Going gangbusters here at the box office...
and Joe, Russel is here in Sydney. If there's someone else over there claiming to be Russel Crowe and showing your movies and leaving the toilet seat up, you've got an imposter on your hands.

In fact, Russel is here now moving IMAX prints around for me and says I have a real job and that acting is cushy and just for namby pambys...

Fundamentally, "Gladiator" has two problems; and two fallacies that are becoming more and more common in movies today, but which aggravate me nonetheless... (this probably has more to do with me getting old and crotchety, I guess):

(1) They take too long to tell the story.
Everybody today thinks their movie is more important than any other, and the director's self-indulgence ultimately translates into running times well over 120 minutes.

(2) Action scenes are cut too #$%@# fast, and with unnecessary coverage!
This is an outgrowth of the MTV generation. Individual shots aren't on the screen long enough to register, and you end-up getting left behind in a smathering of musical cues and sound effects. You have to wait until after the characters are picking up the pieces of an altercation to discover, by deduction, what has transpired. (As an example of how ridiculous this technique is getting... in another movie of this type, I counted FIVE cuts, in a half-second period, to show a character doing something as simple as turning around!)

An additional problem which relates to the latter, is all the action scenes were shot with strobe lighting, which prevents quick movements from blurring. This added to the confusion arising from the quick cuts.

Not to offend anyone, heaven forbid, this is only my opinion. And you know what they say in the military about opinions...

Of course it is great if its in a propoganda machine like Saving Private Ryan. Spewberg can cut frames and give strobing to the opening scenes of SPR but if its done by anyone else its just not needed???

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The man with the magic hands.

No, I don't really like my movie rollercoaster rides slow. I would like to be able to SEE them though, to experience it to the fullest.

If unnecessary cuts and coverage are required to pull off an action scene, then the scene is either lacking in substance, execution, or the director and/or editor is woefully inept. Skillful editing builds excitement and anticipation, and then delivers a release. There has to be a solid PACE. A rhythm. Today's filmmakers seem to have lost sight of that (or else they didn't know it to begin with). I'm only getting the build-up and then they're losing me (and a lot of other people) on the delivery. The result is a great deal of frustration for the viewer.

By and large, all this quick-swish-pan-jump-cut stuff for its own sake came with MTV. This is a fact, it's not a "dis" to young people. And MTV was around a long time before rappers became popular. Since music videos are primarily intended to sell the artist, the only way that a video can stand out is to draw attention to itself. The one that's the quickest, flashiest, loudest, most-obnoxious, or has the newest special effect trick wins. It's eye candy.

"MTV style" filmmaking fails to impress me because it becomes a means to an end. Fundamentally, it has an amateurish quality about it--not necessarily photographically, but one which is telegraphed through infractions of basic editing and storytelling conventions.

I'm sorry but this style is over my head, believe me I would love to be able to catch these new films, but I physically CANNOT FOLLOW THE ACTION!

I think Dwayne pinpointed it, in that there are too many jump cuts. I believe the 180 degree rule has been tossed aside as well. The viewer's eye ends-up getting too many miscues and the result is merely a jumble, which LESSENS a scene's impact, instead of reinforcing it (read FILM EDITING by Karel Reis, this is the reference work on the subject, and it will underscore for you the mistakes these filmmakers are making in logic, pacing and flow).

Regardless of style, there has to be a solid underlying foundation upon which all else is built.

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Better Projection Pays!

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I've read it, I've also read literature by Eisenstein, Godard, and Lang regarding film editing technique, and every film professor will teach the 180 degrees rule, but they will also teach that film editing is a way to manipulate the audience, and however it is edited to achieve the impact the director wants is an effective means of editing. This stated, jump cuts (whether its your opinion that they are excessive) and quick editing enhances the footage and impact of a scene. Its just a different style, and many people like myself got what the director was trying to do. Other people like yourself didn't like it, and in turn critisize it.
I think this style of editing is great, and for you to say that the editor doesn't "get it" is just saying that new and innovative ways of making a movie should be tossed asside, and that every movie should be the same classical style of editing we've been seeing since the 20's.

Ridley Scott, on the other hand, can barely keep the beat.

Then you've missed the point. Just because a "professor" teaches a rule doesn't mean the students will follow it. Reading and understanding are two different things.

>>however it is edited to achieve the impact the director wants is an effective means of editing. <<

Wrong. This is saying that anything goes. You've missed the point of my entire post above. Impact relates to emotional involvement; if an audience can't follow a film, they won't be involved. Simply because a director wants something a certain way does NOT translate into effective. Style and SUBSTANCE are not synonymous. If I made a movie and decided that "my style" was to tell the story completely out of sequence (for example, in shooting order), according to your line of reasoning this would be okay; and if you didn't understand the finished film, it would be your own fault because you're being too old fashioned.

No. Impact is achieved by skillful use of a pallet of techniques (with emphasis on the word skillful), tempered with solid storytelling principles. In other words, you don't use or invent a technique simply because you can, or because it's the flavor of the day; it has to have a purpose in relating your story. Confusion isn't an effective means of communicating anything other than confusion.

>>is just saying that new and innovative ways of making a movie should be tossed asside, and that every movie should be the same classical style of editing we've been seeing since the 20's. <<

I'm not against innovation if it helps move the story concisely (which is, after all, the objective), but style for the sake of style does not an auteur make. In fact, it's pretty boring. FYI, styles have underwent numerous transmogrifications since the 20s. This is illustrated in the Reis book.

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Better Projection Pays!

I guess you've never edited a film, and if you have you must be a VERY strong traditionalist and haven't seen many avante-guarde short film like Brackhage or Deren. When editing styles like that of short film (or even music video) step into mainstream at all it is just misunderstood.

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