Departments
Passages – William R. Butler
Bill Butler, the British-born film editor who received an Oscar nomination for his work on Stanley Kubrick’s 1971 classic “A Clockwork Orange,” died June 4 at a hospital in Sherman Oaks. He was 83.
Film History
Features
Thelma Schoonmaker and the Movie Magic of ‘Hugo’
There’s a joyous moment in director Martin Scorsese’s Hugo, opening November 23 from Paramount Pictures, when Sir Ben Kingsley–– portraying the pioneering French filmmaker Georges Méliès (1902’s A Trip to the Moon)—performs a magi- cal feat onstage to thunderous applause. It’s but a brief glimpse into a forgotten past.
Features
It Came Right Out of the Movie Screen: A Look at 3-D Movies of the 50’s
In the early 1950s, the film industry, hoping to lure audiences back into theatres from their new TV sets, created more movies in color and introduced widescreen formats that could not be reproduced on the small screen. Between 1952 and 1954, it even tried to recapture viewers with movies in 3-D, the process created to intensify the illusion of depth.
Features
‘The Tempest’ Tossed: Remodels, Reformulations and Reimaginations of Shakespeare’s Most Magical Play
By now, revealing the gender change of the driving character of William Shakespeare’s The Tempest in Julie Taymor’s new film is no spoiler for audiences. The wronged and sometime Duke of Milan, Prospero, has become the wronged Duchess of Milan, Prospera, in the person of Helen Mirren.
Features
Writing with the Camera, Directing with the Moviola: The American Film Editing Revolution of the Late ’60s & ’70s
A change in movie storytelling and editing was already under way when French film critic and soon-to-be film director Alexandre Astruc wrote these words in an article in the magazine Écran Français in 1948.
Features
Editorial Patriarch: Philip Cahn (1894-1984)
To those who knew him best, film editor Philip Cahn, who was born June 18, 1894, in New York City, was not a rabble-rousing sort.
Features
A Company Man But A Union Man: Ben Lewis (1894-1970)
In a way, Ben Lewis, one of the three founding members of the Society of Motion Picture Film Editors (SMPFE) — now the Motion Picture Editors Guild — was the quintessential company man, working 45 of his 52 years in the cutting room at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Features
Raising ‘Kane’: An Overview of Hollywood Film Editing in the 1930s
As soon as the MAY-JUN 12 issue of CineMontage — featuring “The 75 Best Edited Films” as selected by Editors Guild members — arrived in mailboxes, readers’ comments immediately ensued: Why was (insert title of your favorite film here) not included?
Features
Baseball: A Selected Feature Filmography
You Can’t Tell the Movies Without a Scorecard!
Features
Diamonds Are Forever: The Movies’ Century-Long Love Affair with Baseball
As the upcoming film Moneyball makes expressly clear, Baseball is a game of statistics––something rarely, if ever, touched on in any of the movies about the sport since the first Baseball movie arrived in 1898.
