SUDDENLY SOMETHING CLICKED

The nitty-gritty of film and sound editing.

When, in June 1896, the Lumière brothers projected their film of a street scene onto a bedsheet in a brothel, no one could have predicted its revolutionary effect on visual storytelling. That was partly because the “catalytic possibilities of montage” were not yet fully developed. Five years later, nascent filmmakers began to “discover and exploit the intoxicating, virtually sexual power of montage.” One of today’s most celebrated practitioners in the world of film editing and sound design is Walter Murch, who explains the art and science of his craft in this book. Murch calls this work, the first of two anticipated volumes, a “three-braided rope” incorporating theory, practice, and history. Most of the examples he cites stem from his work with Francis Ford Coppola, with emphasis on his efforts on The Conversation (1974), the first feature he ever edited, and Apocalypse Now (1979). He also tells of work on other projects, such as the 1998 restoration of Orson Welles’ Touch of Evil, a 1958 film Murch says was “a decade ahead of its time.” Much of this book will delight film aficionados who want to get into the weeds of extensive technical detail, as when he describes “the attributes of the saccade—the jump of the eyeball from one focal point to another” to explain why people see motion when watching a film. He also leavens this work with lighter moments. When the workprint for Coppola’s The Rain People (1969) came back upside down, and sophisticated solutions didn’t solve the problem, “Francis found the obvious solution: just turn the television set upside down.” Murch displays a ferocious wit, as when, under a still from The Godfather (1972) in which a movie mogul wakes to discover his beloved horse’s severed head in his bed, Murch includes the caption “Studio politics.”

An excellent primer on the art of film and sound editing from one of the experts.