The use of Editing in Film

This consists of looking at all the footage recorded and placing it in the desired order with the desired transitions and effects.

The speed of editing is how long each shot lasts which can be seconds or minutes, the length of the sequence establishes the pace of the film and this speed determines the mood of the scene. For example in The Bourne Ultimatum it is fast paced action when the camera is on Matt Damon whereas it is slower more controlled when the camera is focused on Julia Stiles. The quick editing creates the mood of anxiety and suspense.
Also the example of Sleepless in Seattle with its relaxed mood because the scenes last longer and the changes are less frequency.

The scenes at the beginning of a film tell its story. The opening must be long enough for us to be able to understand what's going on and it introduces us to the main characters. The scenes may become shorter as the film progresses and the editing can branch off to different story lines.

The style of editing is how each shot is joined to the next through transitions.
Transitions can be:
Straight cuts - These are invisible and the most common type of transition because the shot moves instantly into the next without taking away the audiences attention. This is beneficial because most modern films aim to make the editing as invisible as possible.

Dissolves - One shot dissolves back into the other whilst it moves into the foreground this is used when the film maker wants to show the connection between characters places or objects or to show the passing of time.

This scene from the end of Psycho shows the face of Norman Bates dissolving into his mothers skull before it fades to the swamp.

Fades - A gradual darkening or lightening of an image until it becomes a block of one colour. This is used to indicate the ending of a particular section of time within the narrative.

Psycho

Phoenix office worker Marion Crane is fed up with the way life has treated her. She has to meet her lover Sam in lunch breaks and they cannot get married because Sam has to give most of his money away in alimony. One Friday Marion is trusted to bank $40,000 by her employer. Seeing the opportunity to take the money and start a new life, Marion leaves town and heads towards Sam's California store. Tired after the long drive and caught in a storm, she gets off the main highway and pulls into The Bates Motel. The motel is managed by a quiet young man called Norman who seems to be dominated by his mother.

Psycho was filmed in 1960 and directed by Alfred Hitchcock. The screenplay was written by Joseph Stefano form the book by Robert Bloch. The stars were Anthony Perkins, Janet Leigh and Vera Miles. 

Thrillers are categorised by their fast paced frequent action which is evident in Psycho with the shower scene being the most prominent but also the car and staircase adding to action. 

The shower scene is most famous action sequence in the film. 

Another trait of thrillers is the resourceful hero who overcomes the more powerful villain. This is true of Psycho but not in the conventional way, the heroic characters of Sam and Lila track Marion and Det. Arbogast to the motel. They also thwart Bates' insane plans of murder and put him behind bars. However the villain does not seem much better equipped apart from  the knife against Marion. 

Psycho uses an ingenious storyline to fool the audience because of the way in which it is brought together. The storyline shocks the audience throughout with the big shocks coming from the shower murder and the revelation about Mother but there are minor shocks such as the Det. being murdered. The shock murder of Marion would trick most audiences as we come to believe her to be the main character of the film and begin to identify with her before her abrupt exit. Viewers seeing this film for the first time would experience the full force of Hitchcock and all his devices. 

However the main character is revealed this time to be Norman Bates as the point of view shifts to him, because of this crucial plot element Hitchcock did not allow any advanced screenings and no one was allowed late admittance to the film. 

The suspense is built up very well in this film due to the score that Hitchcock uses. Whenever there is going to be violence or a murder the music comes in and highlights us to this fact such as the shower scene with the piercing sounds as the knife stabs Marion and then the low beats as she dies. The suspense is very good as we are longing to find out about the house and mother and it keeps us guessing right until the end, where no one would have guessed that it would be Norman dressed as his mother. 

Villain driven plots are a big part of thrillers and this is present in Psycho because the only reason Marion doesn't achieve her goal is because of Bates so this causes the Det. to come looking for her and in turn Lila and Sam. 

This was Hitchcock's break through in America because of the profound impact it had on their psyche. It was a box office smash and had people queuing up to get in but the popularity has not dropped over the last 5 decades as there have been 3 sequels plus a remake in 1998. The remake however could not encapsulate the audience as the original because the story was already known and not a shock to anyone. The uniqueness of the original could not be recreated, no matter how many times the plot could be re-done or the music re-used. Hitchcock's finished article could not be redone as he had created perfection. 

The shower scene has gained much fame as it is the first image that springs to mind when Psycho is mentioned, it is so famous that people who have not seen the film have seen the scene or heard of it. The thing that makes this scene is the music by Bernard Herrmann, the strident, discordant music has been re-used countless times to denote the appearance of a "psycho". 

However this scene it not all that it seems, to the audience we see a woman getting horrifically stabbed multiple times until she bleeds to death but the way the scene is edited shows how our minds work. All we see during this scene is a knife, blood (chocolate syrup), water and a strategically covered up woman's body, we hardly ever see the actually penetration of the knife it is only hinted at. The viewers imagination fills in the blanks which is presumably why modern viewers fins Psycho to be "tame" because it is not full of blood and gore during the scene. Due to this scene there was an understandable shower phobia because of the vulnerability shown during shower, this made people adopt a preference from baths as they were more safe. The most famous victim of this phobia was Janet Leigh herself claiming she never took a shower again after the film.

North by Northwest

Madison Avenue advertising man Roger Thornhill finds himself thrust into the world of spies when he is mistaken for a man by the name of George Kaplan. Foreign spy Philip Vandamm and his henchman Leonard try to eliminate him but when Thornhill tries to make sense of the case, he is framed for murder. Now on the run from the police, he manages to board the 20th Century Limited bound for Chicago where he meets a beautiful blond, Eve Kendall, who helps him to evade the authorities. His world is turned upside down yet again when he learns that Eve isn't the innocent bystander he thought she was. Not all is as it seems however, leading to a dramatic rescue and escape at the top of Mt. Rushmore.

North by North West is directed by Alfred Hitchcock and was written by Ernest Lehman. The stars are Carie Grant, Eva Marie-Saint and James Mason. 


North by North West fits in with the stereotype of thrillers having fast paced and frequent action through scenes like the drunken car chase

The Plane attack 

The auction house 

The film also fits the convention that heroes must be resourceful and that villains are more powerful and well equipped. We see the Roger Thornhill being resourceful and getting himself out of sticky situations in the auction house where he makes a disturbance so he is arrested and can escape the clutches of the villains. We see this again at the station when he pays a porter on the train so he can wear his uniform to escape the police. The villians also show their wealth,  power and equipment during the auction house scene as Vandamm is flashing his money to acquire a small statue and shows the power in numbers preventing Thornhill from escaping which also shows their better equipment having guns etc. 

Hitchcock uses suspense, red herrings and cliffhangers throughout the film. He uses cliffhangers such as the car chase and the cliff hanging scene to create tension and put the hero in danger. The red herrings are the blonde woman who is suspicious as to wether she is a villain but then turns out to be an agent, when Thornhill gets 'shot' because the audience believe he has been shot and is fighting for his life when it was a fake gun and Kaplan was the biggest red herring because he is Thornhill purpose for traveling to find him and clear his name but he doesn't exists. The suspense is evident throughout the film with the constant idea of wether or not Thornhill will escape. 

The villain presents obstacles for the hero to overcome through the mistaken identity they try to kill him. 

Sound Editing

We filmed an argument involving two people from 3 different perspectives, the first was the master shot which shows both speakers and introduces the audience to them, then we filmed the conversation from a frontal position of each of the characters.

We edited the 3 different shots together starting with the master shot and then going back and forth between the characters like a "game of tennis" but including master shots at appropriate times. We used straight cuts to keep the realistic feel of the argument and tried to recreate the feel of two peoples emotions.

We made 3 final edits with different backing tracks. We used 3 very different music tracks to change the mood and pace of the scene, using both contrapuntal and parallel sound. 

The first track we used was an instrumental rap battle beat, this track was used as the scene was an argument and the track was low and carried the conversation along the beat. This track was parallel to the action and it flowed together. However a better track could have been found but we did well with the time we had.



The second track we used was a dub step, which is a popular genre, and it was meant to be contrapuntal because of the varying beat and different tempos the song provided it gave the clip a different flow but was also more jerky. The message of the song went well however with the mood of the scene because it is about two people with one being over obsessive and stalking the other.



The third was a slower song which worked well as it calmed the mood of the argument and gave it a sadder theme but also adds the idea of resolution at the end of the argument because the song is about the future of a couple and them getting through a hard time.



This task could have been improved by a better constructed script and maybe some more seriousness however it did show we understand and can edit sounds using different tracks and also how to edit the diegetic sounds in the clip.

Sound

I have looked at sound in movies as it is one of the biggest developmental in cinema because of the effect it has to create emotion or atmosphere in a scene. There are 3 main types of key sound elements in film;-Dialogue, Music and Sound effects.

These can be categorized into two key terms;-Diegetic sound and Non-diegetic sound. Diegetic sounds are sounds which the characters in the film are able to hear whereas Non-diegetic sounds are sounds that the characters cant hear. Diegetic sounds for example are the dialogue and sound effects in the film, for example someone knocking on a door can be heard by both the characters and the audience, but Non-diegetic sounds are the background music that only the audience can hear such as music in the background to create tension or anxiety. Non-diegetic sound is categorized into two types, parallel and contrapuntal sound. Parallel sound matches the images on the screen for example someone rushing around in a panic we would expect to hear fast paced music to match the speed of the film.. Whereas contrapuntal sound doesn't match the images and doesn't flow with the scene a good example of this is used in the film Insidious when the song Tiptoe through the Tulips, a happy, cheerful tune, is played during quite a scary part of the film, this has the effect of unnerving the audience and pushes them out of there comfort zone and makes it hard to predict what will happen next.

There are another 2 types of sound; on and off screen sound. On screen sound is sound where we can see the source on the screen whereas off screen sound are sounds that are out of shot, this has the effect of increasing the size of the "world of the film".