Or find an editor to help?
Whether in speeches or the projects generating them, filmmakers and writers classically distrust their editors.
Theres even a new documentary about a classically feisty editing conflict.
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TitledTurn Every Page, it deals with books, not film and, predictably, its too long.
Historically, filmmakers have favored movies of this girth because they generate awards.
Some filmmakers have encountered fierce studio resistance to their editing methods.
Cate Blanchett at the Critics Choice Awards (Getty Images)Kevin Winter/Getty Images for Critics Choice Association
Clint Eastwood resolved conflicts through rigorous self-editing.
Both were more tightly edited than John Waynes preachy opusSands of Iwo Jima.
Documentaries confront their own unique editing challenges given their appetite for detail.
It offers emotional interviews with badly burned survivors and witnesses.
The doc has an expansive story to tell in a tight running time of 1 hour, 38 minutes.
But the process has been arduous.
Its not like Im tearing his heart out, the editor explains.
Yet even Gottlieb can be expansionist: He famously changed the title of Joe Hellers novel fromCatch-18toCatch-22.
Turn Every Pagedirector Lizzie Gottlieb edited her film down to 1 hour, 52 minutes.
