The film starts, we fade in, a man is having a dream, the shots cut between twenty different things and back again, what just happened?
Rapid fire editing is the term used by those in the industry, but apparently these days it has lost much of its old appeal. The good folks over at yahoo.com give us words from three time Oscar nominee Steven Rosenblum (Blood Diamonds) on the editing practice:
“There are lesser editors who don’t even have the skills to do really significant quick cutting,” Rosenblum says. “But when really good people do it, they are so skilled that you just buy it. And that’s sometimes a trap, too, because at the end of the day, it’s still going to call attention to itself as, ‘Look at what I can do,’ which almost always works against a story.”
I can agree with that. Sometimes this type of editing can be very distracting, and, it’s also feeling a bit dated to me. There is something a little 80’s music video about quick cutting.
What are your thoughts on the flashing, rapid fire editing? Could you do without or do you think it adds to the film?
