Week 7 Chapter 6 The Hurt Locker 2008 Film Discussion Paper I attached my assignment below.*Please send it by TODAY (July 16) at 5pm (Eastern Time Zone – U

Week 7 Chapter 6 The Hurt Locker 2008 Film Discussion Paper I attached my assignment below.*Please send it by TODAY (July 16) at 5pm (Eastern Time Zone – USA) *Please send it by TODAY (July 16) at 5pm (Eastern Time Zone – USA)
*The assignment should be over 12 sentences
Week 7 Discussion: Editing Choices
This documentary is about the art of film editing. Clips are shown from many groundbreaking
films with innovative editing styles.
The Cutting Edge: The Magic of Movie Editing (1:39:21) : https://vimeo.com/335100287
Requirement:
Examine one scene in any of this week’s films in regards to the editing choices made. Is there a
lot of rapid cutting from one thing to another? A number of long takes? Cutting between time
frames? Cutting between spaces/locations? Cutting between kinds of shots? Be specific and
analyze how these cuts affect our experience of the war we are witnessing. Please capture the one
scene you describe
Videos: I am sorry, but I can’t find the free movies. If you rent one of the films in the YouTube
(it probably $3.99) I will give you $3.99 when I complete this question.
The Hurt Locker (2:11:00): Kathryn Bigelow’s gritty, documentary-style portrayal of the Iraqi
war through the lens of a bomb squad and its new sergeant who doesn’t play by the rules, won six
Oscars including Best Picture and Best Director. The film shows the precarious nature of
occupation and the incredible anxieties that both soldiers and citizens felt towards each other in
this hostile, always volatile environment where the enemy was never easily identified and was
often as much within as without.
Apocalypse Now (2:27:00): Frances Ford Coppola’s homage to Joseph Conrad’s 19th-century
novel Heart of Darkness, this film is set during the Vietnam War with its guerrilla warfare, junglelike terrain, and lack of military strategy. As in Heart of Darkness, the Westerners/white men
unleash their racial prejudices and false sense of moral superiority on the native population. As to
plot, Martin Sheen—who thoroughly becomes Captain Willard—is sent on a deadly journey into
Cambodia “to assassinate a renegade Colonel who has set himself up as a god among a local tribe”
(IMDB). Marlon Brando, in what is basically a cameo, plays Colonel Walter E. Kurtz. This movie
mines the psychological depths of the ravages of war, while also commenting on the politics that
put us there.
Saving
Private
Ryan
(2:49:00):
This too is based on a true story. It’s one of Spielberg’s greatest achievements: a cinematographic
masterpiece that will overwhelm you with its power from its first frames. It’s both brutal and
incredibly moving, epic and highly personal. It emphasizes the bravery and immense sacrifices of
those who served, as well as the massive carnage and its randomness.
Example (An example of a student who chose the Apocalypse Now)
Watching the 1979 film Apocalypse Now, directed by Frances Coppola and edited by Walter
Murch, Gerald B. Greenberg, Lisa Fruchtman, and Richard Marks, was incredibly poignant
regarding this week’s discussion on editing. After viewing the Magic of Movie Editing, I found a
new appreciation for the post-production process. The film’s tone and message, as well as pacing
and acting performances, are directly influenced by the hand of the editor. Apocalpyse Now
follows Captain Benjamin Willard as he embarks on a classified mission to take down the rogue
Colonel Walter Kurtz, who has evaded interference and capture by the military. Kurtz is said to be
insane, a claim that results in the audience and Captain Willard questioning the basis of sanity the
farther down the river he travels.
The editing of this film was artistic as the tale is an allusion to The Heart of Darkness, a novel by
Joseph Conrad. In the opening scene in the movie and sporadically throughout layered dissolved
are utilized to show confusion, disorientation, and emotional strife brought on by the
overwhelming nature of a senseless war. Primarily the editing in the film included many long
shots, and quick cuts were accompanied by sound/music stops and starts, making them more
pronounced and dramatic. Overall, I felt that the editing used to artistically display the emotional
state of the characters was the best use of editing in the film.
The War Film
ART 2010
History of War Films
•
•
•
•
•
•
Early ones include Birth of a Nation,
Chaplin’s Shoulder Arms, and All Quiet
on the Western Front
Used as propaganda especially
starting in WWII.
There are literally hundreds of films
made about WWII, from various
•
perspectives with a wide range of
stories and agendas
The Cold War also inspired hundreds of
films, from the 007 films to Tinker,
Tailor, Soldier, Spy.
With the Vietnam War came many antiwar films, and that trend has
continued through the present, with
films like The Hurt Locker
Great contemporary film makers such
as Steven Spielberg have revisited
WWII and the Holocaust with the aim
to memorialize the millions who
suffered and died under the Nazis, and
recognize those who opposed this
genocide.
Throughout its history, there have also
always been comic and satirical
examinations of war, as well as films
in which war is the background for a
great love story.
Elements
•
•
•
•
•
War: battles, strategies, life and
death scenarios
These can be epic in scope or small, •
intense dramas
They can be propagandistic – but the •
best are not
Often historical, but many war epics
are Sci-Fi or fantasy too
Often concerned with heroism, and
the lessons of war
Raw, brutal, realistic, graphic, and
political
Large scale productions with intense
set and costume design, as well as
challenging stunts
Some Examples of the Range
of War Films
• All Quiet of the Western Front
• Casablanca
• MASH
• Good Morning Vietnam
• Apocalypse Now
• Inglorious Bastards
• The Zoo Keeper’s Wife
Audience Appeal
•
•
•
•
•
•
We get to view up close situations we
hope never to actually experience
Can inspire people to join the military
(Top Gun!)
Can lift the country’s moral and make
them believe they are fighting for a good
cause
Can portray the complexities of war, and
provide insights into the mentality of
those waging and fighting the war
Its themes are powerful, often epic in
scope: survival, love in the midst of
death, endurance of the spirit, kindness
and humanity vs. mindless hate and
brutality, etc.
History: they can inform, investigate,
expose, and/or critique the past so we can
learn from, rather than repeat, it.
Chapter 6
The Relation of Shot to Shot:
Editing
©McGraw-Hill Education. All rights reserved. Authorized only for instructor use in the classroom. No reproduction or further distribution permitted without the prior written consent of McGraw-Hill Education.
What Is Editing?
The coordination of one shot with the next.
The duration of the shot and the way it joins to
the next shot can affect the viewer’s reaction.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Graphic Relations Between
Shot A and Shot B
Has to do with the pictorial and
cinematographic qualities of the shots.
Can involve matching and contrasting these
qualities.
In The Birds, suspense is heightened by having
movement conflict with countermovement and
stillness.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Rhythmic Relations Between
Shot A and Shot B
Varying lengths of shots can create a rhythm and
set a pace.
In The Birds, Hitchcock accelerates the pace at
the beginning of a tense sequence, creating
suspense while depicting the savagery of the
attack.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Why Cut? Four Shots from The Birds
Medium shot, straight-on
angle
Medium close-up
Extreme long shot
Medium close-up
©McGraw-Hill Education
Spatial Relations Between
Shot A and Shot B
Involves establishing or constructing space.
The Kuleshov effect is a series of shots without
an establishing shot, but prompts the viewer to
infer a spatial whole.
Parallel editing is called crosscutting.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Temporal Relations between
Shot A and Shot B
Editing can cue the viewer to construct story
time.
There is an order to events in the film which can
change story-plot relations.
Editing can condense time through elliptical
editing or expand time through overlapping
editing.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Continuity Editing
A system of editing that allows space, time, and
action to flow smoothly over a series of shots.
The rhythm is dependent on camera distance of
the shot.
The goal is to present a coherent, clear story.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Spatial Continuity:
The 180-Degree System
A scene is constructed over an axis of action, or
180-degree line.
The filmmaker plans all the shots so that the
camera doesn’t cross the line.
This ensures consistency in positions of objects
in the frame, eyelines, and screen direction.
©McGraw-Hill Education
A conversation scene and the
axis of action
©McGraw-Hill Education
Continuity Editing in
The Maltese Falcon
The opening shot delineates the space of the
office and establishes a 180-degree line
between Spade and his secretary.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Continuity Editing in The Maltese
Falcon
The following shot/reverse shot, eyeline match,
reestablishing shot, and match on action
reinforce the spatial continuity.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Continuity Editing in
The Maltese Falcon
These shots advance the narrative by
emphasizing the protagonist and linking him to
his name on the window.
Offscreen sound and the viewer’s expectation of
what comes next motivates the following shots,
which makes those shots less noticeable.
Together, the cutting controls the viewer’s
attention.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Continuity Editing: Some Fine Points
The 180-degree line may shift as characters move
around.
Sometimes a director will rely only on the
Kuleshov effect and not have an establishing shot.
A cheat cut lets a director mismatch slightly the
positions of characters or actions.
Point-of-view cutting gives the viewer a subjective
experience.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Crossing the Axis of Action
Occasionally filmmakers will cross the axis of
action in a symmetrical setting, or on the line
itself and use it as a transition.
Shots on the line often happen during action
scenes such as chases.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Crosscutting
Editing can create omniscience for the viewer.
Alternates shots from one line of action with
shots of other events in other places.
Draws the viewer in, builds suspense, and can
create parallels.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Temporal Continuity: Order,
Frequency, and Duration
Classical editing typically shows events only
once and unfolds the narrative chronologically.
Time is seldom expanded, but it is frequently
elided.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Alternatives to Continuity Editing
Abstract and associational form often joins shots
together based on the graphic and rhythmic
qualities instead of narrative function.
Occasionally narrative films will also do this.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Spatial and Temporal Discontinuity
1
Using space ambiguously, inserting jump cuts
and violating or ignoring the 180-degree system
can jar and disorient the viewer.
Nondiegetic inserts can add symbolism or create
a metaphor.
These techniques can interfere with narrative
clarity.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Spatial and Temporal Discontinuity
Shuffling the order of story events or using time
ambiguously can block viewer expectations.
Can force the viewer to focus on piecing
together the film’s narrative.
©McGraw-Hill Education
2
Functions of Discontinuity Editing in
October
1
Eisenstein was interested in the meaning that
arose from juxtaposing disjunctive and
disorienting shots, and creating conflict.
The viewer is an active participant in the film.
The viewer is forced to make emotional and
conceptual connections and interpret the story
events and implicit meanings.
©McGraw-Hill Education
Functions of Discontinuity Editing in
October
2
Laughing soldier
Menacing eagle statue
Rifles thrust into the snow
A bursting shell
The flunky is bowing
Suddenly he is standing up
©McGraw-Hill Education

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