In Sundance NEXT selection King Coal, Elaine McMillion Sheldon employs a hybrid approach, blending contemporary imagery with archival material and poetic voiceover to explore the impact that coal — the substance and the industry — has had on Central Appalachia. Below, editor Iva Radivojevic, herself a filmmaker, discusses her collaboration with Sheldon on the picture. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Radivojevic: Elaine and I had known each other for about a decade prior to making this […]
Collateral meets The Desperate Hours against the backdrop of issues of Vietnamese immigration and assimilation in this Orange County-set thriller that marks the feature directorial debut of music video director Sing J. Lee. Below, editor Yang Hua Hu discusses his work in cutting this Sundance 2023 premiering thriller, in which an elderly Vietnamese cab driver is taken hostage by three recently escaped prisoners. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? […]
Below, editors Inbal Lessner and Kim Roberts discuss their work on Nancy Schwartzman’s Sundance-premiering Netflix documentary, Victim/Suspect, her follow-up to the doc Roll Red Roll. The film deals with alleged victims rape and sexual assault who find themselves on the other end of legal charges when they are accused of making false accusations. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Lessner: Nancy Schwartzman and I crossed paths briefly when […]
In Smoke Sauna Sisterhood, the hazy and intimate doc from Estonian director Anna Hints, a group of women bear body and soul for the camera as they engage in lengthy shvitzes and discuss their most personal thoughts and memories while worshiping the divine feminine connection they all share. Editors Tushar Prakash and Hendrik Mägar discuss how they each approached cutting the film, with Mägar coming on during post-production to do the final edit. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors […]
An aspiring chaplain must complete her yearlong residency at NYC’s Mount Sinai Hospital during a particularly dark period for public health in A Still Small Voice, the latest from doc filmmaker Luke Lorentzen. Between 2020 and 2021, Mati conducts visits as part of the hospital’s spiritual care department, navigating the grief, trauma and uncertainly that weighs heavily on these patients—and herself. Lorentzen, who acted as director, cinematographer and editor, discusses his experience cutting the film, which he describes as his “favorite part of the filmmaking process.” See all responses to our annual Sundance editor interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did […]
Feña (Lío Mehiel) is a 20-something trans guy living in Brooklyn in Mutt, the feature debut from writer-director Vuk Lungulov-Klotz. His life is instantly thrown into tumult when a series of people reenter his life unexpectedly, leading to the opening of old wounds. Editor Adam Dicterow talks about the process of cutting Mutt, also offering insight on how lucky he felt to work on the film in the first place. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes that […]
Co-directors, cinematographers, producers and editors Axel Danielson and Maximilien Van Aertryck embark on a meticulous dissection of “image-making and a mapping of its movement through society” in Fantastic Machine, the duo’s documentary that utilizes a large catalogue of archival footage to make its point. Danielson and Aretryck discuss the intricate editing process they undertook for the film along with another co-editor Mikel Cee Karlsson. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for […]
The Eternal Memory, the latest from Chilean documentary filmmaker Maite Alberdi, follows a couple on a difficult journey after husband Augusto is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. They have been married for 25 years, and August has lived with the disease for eight years at this point. As his memory fades, wife Paulina takes care of him and ensures that above all, Augusto is cognizant of how much he is loved—even if he eventually forgets the woman who provides it for him. Editor Carolina Siraqyan talks about cutting the film and the process of working with Alberdi. See all responses to our […]
Still one of the bestselling books of all time since its publication in 1976, The Hite Report offered a groundbreaking look at women’s sexual desires through anonymous survey responses. Despite its success at demystifying vulvas and those who possess them, the book’s author Shere Hite has remained a relatively obscure figure in popular culture. Filmmaker Nicole Newnham’s latest, The Disappearance of Shere Hite, attempts to bring this woman back into relevancy while investigating why her legacy has gone unspoken for so long. Editor Eileen Meyer tells Filmmaker about her experience cutting this project, also offering insight on she came to work […]
In Other People’s Children, the latest from director Rebecca Zlowtowski, a woman in her 40s named Rachel (Virginie Efira) grapples with the idea of being a mother—as well as the idea of going down a child-free path. Editor Geraldine Mangenot, who’s worked with Zlowtowski since her 2019 film An Easy Girl, discusses how being a mother herself influenced the film’s edit. See all responses to our annual Sundance editor interviews here. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Mangenot: […]