Alternative Editing

The theme for this entry is editing, specifically that in the movies we've watched in the past few weeks. Run, Lola, Run and Bonnie and Clyde both played with the conventional styles of editing. We also saw a small portion of Breathless; a movie that lured those conventions into a dark ally and beat them with a two-by-four until they coughed up their lunch money. Breathless is a french art film (danger!) that saw what most film editors were doing at the time, but respectfully disagreed with their ideas of line of sight matching, 180 degree rule, and anything else that even remotely linked to "invisible" editing. It's a movie for people who like to see experiments in film and almost no one else.

Run, Lola, Run, however, works within the runs set forth by films before it. Rather playing with erratic transitions, it plays with the order of shots. The "and then" photo montages involving Jäger, Doris, and Mike are startling to say the least. The fact that the movie swaps from animation to real life seemingly without rhyme or reason is also an example of the movie's strange experiments with editing. But the thing Lola really messes around with is chronology. In your average movie, one scene leads to the next in a strong chain that leads directly to the climax. In Lola, all the scenes link together... Until suddenly we're back at the beginning. This isn't a flashback, either, this is a retelling of the story. And guess what? When that retelling ends, we get to see it a third and final time.

Bonnie and Clyde hides it's experimentation even more subtly. You wouldn't even notice anything was amiss unless you were looking for it. Every now and then, there's a cut that's just too quick or jarring. Eye lines don't always match, but they do flow. I'm not sure the 180 rule was ever violated, but I'd believe it if it was. Far removed from Lola and Breathless, this movie is reserved about it's experimentation. It saves them for it'd more important scenes; saving them for when you'll need that extra kick to get caught up in the emotion.