The Best Edited Films. Ever.

In the June 2012 issue of CineMontage, members of the Motion Picture Editors Guild ranked the 75 best-edited films of all time.  The top 25 appear below, but a statistical summary the entire list may prove instructive for students and teachers of film:

• Most of the films cited are from the 1970s.  None are from the 1930s (which makes sense, given the difficulties of editing which accompanied the changeover to sound).  
• Five Hitchcock films appear as well as four each directed by Spielberg and Coppola.  
• George Tomasini, Dede Allen, Michael Kahn, and Thelma Schoonmaker, are the list's most frequently-named editors.
• Guild choices also commend work of audio editors, with Walter Murch (6) and Howard Beals (5) cited most often.

1999 - Zach Staenberg

Shades of Je Suis Charlie

The outrage du jour in a free, capitalistic, pluralism.

Our Dodge Polara – more tank than station wagon – slowed as it passed the Biltmore Twin Theatres.  Maybe Mom was trying to read the picket signs.  Marchers and their placards asserted hate for Hollywood, love for God and country.  Oddly enough, I don’t remember which movie was on the marquee.  Last Tango in Paris, The Exorcist, Life of Brian, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Last Temptation of Christ – for all I know, the same protest signs were reused from one film to the next.

The objections were always to depictions of blasphemy or (even consensual) sex.  Why never violence?  Why never the unflattering depiction of women or minorities?  Why never the censorious overreach of governments?  Unevenly indignant, I suppose the protesters nevertheless intended to stand for something noble.

The End of Bold Critique

A month ago, a friend of mine had a baby.  I'm happily included in a cluster of folk who bring meals and coo at the fresh human.  The women in that circle compare birth narratives ("...well I was in labor for twenty hours...," "...like pushing a watermelon through a straw...," "...one kid right after another, like a Pez dispenser..." and so on).  And many of them — seldom in the new mother's presence, mind you — say some variation of this:  "Wow, she looks good; she's lost nearly all her baby weight."

It's clear that women (yes, even in this enlightened age) value certain standards of weight loss and ideals of figure.  But they dare not encourage it.  They can no longer ask each other "So, when did you think you might lose those last five or six pounds?"  These women are not Philistines.  Many are educated "crunchy moms" who read and share articles about home delivery, organic foods, and gender empowerment.  They envision and work for a world free from privilege and discrimination.

MFA & PhD: Questioning Equity

Some questions might help your department extend a previous discussion on the care and feeding of MFAs in your midst by examining whether practice and theory are really as integrated as admissions brochures claim.  As with any survey, you may expect anonymity to affect the answers considerably.

CURRICULUM

• Quantify the courses in an undergraduate Media Production degree.  How many are studies classes?  How many are production classes?  Does your Studies faculty consider that adequate?  Does your Production faculty?
• What is your department's course substitution practice?  If a senior on the cusp of graduation needs a production course that isn't offered, is her advisor any more or less likely to substitute a theory course?

MFA & PhD: The Privilege of Theory

Good Grief.  Not everyone wears chevrons, Charlie Brown.

Nudged there by professors, the issue of privilege floats frequently to the forefront of classroom discussions.  White.  Male.  Abel-bodied.  Western.  Wealthy.  Heteronormative.  Unexamined.  Media-reinforced.  Encouraging students to question and define social norms for their generation is our duty.  It's also our pleasure.  We seem frequently to take delight as the powerful squirm beneath the light of examination.

But who might squirm if the same light were turned on those who themselves study Communication?  Who are the powerful among Media professors and administrators?  Who are the wealthy?  Which groups are favored by history?  How might we identify (and challenge) the privileged among us?

Syllabus Calendars for Media Studies

Media Studies Calendars:  Knowledge-Based, Individual... and Arbitrary

Because a syllabus is shaped by the prevailing mode of instruction, it’s probably wise to divide “Studies” from “Production” in a discussion of calendar creation.

Media Studies courses tend to be knowledge-based.  That knowledge is demonstrated  largely by individual essays, individual tests, and individual speeches.  Despite the occasional group project, the grade of one student infrequently impacts the work of others.  If Mary turns in her paper a week late, it’s no skin off Ethan’s nose.

The Train Wreck of Hate Watching

The moment of impact at the famous Crush, Texas train wreck in 1896.  Many of the 40,000 onlookers were injured by debris.

Some of the best-attended spectator events of the 19th century were staged train wrecks.  Decommissioned locomotives intentionally smashed into each other at high speed before grandstands of onlookers.  Perhaps this love of calamity constitutes an antecedent for the phenomenon of “hate watching.”  Yes, our species is so reliably bitchy that NBC strategically presumed a certain percentage of this week’s Peter Pan Live! audience would be snarky tweeters hoping for something to go wrong.

That reminds me of a few too many college committee meetings.  You know how they are.  Somebody presents a new idea.  Maybe a curriculum upgrade, maybe the renaming of a course.  And those around the table offer criticism.  They almost always offer criticism.  They offer criticism because it demonstrates they’ve read the agenda or studied the proposal.  Much less often (in my own experience) do they say, simply, “I like it,” “Count me in,” or “Let’s move forward.”