Film School Crash Course: The 10 Most Effective Editing Moments of All Time
There are very few things that you can learn in film school that can't be learned online in some form or another. The only problem is that tracking down all of that information can be a bit of, well, a pain in the ass. Oftentimes you have to dig through page after page on obscure forums, or watch YouTube video after YouTube video, just to find something that is relatively helpful in your pursuit of filmmaking knowledge. Other times however, sites like IndieWire, Cinefix, (and ours, of course) bring the film school to you, without any need for absurd tuition and a lifetime of debt, and for people wondering what kind of material is taught in college editing courses, right now is one of those times.
I would like to preface this by saying that the following video is literally a 7-minute crash course in what I learned from the first two weeks of an advanced editing class a few years ago. Essentially, through studying some of the most iconic and viscerally effective moments in editing history, you can begin to internalize the philosophies behind the myriad techniques used in those edits, everything from graphic matches and elliptical edits to frenetically-paced and juxtapositional edits.
So here are the 10 most effective editing moments of all time. This video comes courtesy of the excellent Cinefix YouTube channel, and is a video adaptation of one of IndieWire's many lists.
Having completed my stint in film school, I can guarantee you guys that these are the films, and the specific moments from those films, that are studied extensively. Why? Because many of these moments exemplify the power and allure behind the art of cinema editing, while making us aware of some of the advanced aesthetic techniques that comprise editing grammar. They're prime examples of techniques that all of us, or at least those of us with an interest in the psychological implications of editing, should learn and internalize for use in our own films.
Link: CineFix -- YouTube
