HISTORY OF EDITING
The Birth of Edit
In the year 1906, Edison Skylight Studio was taken over by Edwin S. Porter, and he was made head of production. In 1906, the studio brought out a film called Life of and American Fireman. This was one of the first films where cutting was seen. For example, the shots actually overlapped with action. At first you see the fireman going down the pole, and the next shot is the firemen only just going down the pole, which some people may see as a bit of a flash back. Porter continued to do this throughout the film, like when the fireman is carrying a person out the window, from inside the bedroom and then the next shot is again the fireman taking the person out the window, however this shot is seen from the outside of the house. This initially started the whole edit craze.
In the year 1906, Edison Skylight Studio was taken over by Edwin S. Porter, and he was made head of production. In 1906, the studio brought out a film called Life of and American Fireman. This was one of the first films where cutting was seen. For example, the shots actually overlapped with action. At first you see the fireman going down the pole, and the next shot is the firemen only just going down the pole, which some people may see as a bit of a flash back. Porter continued to do this throughout the film, like when the fireman is carrying a person out the window, from inside the bedroom and then the next shot is again the fireman taking the person out the window, however this shot is seen from the outside of the house. This initially started the whole edit craze.
D.W.Griffith and Continuity Editing
D.W. Griffith, all through his life wanted to be a playwright, unfortunately for Griffith he was struggling a lot by doing this until he decided to submit a scenario to one of his idols, non other that Edwin Porter under the name Lawrence Griffin. However, Griffin rejected the playwright but did end up hiring him as an actor, which was soon to change his life. In 1908 Griffith accepted an offer to play a part in Biograph's film Professional Jealousy, however when the director of the company sadly died, and his son ended up making no money, the company was given over to Griffith which was about to make his life change. In
1909 Griffith directed a film called The Lonely Villa which actually built up for the tempo of the cut and gave it cinematic climax. This was one of the first films which used Intercutting or Cross Cutting, which is cutting between shots in different scenes in a parallel action. This links through Continuity Editing as the cutting style that maintains a sense of continuous space and time, this providing the 180 degree rule.They did this by firstly showing a woman held up in a house, then the robbers trying to get in and finally the husband rushing home. Through the years of 1908-1911, Griffith made over 450 films for Biograph, and left in 1914, where he was to go on and release an independent film which was widely known called After Many Years (1915). This film was to come as the worlds first blockbusters, costing $115,000 at the time making it the most expensive film to date. However the film was even banned in some states due to the racism within the film even in 1915. Griffith still continued to make films and in 1916, he made a $2,500,000 film, called Intolerance (1916) which ended up with 8 hours of footage, but Griffith had to cut it down to 3.5 hours. Griffith was the one who actually created the Cut In. He did this by getting a medium long shot of a hanging tree, to a full shot of the scene for emotional purposes.
Soviet Cinema
During Soviet Russia, Moscow Film School was the worlds first film school which opened in 1919. The main purpose of the school was for the students to make films for agitation and propaganda, which was came to known as agitprop. Due to this being the main purpose, Lev Kuleshov decided to open a workshop names 'The Kuleshov Workshop' after hours and the workshop consisted of disecting and reassembling D.W Griffiths shots from Intolerance (which Kuleshov loved) and make the same film but in a different edit. Kuleshov learned he was able to make the audience feel different emotions using the same reaction video. For example, he first took an expressionless face of a man, and after he would put a shot of soup, again he took the face and after put a shot of a woman in a coffin and finally once again putting the expressionless face shot back in and then a seductive woman on the couch. Kuleshov learnt that audiences read the face by the nature of the shots around it, which gave the audience different feelings for each shot. Again, Kuleshov put 3 shots together. The first was an actor smiling, then a close up of a revolver, and lastly a frightened face. When the audience was show the shots in this order, they named him a coward. However when Kuleshov reversed the shot, the actor was named brave. Thus showing, changing shots, can change the whole meaning.
Eisenstein and the Theory of Montage
Sergei Eisenstein developed montage through theory. He did this by using the edit to break confines of space and time to make film a unique language. This can be seen in his film Battleship Potemkin (1925). The 5 methods of montage, least to most difficult are:
D.W. Griffith, all through his life wanted to be a playwright, unfortunately for Griffith he was struggling a lot by doing this until he decided to submit a scenario to one of his idols, non other that Edwin Porter under the name Lawrence Griffin. However, Griffin rejected the playwright but did end up hiring him as an actor, which was soon to change his life. In 1908 Griffith accepted an offer to play a part in Biograph's film Professional Jealousy, however when the director of the company sadly died, and his son ended up making no money, the company was given over to Griffith which was about to make his life change. In
1909 Griffith directed a film called The Lonely Villa which actually built up for the tempo of the cut and gave it cinematic climax. This was one of the first films which used Intercutting or Cross Cutting, which is cutting between shots in different scenes in a parallel action. This links through Continuity Editing as the cutting style that maintains a sense of continuous space and time, this providing the 180 degree rule.They did this by firstly showing a woman held up in a house, then the robbers trying to get in and finally the husband rushing home. Through the years of 1908-1911, Griffith made over 450 films for Biograph, and left in 1914, where he was to go on and release an independent film which was widely known called After Many Years (1915). This film was to come as the worlds first blockbusters, costing $115,000 at the time making it the most expensive film to date. However the film was even banned in some states due to the racism within the film even in 1915. Griffith still continued to make films and in 1916, he made a $2,500,000 film, called Intolerance (1916) which ended up with 8 hours of footage, but Griffith had to cut it down to 3.5 hours. Griffith was the one who actually created the Cut In. He did this by getting a medium long shot of a hanging tree, to a full shot of the scene for emotional purposes.
Soviet Cinema
During Soviet Russia, Moscow Film School was the worlds first film school which opened in 1919. The main purpose of the school was for the students to make films for agitation and propaganda, which was came to known as agitprop. Due to this being the main purpose, Lev Kuleshov decided to open a workshop names 'The Kuleshov Workshop' after hours and the workshop consisted of disecting and reassembling D.W Griffiths shots from Intolerance (which Kuleshov loved) and make the same film but in a different edit. Kuleshov learned he was able to make the audience feel different emotions using the same reaction video. For example, he first took an expressionless face of a man, and after he would put a shot of soup, again he took the face and after put a shot of a woman in a coffin and finally once again putting the expressionless face shot back in and then a seductive woman on the couch. Kuleshov learnt that audiences read the face by the nature of the shots around it, which gave the audience different feelings for each shot. Again, Kuleshov put 3 shots together. The first was an actor smiling, then a close up of a revolver, and lastly a frightened face. When the audience was show the shots in this order, they named him a coward. However when Kuleshov reversed the shot, the actor was named brave. Thus showing, changing shots, can change the whole meaning.
Eisenstein and the Theory of Montage
Sergei Eisenstein developed montage through theory. He did this by using the edit to break confines of space and time to make film a unique language. This can be seen in his film Battleship Potemkin (1925). The 5 methods of montage, least to most difficult are:
- Metric - Cutting to the beat
- Rhythmic - Concentrating rhythm of action in the shot
- Tonal - Concerning with the tone of the shot
- Over Tonal - Concerning montage of large sequences
- Intellectual - Concerning Ideas
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