The technique of film editing (1958)

Record Details:

Something wrong or inaccurate about this page? Let us Know!

Thanks for helping us continually improve the quality of the Lantern search engine for all of our users! We have millions of scanned pages, so user reports are incredibly helpful for us to identify places where we can improve and update the metadata.

Please describe the issue below, and click "Submit" to send your comments to our team! If you'd prefer, you can also send us an email to mhdl@commarts.wisc.edu with your comments.




We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.

Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.

The first fourteen shots establish in visual terms what the title of the film implies — that the world is rich. Here, not only the choice of individual images but also the rhythm and order of their assembly has been made to underline the desired effect. The passage shows in turn the cultivation, preparation and consumption of food, in each case stressing the lush, plentiful quality of good living. The three opening shots are left on the screen for a relatively long time and are linked by slow dissolves : the opening thus acquires a leisurely, peaceful quality which is precisely what is wanted. The exact cutting points of the subsequent shots (4-11) cannot be theoretically justified by analysis. In each case, the image is left on the screen long enough to make its point and cut at the moment the editor judges that it is made. This necessarily remains a question for personal judgment. But it should be recalled that the shots being assembled have already been pre-selected with a view to each shot's inherent rhythmic quality. The tempo of the opening shots is slow, exploring, contemplative, and each shot is made to reflect this. A shot of a herd of cattle being driven at speed across a plain (such as one has seen in action films like Red River or The Overlanders) might, for instance, have served to make the same point as shot 4. But the quick activity within these shots would have been out of keeping with the overall tempo of the sequence. A comparison between shots 10 and 11 reveals another factor which governs the timing of this diverse material. Where a shot is static and makes its impression immediately, it need be left on the screen for only a relatively short time (see 10) ; where a general panoramic view is given of a complex activity (11), more time is needed to allow the shot's impact to reach the audience. To an editor working with material which was not in the first place shot for his use, this problem of finding the right length for a shot may sometimes present technical difficulties. Shot 52, for example, as it was used in its original form, was too short for the present film and had to be step-printed to the needed length to make it comprehensible. Shots 12-15 take up a new aspect of the theme — the preparation of food. The stress is on the efficiency and cleanliness of proper handling of raw food-stuffs. 13 and 15 are cut to the rhythmic movements in the shot to strengthen the impression of mechanical efficiency of large-scale catering. The next group of shots (16-22) goes on to the next logical step 207