Technique of Film Editing, Reissue of 2nd Edition, 2nd Edition

33

“ O nce more I repeat, that editing is the creative force of fi lmic reality, and that nature provides only the raw

material with which it works. That, precisely, is the relationship between editing and the fi lm. ”

1

This confi dent

statement, from the pen of one of the silent cinema’s most noted directors, was written in 1928. By examining

the fi lms produced in the fi rst thirty years of the cinema’s history and by drawing on his own extensive expe-

rience as a practising director, Pudovkin came to the conclusion that the process of editing — the selection,

timing and arrangement of given shots into a fi lm continuity — was the crucial creative act in the produc-

tion of a fi lm. It would be diffi cult to-day to be so emphatic. Contemporary fi lm- makers have raised other

elements of fi lm production — most notably acting and dialogue writing — to a level of importance which is

incompatible with Pudovkin’s statement. The tradition of expressive visual juxtaposition, which is character-

istic of the best silent fi lms, has been largely neglected since the advent of sound. It will be one of the main

arguments of this book that this neglect has brought with it a great loss to the cinema.

Meanwhile , the history of the silent cinema provides ample corroboration for Pudovkin’s belief. The growth

in the expressiveness of the fi lm medium from the simple fi lm records of the Lumi è re brothers to the sophis-

ticated continuities of the late twenties was the result of a corresponding development in editing technique.

Pudovkin, in 1928, was able to convey infi nitely more complex ideas and emotions in his fi lms than were the

Lumi è re brothers thirty years earlier, precisely because he had learnt to use editing methods through which

to do so.

The history of the silent cinema is by now so well documented that there is no need to restate the precise

historical events in this evolution: when a particular editing device was fi rst used, or who should be given

credit for its fi rst application, are questions for the fi lm historian. What concerns us is the signifi cance of new

editing constructions, the cause of their development and their relevance to contemporary usage. The brief

historical notes that follow are designed not so much to summarise the research of historians as to provide a

logical starting point for a study of the art of fi lm editing.

Chapter 1

Editing and the Silent Film

1

Film Technique by V. I. Pudovkin. Newnes , 1929 , p. xvi .