Oscar 2014 - Film Editing

I'm definitely not in my best shape for writing (I know, I'm saying this a lot, but now's really without the ""). So, I'll just do a lightning pass through the editing section, to get it checked on the list.

"American Hustle" is the first of the nominees. Alphabetically. A story about corruption (more or less) from the New Jersey's beginning of the '80s. I didn't know how did this movie get on this category up to watching half of it. After that, I started to get the reasons. Solid ones. Even so, it was still after one full half ...

"Captain Phillips" is probably the only movie that can snatch the editing Oscar from "Gravity". One reason is that this is the best aspect of the entire movie. And since the editing Oscar tends to get to either action films, or real life adapted stories .. with a lot of action ... To be fair, the movie is quite nicely cut, and the editing is after all the hidden reason why you're still caught by what's going on, knowing the ending from the beginning ...

"Dallas Buyers Club" is another movie that I don't know how it got here. There are some nice cuts, especially in the beginning, or towards the end, but not much in the rest. As a general summary, we have the real story of a HIV patient who managed somehow = mostly self-medicated, to survive for 7 years after an estimation of 30 days to live. Overall, I found slightly radical the movie position ( ironically that I'm writing this today :) ) despite the fact that generally speaking I'm quite on the same line of thought. But let's develop another time ;) ...

"Gravity" again ( I'm starting to lose count ... ) I have to say, and admit that it deserves it, has the best chances for an Oscar here. It's useless to get into the deep details. I prefer the clip below. Although not as long as the full 17 minutes opening scene, it should be enough to show how good are woven the individual takes in order to create the impression of a continuous flow ...

"12 Years a Slave", which ends the nominees list, is another real story, of a free guy who got enslaved for 12 years. Although it may sound ironic - and it's not, the main merit I see in the editing of this movie is that the 12 years seem to be 12 years. Meaning that we have a bit too many lengths .. but I guess the script is the main part "guilty" for this. I couldn't find something very relevant for this topic, so I'll just go for the clip below ...