SINNERS: Why Editing Is Not Negotiable

- This dance sequence, or as the filmmakers call it, the Surreal Montage, What most people don't know is that a good portion of the test audiences actually wanted this scene to be cut from the movie entirely. - We would test the movie whether with audiences or filmmakers, you know, we trust and we got it. Maybe 25, 30% of people saying you should take that scene out. It doesn't move the story forward. People were saying the beginning was too slow and to cut it down. - Today I want to show you why the editor director fought to keep it. Once you get it, you know - You love it. - What had to change structurally to make it work? - A big part is teaching your audience how to watch the movie that they're about to watch. If you don't establish that, you won't get the reactions that you're hoping for in terms of the emotional journey of the audience - And what this teaches us about storytelling, audience psychology, and real editorial decision making. So in this video, I'm going to break it down for you. Now that Michael got nominated for an Oscar, I also want to give you my take on why I actually think he might win. All of this in this video. Preacher boy, where you at? - Come on in man. My - Little cousin, y'all watch this. Okay, so we now know that the filmmakers obviously considered this scene to be non-negotiable. It has to stay in the film because it defines the movie and ultimately I think it will be remembered for many years to come. So I want to do two things. First, watch the scene with you. So spoiler alert while looking at the editing and see what they did there because it's quite interesting. Then secondly, I wanna look at the big picture and see how they made this work so the audience isn't confused or bored while expecting the horror plot to just move along. And quite the opposite has been accomplished Here we're now even more engaged with the story because the film transcends to another level of the supernatural. I'm gonna break down the scene using the always handy DaVinci Resolve function, detect, edit. And I'm actually curious to see if DaVinci will actually miss some of the invisible edits in the scene because technically this is a Oner. A Oner is a shot without any cuts, but here it has some hidden cut points. And then secondly, I'm going to show you what changes they made to the beginning of the film to make it all work. But first, let's look at the scene. So what I'm doing here is I am using Da Vinci Resolve's auto detect function, which is under timeline detect scene cuts, and it's going through the entire scene figuring out where the cut points are and it'll be really cool to find out whether it actually finds the hidden cut points in the oner, the foundation edit, which is about to start right here. Ooh, that's interesting. And it's looking further. and we see this is this foundation and I think it found one of them, but not all of them. Now that we've done this, let's take a look at this scene and see what we can learn about the editing. Listen to the music. Why can't you just say that? Say what Guitar I think about you. Eight day. Alright, seems over Music change. We had guitar before, now it's piano. So new beat, new story turn, long, dissolve. I can't remember if there are any long dissolves in the film, but it stands out as a significant different cut than the rest of the scene. As if the song started and it now is over transition of time. That's what that dissolve is doing. And for it being long, I think it matters because if it was a short dissolve, it's something that we haven't done in quite a while in classical filmmaking, cutting with short dissolves, it's reminiscent to porn actually nowadays back then it wasn't. But these long dissolves, they're kind of are reminiscent of old times of how storytelling was. And like there's a director, Alexander Payne, who very intentionally allows these long dissolves in his films and more so obviously the editor Kevin Tent of like The Holdovers. If you watch it, there's a bunch of these long dissolves and

it's a reflection of period time, long time ago. Okay, to summarize, sorry, I get I, I get always so like into the weeds with this. It's a really nice transition from one big scene to what's about to become probably the biggest scene in the first half of the movie. So it takes a time where the piano starts but with a long dissolve, the song already finishes instead of like now the, he has to continue playing throughout the scene because that's not what the scene is about, it's just transitional. Here we go. Oh shit. Hey, - I've been hearing about this. - I'm also gonna look at the composition of the shots. Right now we are in what we call cowboys. A cowboy shot is basically from the head to like just below the hip where the revolver used to be in Westerns. And it's somewhat of a neutral composition. It's not telling us something about the emotional state of a character, it's just giving us the facts so to say. - Supposed to be a bad blue man. Preach' boy. Where you at? Come on man. - Mediums. Medium. My little cousin, y'all. Cowboy, cowboy boy. Medium. Medium closeup. Oh, oh, oh. So this is the first time as he's starting to play we get a little closer. Everything else was pretty neutral here. We're starting to get a little bit into his head. - Oh hold, hold, hold. Tell'm who you - Are. Medium closeup, were you from. So medium closeup says this is kind of important. Tell 'em who you are, where you're from. Little closer. - I'm Sammy Moore, - Medium. - I'm a sharecropper from Sunflower Plantation - Medium. They called me preacher boy - Cowboy - my daddy be the pastor - I wrote this song for him. - Insert. So tell you for a long time. - So cutting to these mediums and then this insert medium closeup. We're establishing a certain rhythm and flow of how this scene sets up. And this is like reality. We are in the moment. This is real. Everything is real here. It's very neutral, but there is a strategy behind cutting this way. So we're established a certain rhythm and in terms of the composition, the kind of shots we're gonna see and what's also interesting to notice the length of this shot is obviously considerably longer than all the previous shots we've seen so far. It's because it allows us to just take in the song and the, the words of the song. Nothing really is happening in terms of the storytelling yet. It's just like we're getting to experience the song and it settles us in. - I love you papa. You did all you can do. And they say the truth hurts. So I lied to you. Yes, - I love the news. - A reaction of somebody that is enjoying the song. Now we're switching composition. It's a low angle, it just changes things up. I don't know what I'm supposed to feel other than okay we're, we're slightly elevating the tension of the scene. Like it's, it's getting to the next phrase of things, but nothing is really dramatically different yet. We're still getting into it. Okay, this is interesting because she is the love interest of the preacher boy, the guy that's playing. So she gets a little bit set up here for later, much closer on him. Now this is the closest we've been so far. Still a medium closeup though. Another reaction. Somebody - Take me, - He's kind of starting to get with it. I think he's a little bit more, it feels like he's holding back but he's, he's starting to understand that this is actually quite good. But he is not a hundred percent on board yet, right? Everybody else is on board. They're all going with it, having a good time. He's just taking it in and he still has to make up his mind, which creates a little tension in terms of the character

and how he feels about this. Again, we're in this low angle, so it's kind of almost like a bookmarks wasn't forced on us - Like that religion. - Okay, so what's going on now we've ended sort of that whole first phrase of the song and now we are in a different time. The pianist is not playing the piano and preacher boy has a completely different outfit. So this must have happened at a different time or it just happening in somebody's mind. Probably this is a flashback and how do we get into it by this bookmark shot of low angle and then landing on the guitar - Wasn't forced on us like that religion. So we brought this with us home. - It's magic what we do, - It's sacred. Okay, before we now get into the main part of the scene, again, this is a transitional moment and notice how the audio changes in terms of the audio. We have pretty full on music and then it echoes the way you can hear a reverb and we're cutting to this kind of flashback or whatever that is - Wasn't forced on us like that religion. We brought this with us home. - It magic what we do. It sacred. - I love this shot. It feels like truth telling to me. He's saying something important and something really truthful right now. And the shot really emphasizes this. And I love how the key lights here in the eyes, it's a key light basically it just gives it this additional layer. Imagine we would not have this key light here. It would just be black. The shot would feel flat and this creates that additional layer of cinematic artistry. So let's just listen to what he's really saying. - So we brought this with us home. The magic, what we do, the sacred. - So I'm, I'm gathering that this is like he is talking about how music invites magic or spirits. So he's introducing what is about to happen and it's all in somebody's mind. Probably the preacher's boy's mind - Sacred. - We - Pull - Back, there are legends of people born with the gift of making music so true. It can pierce the between life and death. Conjuring spirits from the past. Nobody - Take it. Okay, there are three things happening here that we should pay attention to. First of all, just visually the aspect ratio. You notice it is letter box right now and it starts to go up. It's opening, the world is opening up. We're going from what is real to something that is supernatural. That's number one. Number two is there's a new voiceover and it is not the pianist, it's actually a woman, a female voice. And if you see the film you might track back to when you heard that voice before. And the third thing that we're seeing visually is that kind of the edges of the frames start to become blurry. Anamorphic maybe. But something is happening where we're losing the focus and clarity of the now and it's becoming more surreal experience. In German, it's Z. See the letterbox disappear. - Legends - See how the edges are fading. Oh and the fourth element, like this guy is not, he's from a different time period, right? He's not from there, not even from the same country. He's from Africa may - Between life and death, conjuring spirits from the past. - So that is a spirit from the past. They anxious us damn future and the future. This is a future ancestor. What is a future ancestor? I don't know what word is, but it's going from the past and where they came from to where they're going. Let's go one more time. Sacred. - They're legends of people born with the gift of making music.

So true. It can pierce the veil between life and death. Conjuring spirits from the past and - Arms tonight - It's all a warner. As I described earlier. The camera's moving around, it almost feels like the camera sometimes lifts up or the person is on some form of crane that he gets on whatever the editing was before in terms of the conventional medium, closeup, maybe a cowboy. All that has changed. Now we are now in a different state of the scene and so has the editing, which is there is no editing. It's a Warner and it's floating. It's moving. And what I'm curious to see is look at this angle. What do you see here in the background? There's nothing there. Like it's an empty stage. Just keep that in mind as you see the camera turn around, what happens to that space? Damn, Do you notice it? Now there's a DJ there, right? And so they must have rolled in that table with a guy while it was like on the guitar, like the electric guitar player from the future right there. Da Vinci Resolve actually found an edit point there. Let's see if that is an edit point right there when it sweeps over the piano boom. Yes, when I saw this scene just yesterday when I looked at it, I felt the same thing that this is a composite shot right here. So this is where they stopped the first time. So far everything's been one take since we started to like move around and float around. And then right here they had their first cut point. Why? They just needed some points where they can like reset because there's so much blocking going on. So many things have to come together in the shot in terms of like the table moving in with the DJ and the ancestors from the past coming and all this stuff that you want to break it up into chunks where you can like just shoot that a couple of times to make sure you get it and then you move on to the next segment of the scene without giving away that. Obviously that's a hidden cut point. Just also wanted to point out two things here. I love the beer bottle on the piano and I wonder if we've seen this beer bottle before. This is really the very first time, but it just, it adds a little bit more layers to a shot. A shot usually has, can have three layers, right? What's in the foreground, what's in the middle, what's in the distance? And having something in the foreground just gives it more perspective and it makes it more interesting. We haven't even talked about the song yet. There's these whoosh sounds which is probably from that record, but then kind of enhanced in the sound design. Just wanna point out also, this guy over here just popped out of nowhere again another ghost from the future. And there the ghost from the past is a cut point. Okay? So we're following her for a while. Pick it up here.

This is all obviously choreography in terms of the blocking of the actors in leading the camera toward what the next point is. That is interesting. You need something to happen. And what's happening is these people just dancing around, walking to different parts of the room. Notice these two guys, notice this guy. Boom. And then notice her. So again, it's another cultural reference of where we all come from, how we got here, where we going while they were doing the shot, she was hiding behind this curtain. We never saw her until the camera turns around. Let's take a look at that. So she's already here, she's waiting behind the curtain. Okay, so da Vinci did not catch this cut point here, right? You can tell if you go frame by frame that this is the new reset here, which is good. These transition points when we like move across a column or the piano are good ways to hide cut points and then they can, they can get into the next thing. I just feel the cut right here. I think this exactly is the cut point right there. So I'm just gonna manually put that in here. Okay? Another cultural reference that I'm sure has some meaning that I'm not aware of. Let me know in the comments. If you know exactly from what culture this is coming from, it's another future ghost. The music has changed, it's more hectic future ghost, it lands on him, his hand guides the camera. So now imagine watching this film of you haven't in the theaters in IMEX theater and you get to experience it there and you have no idea what's like that. This would be coming, nobody's told you in the film. And the film didn't really reveal that this is the level that it's going to take. It's emotionally so impactful. And I was just completely besides myself when I was watching the film for the first time. And then obviously here's a cut point somewhere here. It's a dissolve. We're in effects land right now. This is visual effects. So let's put it in there. Camera comes back down, we heal our people, we be free. Listen to the instrumentation of kids. So this is obviously the piano player's voice I think, but what is the instrument? We're seeing him play the guitar, but what are we hearing? Lemme see. We hear our people. It's an electric guitar, right? We be free. Oh and there he is. And then we're transitioning back into

what is the main plot. The music again starts to transition. Kind of a wish or sting at the end. The love story of the preacher boy. I mean I think this was quite interesting to look at the scene and see all the little sort of finessing that they did and how they designed the scene on its own. But big picture again, they had a challenge because the beginning didn't prepare us for the scene and that's why they changed the complete opening. And if you're watching the film, you notice that now at the beginning you have this kind of spiritual introduction to the mythology of the film is what I would call it. So you hear music and you hear this female voice that we heard here as well Introduce us to this idea that music can conjure up spirits and can bring them back. And sometimes that's a good thing bad thing. - There are legends of people born with the gift of making music so true. It can pierce the veil between life and death. Conjuring spirits from the past and the future. In ancient island, they were called Philly. This gift can bring healing to their communities, but it also attracts evil. - This sets up the premise of this film very much so without that scene at the beginning. And they had like quite a, I think they had like a horror scene first where white guy in his farmhouse, when he gets visited by those zombies, that's originally how the film started potentially, if I remember correctly. And it created a false expectation or different expectations so that by the time the audience landed on this scene, they just didn't know what to think of it. And Michael described this actually with another example. He was cutting a film that was meant to be a comedy. And the first version of that didn't start with a joke. It started with something that was kind of a dramatic thing. So the audience immediately thought they were watching a drama. And then later on when all the comedy was happening and the comedy was quite like awkward intentionally, it just didn't land with the audience. They weren't laughing and then they just included a joke at the beginning of the film and they got a predictable laugh of it. So it was a strong comedic moment, an a moment as we call in comedy. And then the audience was ready for everything else that was happening in the film. And this is what's going on here as well. I mean, I'd be very curious to know what you think about the scene. What do film overall in terms of the craft, the storytelling, how unique this is? It's an original story and it's succeeded on many levels in terms of connecting with an audience and being financially super successful. And that's not an easy to do nowadays where you're up against all these ips that the studios are throwing at audience and trying to get predictable result to take a chance on a film like this is quite amazing. And I enjoyed it quite a bit. I think this year we had some really, really interesting films. Now I want to end with two things that Michael said as well in terms of editing and our career. And this applies not just to editing, but being a filmmaker. If this is something that you are really interested, you have that desire, that dream to tell your own stories. The first thing that he said is take power. You are in a position to decide what you're gonna do. You don't have to wait for anybody to give you permission to be a filmmaker - Because if you make something good and throw it on YouTube, it's gonna get noticed. I didn't have that path, which, you know, on paper can seem like an easier path. It was actually much harder 'cause I was my own assistant for several movies. The whole reason why I'm here is because, you know, and I was the guy who sat in the back of the class, didn't answer questions, except that when I was called on. - And the second thing, and this is something that I think is quite surprising for many people, is that he's accessible and his advice is - Reach out to anybody that's in the position that you wanna be. Wherever it is. If someone reaches out to me and is like, Hey, can we get a cup of coffee or lunch or something and talk or jump on a zoom, if I can fit in my schedule, I'm happy to. I think a lot of people would be surprised at how much people don't reach out to us. So you know, stepping outside your comfort zone, like taking a risk, reach out. You know, I tell my agent, if anybody reaches out to them, send 'em my way. And if I can help, you know, do that. Especially editors, we're in a service position, which means I think we're on the more affable, friendly, helpful side of things. Take a couple shots, throw some things out to get there. - Now don't all reach out to Michael because he said it, but take that as advice

and journal that whoever you admire, whatever films you look up to, don't be afraid to reach out to the editors. Quite accessible. Directors might be a lot harder because they're kind of celebrities, but editors first of all in the service industry. So they're there to help people. And secondly, they're not being hunted down as much when it comes to people that look up to him that want to learn from them. And then also, if you're interested to get deep into the scene, Michael was demonstrating how we cut the film. Like we get to see his avid timeline and various scenes that he went through and described the process of how the storytelling evolved. If that's something you want to dive into, I can recommend to you to become a member on this YouTube channel. And I have posted that two hour segment in there. I'll leave a link in the video description. And if you become a member, as a reward and as a thank you for not just being a subscriber, which is really the most important thing is to, if you're into this kind of content, please subscribe. But also support the channel by being a member and getting some extra bonus videos that go so deep that if you're not really that into it, maybe it doesn't matter. But for those people that deeply care about the process of how to tell a story in a way that it engages an audience is something that is very, very valuable to them. Thanks so much for watching and happy editing. Cheers.