Brick (and some nice online support resources)
By S Simmons. Filed in Editing |
Brick is a strange little gem of a movie that I had the pleasure of watching recently. It is a film-noirish, gum shoe, detective yarn, all set in high school. The low budget independent was a Sundance winner of a Special Jury Prize for Originality of Vision. If you are a fan of the Coen brother’s Miller’s Crossing (as I am) then Brick will feel very familiar as the writer/director, Rian Johnson, cites Miller’s Crossing and the novels of Dashiell Hammett as influences in the first few minutes of the dvd audio commentary. I even remember hearing the term “dangle” at one point in the film.
One of the great things about a film like Brick is that it is a great learning tool for filmmakers. The dvd has a good audio commentary and although it is not very scene specific as it follows the film it is a great story of how the filmmakers went about the multi-year process of getting the picture made. There is very little talk of editing in the commentary but that is reserved for the deleted scenes extras part of the dvd. Johnson shows a number of scenes in various states of finish and gives some specific details of why they were cut from the final edit. Another nice bit of supporting material comes from a section of the director’s website. He provides a free download of the original shooting script as well as an illustrated novella. The script has a number of footnotes that provide another little bit if insight into the making of the film. Sure this is all overkill for most movie watchers but chances are good if you are reading this blog then you are not the “casual” movie-goer and probably enjoy a bit more of an in-depth look at the process. So, enjoy!
