Michael Pulcinella
April 14th, 2008, 10:04 AM
In a review of Roman Polanski’s The Pianist, Roger Ebert gets something wrong. While I agree with Ebert’s reviews nearly all of the time, in this one instance he misplaces his praise. He writes...
“The closing scenes of the movie involve Szpilman's confrontation with a German captain named Wilm Hosenfeld (Thomas Kretschmann), who finds his hiding place by accident. I will not describe what happens, but will observe that Polanski's direction of this scene, his use of pause and nuance, is masterful.”
I’m sorry, Mr. Ebert, but the responsibility for the placement and length of the subtle pauses belong to the film's editor, one of the most often overlooked craftsmen in the film industry.
The image of the director as “God”, with control of every aspect of the production, is an old myth. Yes, Roman Polanski may have been responsible for coming up with the concept for the scene (along with the screenwriter) and for shooting it a certain way to achieve the desired effect. But as we here all know he may have shot it many different ways with many different kinds of performances and pacing and then he dumped the whole mess into the lap of film editor Hervé de Luze to sort out.
It was Hervé de Luze who was finally responsible for choosing which takes to use and how long to let a silence or a look hang before making a cut. In a delicate scene like this one a few fractions of a second too short or too long can make all the difference.
Just wanted to get that off my chest!
“The closing scenes of the movie involve Szpilman's confrontation with a German captain named Wilm Hosenfeld (Thomas Kretschmann), who finds his hiding place by accident. I will not describe what happens, but will observe that Polanski's direction of this scene, his use of pause and nuance, is masterful.”
I’m sorry, Mr. Ebert, but the responsibility for the placement and length of the subtle pauses belong to the film's editor, one of the most often overlooked craftsmen in the film industry.
The image of the director as “God”, with control of every aspect of the production, is an old myth. Yes, Roman Polanski may have been responsible for coming up with the concept for the scene (along with the screenwriter) and for shooting it a certain way to achieve the desired effect. But as we here all know he may have shot it many different ways with many different kinds of performances and pacing and then he dumped the whole mess into the lap of film editor Hervé de Luze to sort out.
It was Hervé de Luze who was finally responsible for choosing which takes to use and how long to let a silence or a look hang before making a cut. In a delicate scene like this one a few fractions of a second too short or too long can make all the difference.
Just wanted to get that off my chest!