Editing, directing, and The Cool World: filmmaking as a choreographic art. Issue 10 (3rd October 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Pearlman, Karen
• Is Part Of: Textual practice. Volume 35:Issue 10(2021)
• Page Start: 1587
• Page End: 1605
• Publication Date: 2021-10-03
• Subjects: Shirley Clarke -- film editing -- film directing -- choreographic -- director-editor -- movement phrasing -- The Cool World -- authorship; Literature, Modern -- 20th century -- History and criticism -- Periodicals; Criticism -- Periodicals; Criticism, Textual -- Periodicals; Semiotics -- Periodicals; 801.95
• DOI: 10.1080/0950236X.2021.1965291
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0950-236X

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Given that cinema is a movement-based art form, this article proposes that a director's work is more analogous to that of a choreographer than that of an author. From there, it considers others involved in choreographing a film's movement and focusses on the film editor. The case study for revealing how directing and editing shape cinematic movement is The Cool World (1963), a radical and insufficiently recognised film directed and edited by Shirley Clarke. My analysis looks closely at a specific passage in the film to identify how its movement-phrases, as shaped in editing, convey or create experiences of community, space, and subtext – experiences that cannot be created on paper or even in shots until the shots are edited. Through this case study of a director-editor, I demonstrate that editing is a process of authoring the movement-phrases that move the spectator. Having considered editing as an intrinsic part of Clarke's directorial agency, I conclude with brief consideration of the question: if we understand a film to be at least in part 'authored' in editing when the director and editor are one person, what happens when they are not?