he's used, I found an extremely large amount of information from articles and interviews on his time working as the only film editor on Fincher's Gone Girl.

Firstly, when discussing approaching a narrative that explores a number of storylines and the overall length of the film, Baxter said the following: "The editorial trick was creating a language for three different storylines that was easy to follow and compelling — while getting out of the first act as quickly as possible for this 149-minute thrill ride." [3]

- I found this inspiring, as similar to Gone Girl, Double Exposure's biggest twists in the story are later in the film, and although our film is a short film, I found it important to focus on cutting down time in the earlier acts, to get the core of the film.


Similarly, he discusses his collaborations with the director, working together to further cut down the film: "It was an absolute joy to edit because David had all of the moving parts, but we were constantly going for months, ‘How can we make it faster, what can we trim?' ... It helped our quest to reduce time for the sake of the overall flow of the movie, but I think it also made it a better film.[3]

- I think that from all of my research into editing for this project, I've found it to be common practice in editing to trim down a film to allow it to flow and improve, as well as making sure that the run time doesn't overrun.


In another article where he touched on the length of the film, he states that: "We got it to the length that best served the picture, and to make it any shorter is just chasing arbitrary numbers, rather than delivering the best film." [4]

- This was helpful to me in remembering that the film doesn't need to be cut down to the shortest possible time, every reason for cutting needs to only be in the best interest of the film's quality and narrative strength.


Baxter later discusses working on the assembly of Gone Girl"It’s not just the volume of takes, it’s finding the road map of how to tell a scene, and where to be, how to move through it and how much we want to present to the audience. It’s mostly the mathematics I have to work out first. Once I have that in place I get to the nuance of what are the best pieces of performance." [4]

- I found this information on his experience of creating an assembly cut to be very helpful in my own work. I felt as if when organising all of the takes and connecting clips and narratives followed by selecting the best performances from the actors, that I was working in a very professional way that an industry standard editor would.


In more technical aspects of his work, I found out that: "Gone Girl marks the first major Hollywood feature cut on Premiere Pro CC, which is a big boost for Adobe. The decision was made because of the tight integration between Premiere Pro CC and After Effects CC, which allowed multiple editors and VFX artists to work on the same project." [3]

- I think that this is quite groundbreaking in editing, as Avid is so typically used to edit big-budget Hollywood films. So for a film as big as this to have been edited using Adobe Software is a huge change. It was also very interesting to learn that such a high quality and high standard of film was edited on the same software that I would be editing on.


Baxter also talks about his experiences in working with different editing software:  "I went from Avid to Final Cut to Premiere, and I find all of them take about a day or two to get used to so that your fingers do the work without your brain having to think about what your fingers are doing. And for the editor, that’s the main goal - just focus on doing." [4]

- I've found that at my level - a dramatically earlier one than Baxter - learning and working with different post-production software can take a long time to work with. However his words above are inspiring, as it shows that with time and skill development that new and complicated methods and software can easily be explained and explored.


Lastly, he talks about the difference that shooting in 6K made: "David was able to overshoot the image - that part was really handy. Because I can move a shot around to change headroom or affect the camera move on it, means that we’re choosing all things based on performance, not based on camerawork. To me that’s the best element of it." [4]

- I found this to be one of the most relative parts of my research to my own work. As although Double Exposure was shot in a format close to 4K rather than 6K, I too had the ability to manipulate framing sizes to adjust headroom and camera movements. Allowing me to also choose takes based on the best quality of shot and performance.



Editing Example

Another useful area of my research into Kirk Baxter and his work was to review the editing techniques of a clip from one of his credited films. Allowing me to draw inspiration from this for my own work in editing.

Gone Girl

This scene is a great example of cutting an uncomfortable dialogue sequence. Using L & J cut to keep the dialogue between the characters consistently flowing, matching shot sizes to get a sense of their distance from each other, and especially the use of cutting to closer frame sizes as the conversation becomes more confrontational and intense. I found that this technique was very useful in considering the ways to cut together the confrontational dialogue scenes of Double Exposure.



Why I Chose Kirk Baxter & Influences

I chose to research Kirk Baxter for many reasons; his editing work on numerous thriller films that allow me to draw inspiration for the thriller film that I'm editing, his collaborations with a successful film director, the encouraging beginnings of his career, his talent put to practice through inspiring editing techniques in a number of films, my familiarity and high interest in the films that he's worked on, and how he has achieved so much in such a short amount of time.

By researching and learning about Kirk Baxter, I was able to gain knowledge in a large amount of areas, including the ways that an editor can break into the industry, the awards that can be won for my future work, professional editing practices, and editing techniques and style inspiration for my own work on Double Exposure and future projects.



References



Wednesday, 12 April 2017

Major Project: 'Prosopagnosia' Short Film Review, Research & Comparisons

As Double Exposure is a short psychological thriller, I wanted to research and review another short thriller film to understand ways of potentially approaching the edit of this type of film in line with themes and conventions of the genre and time span.

On a website called Short of the Week, I searched through the thriller genre to find a short film that would be suitable to review and analyse. I decided on the 2011 short crime thriller called Prosopagnosia.

This film can be found  HERE .


About Prosopagnosia

Similar to my research on Black Swan, I wanted to learn a bit more about the short film before I began my viewing and analysis. I found that the film was directed by Hugo Keijzer, and edited by short film editor Nils Rensen. As Rensen isn't greatly known in the industry, I struggled to find any information or personal insight on his work on the short film, but I am able to learn about his editing techniques through my review.

The synopsis provided on the film in Short of the Week is below...

Alfred finds his best friend dead in her apartment and looks the perpetrator right in the eyes. Too bad he can't recognize anyone's face.



My Film Review

In this second film review and analysis, I watched carefully and made notes on the editing styles and techniques used throughout the film...


General
- Most likely as to not use up too much time within a short film, the opening title card is brief and cuts to the point, while still having an artistic element to it. As can be seen below...

Title Card


Editing for Suspense & Tension
- We feel the tension between Alfred and the investigator through quick cuts between their dialogue, as Alfred is interrogated.

- Throughout the interrogation scenes, the tension builds more and more through quick cuts and pacing.


Editing for Drama & Emotion
- Calm insert/flashback styled shots are used to portray memories of Alfred's best friend and his girlfriend, allowing us to connect with him. An example of this can be seen in the screenshot below...



In a different style to that of Black Swan, the editor doesn't linger on shots for suspension, but instead to capture the emotion on a character's face.


Editing Techniques
Jump cuts, L & J cuts, cutting on action & cutaways

- The film starts with a brief shot of the main character Alfred's face and immediately cuts away back to the night of his best friend's murder.

- The use of L & J cuts are very well used to keep the conversation between Alfred and the inspector flowing.

- Transitioning between scenes, mostly the opening scene and the scene after the titles uses a fade in from black, creating a smooth transition.

- The film doesn't stick to a linear order, as it frequently jumps back and forth between Alfred's flashbacks and the present, however they're well connected with moments transitioning with him looking a photograph before we see the flashback. Such as the example below...



- Throughout the interrogation scenes, trickery shots are cut between to use different actors to play the inspector in a seamless way. Portraying Alfred's non-recognition of his face.

- Jump cuts are used between all of Alfred's flashbacks in almost a montage style, allowing him and the audience to connect that his best friend was the same person as his girlfriend.

- The film then ends with further jump cuts as we distance ourselves from Alfred upon his realisation, jolting further back from him before the film cuts to black.


Pacing
- The film starts quickly, going straight into the core of the story to establish why Alfred is talking to an investigator.

- Similar to Black Swan, when the character is thinking of a happier time, the pacing dramatically slows down, before picking back up when in the distressing reality of the situation.



Influences & Comparisons

This was very interesting to review in order to learn about how to deal with cutting a short thriller, as the time is restricted but the content still needs to flow and draw the audience in. I found that within this short film, there was less time to linger in order to build suspense, so often quick cuts were used to heighten tension instead, which worked to the story's advantage very well.

I found the techniques of building tension with a fast pace and emotion with a slower, more heartfelt pace to be inspiring when considering the ways to edit these moments in Double Exposure. I also noted that the key similarity between the two films is the fact that the story is non-linear, and uses flashbacks to tell the story. I found the transitions between real-time and flashbacks in Prosopagnosia to be very clear and smooth, and it had me make important considerations in the way that the flashback in Double Exposure needs to be transitioned into.

Overall, combined with my review on Black Swan, it was very useful to me to analyse thrillers similar to our film in both feature film length and short film length, to gain the two different perspectives and editing styles used in both. Before editing, the two films gave me great inspiration in which individual techniques I wanted to use to best suit the film.


Major Project: 'Black Swan' Film Review, Research & Comparisons

From the beginning of this project, I knew that I wanted to research and review the 2011 psychological thriller Black Swan before starting my work in post-production. Although the film has an extremely different plot to Double Exposure, with a lot of effects and melodrama, the themes of a woman's psychological break down and her losing the line between reality and imagination are extremely relative to our film.


About Black Swan

Before beginning my review of the film, I wanted to collect general research on the plot summary of the film, general information and it's themes and messages.

The film is directed by Darren Aronofsky of 'The Wrestler' and stars Natalie Portman as the main character, Nina.

In short, the film's plot can be described as:

"BLACK SWAN is a film about a young New York based prima ballerina, portraying her psychological deterioration while preparing for her first leading role." [1]

Another source describes the film's genre and the metaphor that the film portrays:

"Usually described as a psychological thriller, Black Swan can be also interpreted as a metaphor for achieving artistic perfection, with all the psychological and physical challenges one might encounter." [2]




The Editor

My main focus within the film when reviewing it was the editing styles and techniques explored by the editor. But before I started, I wanted to learn who the editor of the film was, and find out through research what their thoughts and process was on editing Black Swan.

The film's editor is Andrew Weisblum, a successful editor that I found a large amount of information on when it comes to looking at his time editing the film. I firstly found an interview on editing Black Swan:

"Q: How did you prep for editing this movie?

A: Darren and I had some discussions about genre and editorial styles that would be applicable. We discussed psychological thrillers and horror films. With horror films, we were referencing scary moments to see how those moments were executed and what were the tricks of the trade. There was a mandate to always concern ourselves with Nina's subjectivity. We were concerned with when and how to cross the line between realism and impressionism and how to blur that line as much as possible." [3]

- I learned from this that even professional, industry standard editors will often find inspiration from other films to decide on their own style and approach to a film. As well as considering which techniques to use to blend reality and non reality without the audience being able to decide which is which.


"Q: I understand you were actually editing on the set.  How did this work?

A: [I] spent more than half the shoot on the set using a laptop [with software-only Avid Media Composer] with FireWire drives. I was on set for all the dance sequences and all the horror beats.  We did that because the schedule was so pressured and Darren wasn't storyboarding, so we wanted to make sure we were covering all the bases. I could try things out, make sure that things would time out in a way." [3]

- Although the circumstances and editing software would have been of a much higher quality, it was very interesting to learn that a professional editor remained on set and created dailies to ensure that the film was working and would cut together. Similar to my process of creating dailies off-set to ensure the same thing.


"Q: What ended up being the most challenging scene?

A: Technically, the most complicated scene was when Nina and Lily go clubbing. There's so much going on subliminally. There are 20 instances of Nina thinking she's seeing herself. We pushed it farther and went all out. Every image of that scene — which is 45 to 50 seconds with 1,000 images — is manipulated.  Frame by frame, we manipulated the environment so the backgrounds were a selective mix of things from her reality and her imagination." [3]

- This is an area that shows a distinct difference between a low budget film in comparison to a Hollywood standard film. As they have the time, tools and experience to use special effects and manipulate images to explore the reality and non-reality based scenes. Where as for Double Exposure, I need to focus more so on shot types, lengths and cutting techniques to heighten this instead.


Also, in sources containing further information on Weisblum's experience in making Black Swan, I found the following:

"A guiding principle for Weisblum in constructing the “trajectory of her madness” was to “keep up tension, not give her any release or relief” — but as it was written and shot, a scene early in the film undermined this approach. After blowing an audition for the dual leads (the White Swan and the Black Swan) in Swan Lake, Portman’s character returns home and successfully attempts a difficult move from the piece, the “32 fouettes tournants.” Later she goes to the director to tell him she did it, and ask for the part. Weisblum ingeniously recut the scene so that she attempts the move, but fails: “It was more ‘Black Swan’ that she would go home and not be able to do it and go in [to the director] and lie.” This change had a ripple effect throughout the rest of the film, creating a throughline of tension that only finds release at the end, when she successfully completes the 32 fouettes tournant on stage — then (at least in her own mind) dies the death of the White Swan, achieving ultimate perfection." [4]

- I found this very interesting, that the editor could see the way that the tension that the character and the audience were experiencing needed to constantly build, instead of stop and start, so he manipulated a scene himself to achieve this. Although I'm aware that the editor doesn't take the film into their own hands, it's inspiring to learn that a film doesn't have to remain shot for shot in line with the script, and can begin to explore new ways of approaching the plot and themes.


"As an editor, he says his role was to continually escalate the unraveling of Portman’s Nina character, but in a way that viewers could relate to her point of view. “It had to be a gradual build,” he recalls. “She could not start out insane.” [5]

- This is very similar to the ways that Emily in Double Exposure needs to be portrayed in the edit, the audience needs to question her sanity and decide for themselves before she starts to change later in the film. If she was instantly unbalanced, there would be no twist in the film and the audience wouldn't connect with her.


"“I don’t like having rules, but I know it makes things stronger some times. It’s not a bad thing to have discipline.” [5]

- I feel the same about this when it comes to editing, that my creative approach may lack slightly if I'm following a rulebook throughout the process. However, some guidelines do need to be followed so that the project remains consistent and balanced.




My Film Review

It was very inspiring to learn about Weisblum's thoughts and processes before beginning my review on Black Swan. The information below now consists of the editing techniques that I noticed and analysed within the film...


General
- The first thing that I noticed was that the opening titles/film title were immediate, very basic and short to get straight into the film. Below is an example of this...

Title Card

- The more the moments of Nina ripping off parts of her skin in her imagination occur, the more we seem to see of this, with uncomfortable close up shots that really make the audience almost feel what she's doing. We also then see that nothing actually happened, using the suddenly changing shots to portray her psychological state.


Editing for Suspense & Tension
- For almost all characters, when focusing on the look on their face, the shots selected are close-ups, keeping uncomfortably close.

- The first time Nina questions reality and her imagination is at around 15 minutes in. Cutting from one end of an alley on her face, to suddenly cutting to a more seductive looking Nina passing her from the opposite direction, then cutting back to the real Nina, with the real, ordinary woman passing her. All of which is very fast paced. This moment can be seen in the screengrabs below...



- In the intimate, sexual moments such as Nina alone, with Thomas, and with Lily, the cuts are quick, sticking with invasive close-ups of their actions.

- In more horror-like moments, we cut back and forth from Nina's POV (point of view), to seeing something unusual occur when looking at her, jumping back to a jump scare moment of her POV now having a version of herself leaning over her.

- Another horror moment/jump scare is created by holding on one shot, having the character turn of the lights, then when she turns them back on, a creepy character appears.

- From the moment we see that Nina has lost her mind and transformed into the 'black swan', a large part of the scene remains on one shot of her as we see her in her fantasy.

- One of the biggest moments in the films has us watch in one long shot of Nina realising that she hasn't killed Lily as she looks around her dressing from, moving to a terrified look on her face. The big reveal moment is a close up of her bleeding from her stomach, and we see that she in fact stabbed herself.


Editing for Drama & Emotion
- The shots often remain on Nina to keep us connected with her and feel her emotions, for example when she calls her mum, we don't see her mum at home talking back, we remain on one shot of Nina. As can be seen below...



- We are very often seeing Nina's point of view, even if from behind her. Cutting back and forth between what she's seeing (over should shots), and a close-up of the look on her face, to connect with her thoughts.

- In an emotional moment, the last two shots we see are Nina's face saying that she was perfect, and then her POV as she looks up at the lights, and the shot of her face fades to white as she dies.


Editing Techniques
Jump cuts, L & J cuts, cutting on action, match cuts, & POV

- Due to the large amount of dancing, right from the start of the film, all movements flow with the music.

- Although the first scene would have been manipulated to change the character's costumes, it appears as if it's one long shot.

- The editor often holds on one shot of a character talking, rather than cutting back and forth between the characters.

- Jump cuts are used as Nina prepares her shoes, speeding up the process and giving us a sense of her routine.

- Each scene jumps into the next to keep the story moving, however we're still able to keep our sense of surroundings due to other characters in the shots such as ballet dancers.

- Match cuts are used to have a character enter and leave a room through the door.

- L cuts and J cuts are frequently used as to be expected, to cut between dialogue.

- Cutting on action is used to an extreme standard, by using rapidly moving camera shots that stop at the same time as Nina stops, cutting between a static shot of her spinning and stopping, and the spinning camera shot from her POV, stopping on another character over and over. This can be seen in the clip below from 0:12 to to 0:21 seconds...



- An unusual method for the film of transitioning between one scene to another by cross-fading. The cross-fade techniques is used more further into the film to move time along.

- Slow motion is used to represent the precision of Nina's movements as we see her spin and land as she tries to correct her move.

- In a scene when Nina goes to bed, it fades to black to end the scene, and cuts straight to her on the train the following day, seemingly to show us her routine.

- Once Nina goes out dancing with Lily, the cuts rapidly cut back and forth between the characters and to black, to give the appearance of the flickering lights in a dance club. This also allows for jump cuts so that we can see Nina hallucinate as insert shots are added.

- There's the use of a lot of camera trickery and special effects to portray the idea that what we're seeing in those moments are all in Nina's mind. Especially when she transforms into the black swan towards the end of the film, as feathers appear, her eyes turn red and her legs snap and change their shape into that of a swan.


Pacing
- Even though the story and content of the film starts quite slow and calm, the pacing of the cuts are quick and almost uneasy, to already make the audience feel uncomfortable.

- Each time Nina dances, the editor makes sure not to cut away, and remains on the long, fluid, tracking shots of her movements for us to get lost in her dancing.

- When Nina finally starts to relax when she goes to a bar with Lily, we can see a noticeable change in the pacing, the cuts start to become relaxed with her. However they pick up the pace again from the dance club scene onward, rebuilding the tension.



Influences & Comparisons

By reviewing this film and noting down the overall editing style that Weisblum used, I learned a lot in how to approach editing a psychological thriller. One of the key things that stood out to me and helped me to understand was that not every scene needs a transition, such as a character leaving and entering a location or a shot. If what we're seeing feels familiar (e.g. same costume and time of day) we can understand that the next scene follows from the last.

I also took note on the fact that it's extremely effective have the pacing of the film match the mood or mindset of the main character within this type of genre. Even if the character isn't doing much, if they're tense then as an audience we should feel tense with them, if they're relaxed then we should become relaxed for that moment. And lastly, I found that one the main things that makes Black Swan feel so powerful, are the lingering close-up shots of Nina, to either build tension or to have us feel her emotion, I feel that they allow for a real connection to her character throughout.

I found a number of similarities between the approach to Black Swan and my planned approach to Double Exposure. Such as planning to have a simplistic opening titles sequence to not distract from the film itself (as agreed with the Director), to use a lot of quick cuts during tense or more 'thriller' styled moments, to make sure to linger on shots of Emily where necessary - either to heighten emotion or suspense for the audience, and to ensure that the pace of the film always matches with Emily's actions and mindset.

Researching, reviewing and comparing Black Swan to my own work on Double Exposure was extremely useful for me, especially as the themes, genre and protagonist character type match so well. This review and research taught me about the best ways to approach editing the film with genre and professional conventions, but also the unique feel that I want to bring to the film.



References