I talked to Pia when she was editing ‘The Escapist’ for Gillies Mackinnon, with whom she has now worked six times, including ‘Regeneration’, ‘Hideous Kinky’ and ‘Pure’. Their latest collaboration is on ‘Gunpowder, Treason and Plot’. We met in her edit suite at De Lane Lea in London’s Soho.
I was born in Toronto to Italian parents. My father was a dental technician and my mother raised five girls. She stayed home until we were all off at school. My mother loves entertainment, theatre opera and dance, and she always played music at home. She is very vivacious and loves ballroom dancing and salsa.
Regeneration (Courtesy of Artificial Eye)
She was sixteen years when she emigrated to Toronto and my Dad was twenty-one. They had known each other in Italy, but they got together and started dating in Canada. They came from Bari on the south-east coast of Italy. My father’s brothers and uncles were/are all dentists or dental technicians. My mother’s mother stayed at home and raised six children and my mother’s father worked as an electrician, but was also an impresario. He would bring over acts from Italy, mainly singers, and entertainers to Toronto, where there was a large Italian community.
During High School I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do so I applied to George Brown University for dentistry but it was not my first choice. I applied to the University of Toronto for languages as a back up, but I also applied to Ryerson for a photography course and I was shocked when I was admitted. I created a portfolio of portraits, animals, action shots and sports. It was really just thrown together for the interview, but I had no idea that I would be accepted.
During the first year we had to study film-making as well as still photography, so we had thirteen hundred-feet exercises to shoot and they were amazing. One exercise would deal with depth of field and depth of focus; another with lighting; another motion and so on, and it was really eye opening. A hundred foot Bell and Howell 16mm, so two-and-a-half minutes for each exercise. There was very little editing.
Up until the end of the summer after the first year I still thought I was going to major in stills. Then I thought no I want to work with people, I like the collaborative effort. Even though I’m in the cutting room now I still go to set, and I still want to deal with the crew members.
Towards the end of the second year or beginning of the third year we all shot one scene and we all got the same rushes. It was just then that I knew what I wanted to do. I created something that really wasn’t part of the scene. I was using images before the slate and after cut and just giving it a different look. I just discovered it myself, with no tutoring.
I remember starting the scene on a poster with one line played over and then I cut straight to singles, and no master, unconventional
I suppose. From then on all my friends asked me to cut their films, because they were just too lazy to do it! (laughs). I just was having fun and fell into it.
We did study the history of film. We studied different genres; I took a Western course, which really opened my eyes to that genre. My favourite course was music in film, which was a two-year course. The professor was Madame Sevigny, and she really knew her stuff. She had a musical background and she knew how it applied to film so she really enlightened us.
We also had another exercise putting different audio, music, sound effects, voice over against the same visuals and that was very interesting. So I was able to be experimental and play with images and sound. It was a good time. I chose to work on others films rather than make my own in the fourth year, I just edited.
Years later I realised that from the age of about ten years I used to walk down the street and what I would do was like editing. For instance a car would whip by and I would cut. I would look somewhere else, at a person and wait until they did something interesting then I would look away. I would do that on the subway and buses. I realised that I was putting together these images and just editing, either by looking away or in my mind.
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When we graduated we were told not to go into the business, that none of us would get jobs. We were wasting our time. In my own case I had been a camera assistant at college on many films and they were the only jobs I could get for the first year. I’ve always loved cameras so it was fine but I was really wanting to get into the cutting room. Then ‘Sunrise Films’ was doing a ‘Movie of the Week’ and I asked if I could be the assistant editor. The director/producer, who is a good friend of mine now, Paul Saltzman,1 suggested that if I agreed to be their camera assistant then I could follow the film into the cutting room. So I was offered two jobs in one interview! So that was the beginning of my cutting room experience.
The editor really wanted to be a producer, so he cut that film and then became post-producer on a long running series, ‘Danger Bay’, that ran for six seasons, which I worked on too. I started off as an assistant sound effects editor. The next season I became a dialogue assistant, and then the third year picture assistant. The following year there was an episode that nobody wanted to cut, because it was really bad and it was on the shelf all season. Finally they asked me if I wanted to do it and of course I jumped at the chance. So the next season I was on as a fully fledged editor. The background in sound was very valuable. It really helped cutting picture, understanding what sound would bring to it.
Although there was a variety in the series in terms of style and content, which gave me great experience, it was really hard to break out of TV series. People felt that you could only cut a half-an-hour and not a sixty-minute or full-length movie. The next step was to do a one-hour series, and whilst I was doing that we got to work with the directors more and so I met a director who was doing a movie of the week right after and he asked me to do it.
From then I did a lot of TV movies, and unfortunately that was the bulk of Toronto’s work.
The natural step would have been to move to Los Angeles, because all these movies were co-produced with the States, but I just couldn’t. I don’t like the whole business there. So after thirteen or fourteen movies of the week I finally got a low-budget feature, ‘Intimate Relations’2 but it still didn’t lead anywhere, and I cut several more movies of the week.
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It was only when Gillies3 came to the Toronto Festival that the chance occurred. He had ‘Small Faces’4 in the festival and I had ‘Intimate Relations’. He was interviewing for ‘Regeneration’5 which was a co-production so he had to hire a Canadian Director of Photography (DoP), composer and editor. So I went to meet him and luckily I got the job, because it was the best script I had ever read. I was just so thrilled I couldn’t believe it.
So that allowed me to come over here, because I had wanted to move to London for a while. I came here in 1988 and fell in love with it. I just knew it was a place that I wanted to be for a while. So when I went back to Toronto I got my Italian passport and kept it in a very safe place. I knew it was a matter of timing, which comes in handy with editing!
Gillies said he knows instantly whether he can work with someone or not. He looked at a film I brought which was a beautiful film. He said it was between me and another editor, but I was more enthusiastic. You really don’t know how a person is going to cut your footage. Also you don’t know what material they had when you are looking at somebody’s demo reel. So it is a gamble.
When I was doing those movies for the American networks I’d have to, for instance, get reactions from every character in a scene. I’d have to go around the table, show what everyone was doing at that moment. It was always a matter of faster, louder, bigger, and then I did ‘Regeneration’. So I had to slow myself down and I had to really breathe it in and take in a whole major change, and it meant something. It wasn’t a matter of cutting to somebody for the sake of including them in the scene, for a production value or to make it faster, so it was really important and I think it’s great for an editor to have those opportunities. To cut something and aim it for a certain market and then do something completely different for someone else’s sensibilities.
When I did ‘Regeneration’ I had come off movies of the week, back to back, so my rhythm my timing was a little ‘speeded up’. So I assembled the first few days and Gillies saw it at the end of the week and he just felt that it had to slow down. He said to me to let the material speak to me about the pace of the film. So I did that. I just found a slower rhythm. It helped to imagine him there because obviously you try to take in that rhythm of his sensibilities at the time.
I hate to say this but I think I am self-taught. I didn’t have any heroes or influences. Though I love a diverse range of films and directors, from Antonioni and Fellini to Scorsese and Coppola. Also Truffaut, Hitchcock and Billy Wilder and De Sica too. But if there is any influence on my editing it is by osmosis rather than consciously. I haven’t analysed a film and tried to emulate what they’ve done.
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As much as I love all the aspects of editing, assembling scenes is the least enjoyable. I get a sense of accomplishment when a scene is completed but I really love fine cutting. I feel this is where the art is, this is where the editor can truly show what they’re made of. The transformation that a film goes through between the assembly and a fine-cut is astonishing. You get to re-direct the film in the cutting room. You can accentuate the poignant moments. You can improve the timing of an actor’s performance. You try to mask all the problems and blemishes that are present in every film. You get to retell the story in a more concise and visual way. You get to try various styles and techniques. You get to create the pace and rhythm that the individual scenes require and that the film deserves.
That’s the beauty of editing, you can always change cuts, replace shots, change the emphasis, sculpt, finesse and create. Just when you think you’ve done everything you can to a certain scene, you’ll get another idea that sends you off on another tangent. I really love the craft. There are many ways a scene can be cut but once you’ve explored every way possible and you keep returning to a certain cut, you know its right.
Talking technology, I started on film using the Moviola. Then I worked on a 3/4-inch system, then I moved up to the Grass Valley, which was a little more sophisticated. Then I used the D-vision, which was non-linear hell. It was the first one in the country. No one knew how to run it. I’m not a computer nerd so my assistant and I had to teach ourselves how to run it. So it wasn’t ideal. Then I used Lightworks and Avid and I was hooked.6
Non-linear systems have revolutionised the way we look at images. We can mould them into whatever our imaginations can create. One great thing about working with Gillies is that we both see every frame as non-linear entities that can be placed wherever we want to serve the story I really enjoy these moments when you think of something you had discarded for some reason but it works brilliantly out of context.
I was forced to cut film again three years ago. I didn’t want to. The director and the DoP thought it was a great idea. It felt like going backwards, because I knew what you could achieve on a non-linear system, sound wise and picture wise. It was very frustrating for me because I didn’t have the time – it was just not ideal. I loved cutting film and I had a great system which was well organised, but once you know what a non-linear system can do it is difficult going back.
It’s a little overwhelming when you think about all the footage you get for a major scene but it’s a matter of organisation. When I have a large scene I like to create a selected clip in the Avid, which has the best bits from my preferred takes. This clip will be the foundation from which the scene will be cut and I can always refer to it months from now instead of watching every take again. If my instinct tells me to drop a shot or a few shots I do. It gives me great pleasure to tell the director that I didn’t need something. The opposite usually happens; you end up asking for pick-up shots. I start compiling a pick-up shot list as soon as possible so that I have a better chance of getting what I need. Some of them were originally planned but they ran out of time on the day. Some of them are abstract images that I think could be useful down the road when we start layering and being more creative. I also compile a list of wild tracks that help with the mood and timing of the film. Some of them are specific sound effects or ambiences of certain locations and others are actors’ lines and voice over.
For the first time in a long time I think editors are in the limelight to a certain extent because of films like ‘Erin Brockovich’7 and ‘Traffic’.8 I choose those because of all the deliberate jump-cuts – mismatched action which was completely intentional, and the fact of same director – two different editors. I watched both films and there are court scenes in both films and they are cut exactly the same way. If you watch them both there is a word that precedes the cut for the dialogue in the court scenes in both films. So you just wonder did Soderbergh9 steal from Anne Coates10 and then take it on to ‘Traffic’ or was it his vision?
I think there is more freedom in editing and we are not really confined to the rules and laws that exist that I don’t believe in anyway. It means you can try things and if they work for the scene and the film then fine, like the way we are using freeze frames in ‘The Escapist’.11
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I think Gillies or my assistant would say that I am a little weird in my habits. For instance I can’t stand working with my back to the door, so the Avid isn’t necessarily in the best position. Feng shui perhaps! I like candles, I like to have a peaceful atmosphere. What’s weird about me, which I think many editors would understand, is that I get really involved with the screen. So if someone is smiling I might smile back!
I think an editor has to be calm. You have to play psychologist some times between the director and producer. You have to be diplomatic. I think patience is important, because sometimes things don’t happen quickly, and you have to work on a scene for weeks before you get it to a stage where you might like it. I think you have to explore all different avenues. Sometimes you have to be ruthless. There are lots of traits that come in handy.
The editor has to pursue ideas, they have to solve problems, they have to love putting the puzzle together. I really enjoy the job, and I think that’s a big part of it too because if you are miserable and if you hated the whole idea of it, it wouldn’t work.
The first assistant director on ‘The Escapist’ said ‘We all read the same script, but we all see a different film’. It takes a lot of restraint to make things simple. You have to be organised, focussed not afraid of trying things. I say this because there is a tendency to second guess what the director wants so you try to load the film up with everything that was shot. This is the beauty of working with someone you know and trust, you tend to try anything and sometimes you go against what the director wants in order to show a different point-of-view.
I was a camera assistant when I first finished film school and although I loved it, I prefer the control of the cutting room. Oops, that ‘control’ word slipped out. I guess you have to be controlling to a certain extent. You have to control the material otherwise it can overwhelm you and you have to control what enters and exits the cutting room. You have to protect the space and department from politics, you have to be diplomatic and you must play psychologist because you’re always in between the director and producer.
The approach to sound is very important so I tend to build it into the way I cut. I don’t think the sound editors like it because it doesn’t give them a lot of leeway. I’m not saying that my effects are great. They are just guides, but if I do want something pre-lapped it is built in. If I want a certain kind of sound, for instance if I want to accentuate something I will put an explosion on it, even though it is a plane landing or a wave crashing or just anything like that. I just try to use sounds to help me portray the feeling of it. I’ll just steal anything and make use of it.
I love using sounds out of context. I find it interesting to test what audiences accept as true sound effects. One example of this is that I used a sound effect of a lighter for a lamp being turned off. On this film I have used explosions when Ricky drives through the gates. I used bellows effects during the hospital scenes because it’s surreal and sounds like unnatural breaths.
This is minor compared with what David Evans12 has proposed for the track. He suggested using only mechanical sounds at Sullen Voe so that nothing is natural. Sullen Voe is surrounded by the sea and David is going to use explosions when the waves crash against the rocks. He is going to make the sea an evil breathing force. He is going to slow down sirens and use them for seagulls. He is going to use a roller-coaster in the coal yard so that we are surrounded by conveyor belts and we feel trapped. David is going to make Sullen Voe a medieval setting with pulsing steam, only male voices and distant foghorns. He will play with reality and then switch to surreal sounds. I was very pleased because the film will get the added dimension that it needs to darken it and enhance the world we are trying to reveal.
I have a close relation with the sound editors. I give them detailed notes and Gillies is pretty detailed about sound as well. On ‘Regeneration’ he handed me a whole script with sound effects ideas throughout the whole film, and I thought that was brilliant. It was the first time I ever received anything like that. I do give them detailed notes of what I want in every scene.
With composers I like it when they don’t just support the emotion of the scene. A good composer will dive into the subtext and they try to tie in themes and ideas from other scenes and they try to connect various characters together with melodies. On the other hand I really hate it when you’ve got an emotional scene and the music precedes the emotional line. It just takes away from the performance and the film if you are spoon-feeding or telling the audience how to feel before they have had a chance to discover it for themselves.
Its funny because in this film we had a little opening sequence and we had music that really belonged at the end because it was reflective. I felt that we had to foreshadow some of the action or mystery or thrill of the story, but we don’t have anything in there now. I think we have to hint at it, but to give it away would be a mistake too, because you have to introduce the film and characters which is not the mood that you are going to find ten or fifteen minutes later. So it’s a fine line and I think a clever composer can achieve this.
I feel it is important for the editor to follow the film through to the end of the mix. No one knows the film better than the editor, how the sound was designed, what the opticals should look like, what performance was selected, if automated dialogue replacement (ADR)13 is actually better or worse than the original, etc. I do love the music recording. I also like the final mix because you finally hear the full stereo sound, which is what you’ve been imagining for months.
In the end the most important thing is the film and you have to work at every stage towards enhancing that.
Notes
1. Paul Saltzman – Producer, e.g. ‘Map of the Human Heart’, Vincent Ward, 1993.
2. Intimate Relations – Philip Goodhew, with Julie Walters, 1996.
3. Gillies Mackinnon – Director, born Glasgow, 1948.
4. Small Faces – Gillies Mackinnon, from his script, 1996.
5. Regeneration – Gillies Mackinnon, based on the novel by Pat Barker, 1997.
6. Technology – Pia’s journey through from the Moviola to the Avid is quite typical of the generation of editors who started on film before so-called non-linear came in.
7. Erin Brockovich – Steven Soderbergh with Julia Roberts, editor Anne Coates, 2000.
8. Traffic – Soderbergh – not as good as Simon Moore’s original TV series, 2000.
9. Steven Soderbergh – Director, sprang to fame with ‘Sex, Lies and Videotape’, with Andie MacDowell, 1989.
10. Anne V. Coates – Eminent and still active editor, born Reigate 1925, who went to Hollywood after establishing successful career in Britain gaining Oscar for ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ in 1962.
11. The Escapist – Gillies Mackinnon, script by Nick Perry. An excellent thriller, sadly not released, 2001.
12. David Evans – Experienced sound editor, recently did sound effects editing on ‘Die Another Day’, 2002.
13. ADR – Automated Dialogue Replacement.