It is important to know your target audience. Once you know that it becomes easy to reach them with your message. Highlighting this aspect in his Masterclass ‘To cut or not to cut’ in IFFI, noted film editor A Sreekar Prasad shared key insights on the nuances of film editing.
Talking about the importance of knowing your target audience, Prasad exhorted, “Filmmakers, especially the younger lot, need to know the audiences well. Knowing the target audience well helps in ensuring the film’s success. In most of the films, the high one gets is at the end when it becomes a success and is liked by the audiences.”
Talking about exaggerations in films, Prasad said that the level of exaggeration varies according to the film and the cast. He said “In star films, we exaggerate moments to please the fans, the level can vary but it is there. It boils down to enjoying the film, you cannot compartmentalise, it is important not to overdo exaggeration and bring in reality.”
On his experience of editing, Prasad elaborated that every experience leads to another experience. “It teaches you what to do and what not to do. It should be a learning experience every time. It is very easy to give up but it is more challenging to work towards the goal and achieve it,” he asserted.
Speaking about the coverage technique with various angles and multiple cameras and its impact on editing, Prasad had a message for younger filmmakers “ “Younger filmmakers cannot imagine the cut till they sit at the cutting table. Many directors do not have experience of an editing room. Earlier, it was mandatory for filmmakers to have that experience to make their directing better. Now, we get to the editing room later, but now there is scope to edit more especially with the help of software, but it is strenuous to get the right thing out.”
Explaining the importance of pauses, Prasad briefed, “Pauses are a pan India concept but typically in Southern films, the lag is not between shots but the whole story. It is important for editors to know the timing. Each situation requires its own timing. Cutting at the right time is necessary and makes a huge impact and smoothness of the cut of a particular scene depends on the situation and must be decided as the situation demands.”
He added, “Sometimes, replies are not supposed to be given so we stretch the moment with a pause to make it more effective and impactful. The actor might not have taken that long a pause but to make the sequence work, we increase it. Back-to-back dialogues can become strenuous on the mind, the audiences need to feel the moment so they need time for it to sink in. Like a joke, audience must be given time to understand and feel the emotion.”
All these things play a huge part in editing being smooth. Silent sequences are impactful and share the feeling attached and with background music, the emotion is there too. Showing two versions of the same sequence of a film, Prasad explained how directors allow long pauses to make the scene more effective and impactful.
