Every day until the Oscars ceremony we’ll be highlighting a different category or movie here on the LAMB! Here’s a link to all the posts written so far:

Today, Rob from MovieRob (that’s me) is here to look at the nominees for Best Film Editing.

Thanks!

Best
Film Editing

Film Editing is an often overlooked profession in the industry because we never get to see how they do their work, just the final product and for those of us who love movies, it’s quite easy to see why their work is so integral to making the movie work so well.

The Film Editor has the task of taking the finished elements of the movie and putting them all together in a way that we can enjoy the story and characters so much better.

This year’s five nominees all were able to give us more concise stories to savor for all time due to their diligent work in making these movies coherent and put together so well.

Ford v Ferrari
As with most films that require fast paced action, proper editing is needed in order to make the action flow so well. In a racing movie like this one, it’s even more important to edit things properly since it allows us to see the cars racing along from numerous angles without the feeling that the story isn’t flowing properly or worse – that the cars aren’t really racing. This film won the BAFTA for Best Film Editing last week.

The Irishman

This film does a wonderful job with the after effects of editing because they are able to make a 3 and a half hour film feel like it’s flowing so smoothly due to the adept editing. If the story wasn’t constantly cutting from different perspectives in every scene, then things would end up feeling completely monotonous. (Which is a big non-no if you want to keep the audience in their seats for over 210 minutes.)

Jojo Rabbit

The editing in this film is also great and they are able to tell such a compelling story with some very clever edits in order to help the satirical nature of this film come alive which is quite important when trying to walk the fine line between drama and satire. This film also won the ACE Eddie for Comedy.

Joker

The editing of this film is also wondrous. They are able to create a story that stays quite intriguing throughout because of the quick cuts between scenes and interactions between the characters. The editing is also what helps make this film feel slightly off-balanced which in turns reflects how the main character feels throughout and thus helps the audience connect even more with the character.

Parasite

The expert editing in this film helps keep a balance between the two social classes being depicted because it is able to place them side by side or change them around when needed. The film also contains a great 5 minute montage of shots (involving a peach) that helps make us get a much better understanding of everything going on without the need to give us a long drawn out explanation. This film also won the ACE Eddie for Drama.

My analysis

I think that Parasite actually has the best chance here to win this award due to its recent win at the ACE awards and also due to the fact that the Oscar voters have never had as much love for racing dramas like they do at the BAFTAs. The overall love that many voters have for this film might also factor into play because it gives voters a chance to give this film more love.