Interview: Editors of “The Social Network”
From Vanity Fair, a nice glimpse into director David Fincher’s approach to filmmaking and the importance of the script’s narrative structure on the editing process with Angus Wall and Kirk Baxter:
Little Gold Men: Let’s start with the obvious. What do you think as editors when Fincher comes at you with his infamous “99 takes” approach to filmmaking?
Angus: Well, he may have shot 99 takes, but he doesn’t actually send all 99 takes to us. I think it was usually 60-odd takes and 30 he didn’t like. The great thing with David is you get a lot of material. Having that allows you to do things that make the scene much better.
Kirk: It’s not like he’s shooting one shot, 99 times. He’s also getting all his coverage. He might do that master for a bunch of takes, then he’ll get the over-the-shoulder, then the close-up. He’s going to make sure he’s got a great performance from every angle.
— —
Was the screenplay’s structure a challenge? Was it hard helping the audience keep track of when and where the action is taking place?
Kirk: The main heavy lifting is really the writing. The traction of it all makes sense and that’s based on what Aaron wrote. Our task was — does it make sense to be overlapping this, should there be hard cuts?
Angus: Does the dialogue pre-lap? There are a couple of phrases or lines that are lifted from scenes, but in terms of the shape of the movie, it’s very much in the original script.
Kirk: We played it quite straight towards the beginning when you’re jumping back and forth in time. As the audience got used to that language, we were able to get more aggressive in overlapping the lines and speeding it up.
Note that use of the term “pre-lap”. That’s where dialogue from the next scene actually begins in the preceding scene. You’d write that like this:
INT. HOUSE — NIGHT
Jason enters. Hears noises in the bedroom. Pushes open the door
to see —
A WOMAN AND A MAN
Thrashing around in bed like a pair of crazed weasels —
JASON (V.O.)
That’s when I realized…
INT. BAR — NIGHT
A bleary-eyed and severely drunk Jason. Pouring out his soul to
an uncaring BARTENDER —
JASON
My boyfriend liked girls.
You can use pre-laps to make seamless transitions from one scene to the next.
For more of the interview, go here.