"THE INSIDER"
Delving Inside The Post-Production Of"THE INSIDER"
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photo by Greg Plotkin |
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Paul Rubell, Billy Goldenberg and David Rosenbloom |
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interview by: Scott Essman |
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photos by:
Frank Connor, |
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Based on a real incident from the early 1990s, "The Insider" is Michael Mann's newest feature after scoring critical successes with films such as "Heat", "Last of the Mohicans", "Manhunter", and "Thief". Starring Al Pacino as "60 Minutes" producer Lowell Bergman, Russell Crowe as whistle-blowing tobacco scientist Jeffrey Wigand, and Christopher Plummer as "60 Minutes'" Mike Wallace, the movie features a tantalizing human drama, played off of the parallel stories of Wigand and Bergman. For the editing team, "The Insider" represented a formidable example of overcoming the challenges of working with a passionate fastidious director to realize his vision. To do so, the editors' collective tenure on "The Insider" was staggering - lead editor Goldenberg worked for a year, Rubell for 14 months, and Rosenbloom for five months. Needless to say, their efforts are all onscreen - "The Insider" is a two-hour thirty-seven minute engrossing experience that evokes the craftsmanship of classic 1970s cinema.
Why did Michael Mann choose to have three editors on this film?
PR: 
Michael's roots
are executive producing TV series like "Miami Vice" - of
which David cut the pilot - and I think he loves the action
of having three shows in various stages of completion with
editors working down the hallway on a variety of shows, with
some stories in development and others getting ready for
air. I think, consciously or unconsciously, he probably
tries to recreate that same buzz when he is editing a
feature.
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"60 Minutes" producer Lowell Bergman, who must put his career on the line to air one of the most important stories in the program's history. |
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Since this was based on a true story, did you feel compelled to research the facts?
DR: You become
informed by the material and you learn what you need to know
from it. The movie itself is pretty descriptive and has its
own point of view, so while it is documentary-like in the
way it was shot, we're not necessarily educating the
audience beyond how the story educates.
Why did only two of you stay on for the entire length of the project?
DR: When I left [at
the end of 1998], this picture was in pretty good shape and
at that point, Michael felt that there wasn't necessarily
enough work for three editors. It was into a very good form
- pretty close to what got released - then the post
production sound work began. Michael just felt that three
was too many - he was right.
The Insider, while not a political film, addresses many issues - capitalism, power, and corporate decision-making, among others. Do politics enter your decision to do a film?
PR: If you object to
the politics, then you don't take the job. But your role as
an editor has nothing to do with your personal opinions.
You're there to make the best possible version of that movie
that it can be.
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How was it determined which of you edited the various sequences in the film?
BG: It is
interesting that on "Heat "[Goldenberg was the only member
of "The Insider's" editing team to work on Mann's 1995 film,
"Heat "- Ed.], Michael was very specific about who cut what
scene. He felt like each editor had their strength and he
assigned the scenes, but on this film, I think he felt
comfortable with all three of us cutting anything - he felt
that we were all equally ready for any scenes. When we once
got the movie into a first cut, then we decided we would
divvy it up more logically, so that we each had longer
stretches of the film.
PR: We had a very
specific method: we'd just take whatever comes up in the
rotation. Just grab it off the shelf and cut it. And then,
as you get further along, if there are a couple of scenes to
choose from, you take the one that might link up to yours so
that you have a bigger section with more of a flow. But
basically, it is just chance.
We had a team of Avid assistants and a team of film assistants (see below). At the end of every day, we would turn over the scenes that had changed to our Avid assistants and they would then conform the Avid cut. They would then handle the necessary change notes to the film assistants in the film department who would then conform the work picture. Michael likes to screen the movie a lot, sometimes, on a daily basis, and at least every other day, which, if you are editing on film is a relatively simple thing to do. It's much more complicated and time consuming when you are working on the Avid.
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PR: Michael's method
is to watch them and dictate into a micro cassette recorder
a stream of consciousness [report] of everything he is
thinking. It then gets transcribed and put into a book, a
copy of which each of us has. This became the bible, and he
would constantly refer back to his first impression because
he knows that the longer you look at something, the less
objective you are. He would work the same way with regards
to the cut; each successive cut would be put onto tape, sent
to him, he would view it, dictate his notes, and then we
would get back his transcribed notes, which is a great way
to work. He also did that with sound notes. On the dubbing
stage, he was very hands on; he mixed most of the music in
the movie himself. He would then screen the movie and
dictate his reactions. He would fiddle with levels during
the screening, note the levels on the page, and then those
would be transcribed. The next day [the sound team] would
come back to the dubbing stage and they'd recreate those
moods.
With such a hands-on approach, does that leave you any room to be creative?
PR: Michael has the
ability to set the parameters and then let his people fill
in the blank spaces. I think a prime example of his courage
in doing that is the way this movie was shot - the camera
work is kind of chaotic. It is the opposite of what you
would call a controlled visual style. The camera is always
moving and it is very jittery and when you look at the
dailies, you see that the operators had great latitude in
what they could physically do with the camera; they tried
some wild things and Michael loved that. He would sort of
control the chaos and shape it, but he allowed the chaos to
occur.
BG: He did something
that is similar to live television on this movie, where each
cameraman had headsets and he would speak to them during the
shot. He would make adjustments during the takes which I am
assuming that other people do, but it was the first time I
had seen it in a feature.
DR: I never worked
with a director who gave such precise notes - the fact that
the notes were precise and that there were so many of them
made them imprecise because you couldn't possibly do
everything that the note said to do. If you did, you would
have 24 versions of the scene. The notes provided you with a
road map and oftentimes the chaos in the editing was trying
to figure out the one way that you could first put the scene
together. Although there were versions upon versions, the
first step was try to figure out what Michael wanted and
which note might supersede the next. Ultimately, you could
only arrive at one destination. So, on the typical day, we
would share each other's notes, then see if we achieved the
note.
BG: I think that
most times, you try to figure out the spirit of the note as
opposed to doing specifically what the note said.
PR: We also agreed
at the outset to grant each other the freedom to criticize
each other's scenes in making the film stronger and so, we
would approach it in the spirit of total camaraderie and
would make suggestions about each other's scenes and just
set our egos aside. Michael doesn't want to sit down and
have a theoretical discussion about a scene. His metabolism
works too fast for that, but he loves it if you just cut a
different version of a scene and show it to him. That is why
I say he communicated to us by memo and we communicated with
him by tape because a picture is worth a thousand
words.
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BG: He would
sometimes watch dailies eight hours at a stretch, commenting
on every line and taking it all in, not missing a thing,
remembering moments like the way the light hit Russell
Crowe's eye in a certain take. He would just remember it
months later. Also, Michael has the unique ability to watch
the movie every other day, and see it as fresh as anybody I
have ever seen. He is able to look at it like he has just
seen it for the first time or hadn't seen it in a long time.
It is a unique ability to maintain distance when you see the
movie four or five times a week.
His attention to detail and accumulation of it is like nothing I have ever seen before. I have done two films with him and he really feels like the small things add up to the whole, and he doesn't want to let one of those small things get by without making sure it is perfect.
If there is a moment of complacency, Michael feels like the movie is not getting better. At the point where he relaxes, takes a breath, he feels that there is something we could be doing.
With a film so dependent on performances, can you manufacture key moments in the story when you're in the editing room, or does it have to come from the footage you are given?
DR: I think the more
movies are manufactured in the editing room from scene to
scene to scene speaks to the problems inherent to the script
than the creativity of an editor or the director in the
editing room.
PR: You can give
greater meaning to lines through editing than exists
initially, so you're not so much manufacturing with shots
from other scenes, but you're manipulating the dialogue to
create a greater importance in certain lines than ever
existed. The reason or need for that importance in the line
comes to light after you see the movie as a whole than when
you are just viewing the scene. The scene works differently,
obviously, in the context of the picture than it does by
itself. So you work on it once by itself to make the scene
work, put it into the body of the picture, and you realize
you need to get other values out of it. At that point, you
begin to go in, take the line, and reorder the sequence of
lines to get the meaning that is more germane to the picture
than to the scene.
Is there any extra pressure on you as editors when you are cutting a scene with such high-powered actors as Pacino, Crowe, and Plummer or is it actually more enjoyable than cutting lesser actors?
PR: There is a lot
of pressure the first day. Cutting a scene with movie stars
you have never edited, you feel the pressure of maintaining
that reputation, but after the first day, it is just another
character and a lot of the problems begin to recede.
DR: True, but it is
absolutely more fun because they are just better actors, so
you are dealing with better raw material. When you are
overcoming a problem or trying to get around something, you
don't view it as a performance problem. It's absolutely more
fun and more rewarding. You are just dealing with a better
color.
It seems as though the movie is told from two different points-of-view.
DR: Actually,
one-third is Russell Crowe's point of view, a third of it is
Al Pacino's point of view, and a third is when they are
together - then, it's a collective point of view. It's more
in the writing as to whose movie it is, or maybe it's the
interpretation by the audience, but I don't think anybody's
going to walk away and say that the movie belongs to either
one guy. They both have a story to tell, and you can have a
great impact on the entire movie just by merely focusing on
a scene or replacing it in the structure. It is unique in
our work that you can have such an impact.
Your hours must have been totally consuming on this project.
PR: In a typical
two-day period, Michael would screen the film, dictate
notes, and get those transcribed. Then we would make
changes, show the changes to Michael, get more notes, turn
the film over to the assistants, and screen it again. We
never worked less than twelve hours, and sometimes eighteen
hours and anywhere in between, maybe three times a
week.
With such an intense amount of work and time on this project, is it worth it in the end?
BG: Absolutely. You
work really hard on a Michael Mann movie, but what keeps you
going is that Michael makes movies that are about something
at a level in which very few directors operate. As an editor
you really are subject to the material you are given. With
Michael directing - and he is as hardworking or harder
working than anybody I have ever seen - you still know, even
at the end of an eighteen hour day, that every other editor
would jump at the opportunity to work with him in a
second.
PR: What we are
leaving out is that Michael is constantly inspiring. He is
also quite funny.
In addition to Greg King's sound effects editing, the music and dialogue play a major role in The Insider - as integral to the success of the film as any aspect of post-production. (See article, THE INSIDER's Sound King)
PR: Yes, and
generally you want the sound editors to come on early enough
to help you create a great sounding track for the first time
you run the movie for the studio, and you cannot always
afford that. In our case, the sound editors came on early in
post-production.
BG: What I think
Greg did beautifully was everything that he created sounded
completely authentic and original but also organic to the
movie, so you never feel like it's a sound effect, yet it
still impacts the movie in the way you see it and in the way
it makes you feel.
PR: Greg's great
strength is his taste and his courage to make decisions
about what to leave out; his work is terribly focused and
not everyone is willing to do that because it's risky. The
director may ask, "why am I not hearing these sounds?" and
then you have to scramble to go and get it, but Greg's
decisions were always right, so he got us down the road
quickly.
BG: Also, the
dialogue has a very genuine sound, much to Greg Baxter's
credit. He edited the dialogue and is probably as diligent
as Michael is about detail.
Music is such a big part of Michael's movies that we are always putting in temp music and we made an effort not to put a movie score in; it was not what Michael thought was appropriate for the movie, so we were constantly trying to find original instrumental music.
At first, Pieter Bourke and Lisa Gerrard, the co-composers of "The Insider", were going to have four or five pieces of music in the movie - some of those were written for the movie and others were pieces that Michael loved and wanted to use. But it ended up that their music worked so well, they did the whole score, save a few pieces of acquired music.
Where does The Insider fall in the pantheon of your editing experiences?
PR: I certainly
learned logistically that we were capable of much more than
I would have thought possible. Creatively, Michael has very
high standards and it's good to be constantly exposed to
high standards. He never allows you to become
complacent.
BG: Aesthetically,
it's right at the top. The last two films I worked on,
"Pleasantville" and "The Insider", were films that had
something important to say and it obviously made me feel
proud to be on them. Those opportunities don't come all the
time.
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Reprinted from
The Motion Picture Editors Guild Newsletter
Vol. 20, No. 6 - November/December 1999
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Copyright © 1999, All Rights Reserved by The Motion Picture Editors Guild, IATSE Local 700