Post Magazine

D I R E C T O R ' S C H A I R 26 Post • October 2008 www.postmagazine.com But it turned out that beautiful things hap- pened, so there was lots of bonus material that found its way into the film as a result of letting these scenes play on. "And Tim was great in choosing from the start not to just cut to script but say, 'That's a great moment, let's slip that in.' "What happened later in editing, which panned out in a very practical way, was that as we went through the film in different ways and had the sorts of questions that al- ways come up about a scene — 'too bad it doesn't have a little of this' — Tim with his completely photographic memor y, would just say,'Let's go back and look at alternate versions,' and sure enough, the answer to our new need was usually already edited and ready to go. So the whole editing process was very exciting." POST: Where did you do the post and DI? DEMME: "PostWorks, New York." [Editor's Note: PostWorks' Scot Olive was colorist, working on a Pandora Pogle. The stu- dio also provided Avid systems, including a laptop with Media Composer 3.0 and a full Adrenaline.] POST: How did shooting HD affect post? DEMME: "Cer tainly it all happens so much faster, but without feeling rushed. I've made so many films in the old-fashioned film way and I was ver y reluctant to move into computers and Avids and Lightworks. I loved working on Steenbecks and Kems, and that enforced reflection time where you're sitting there and thinking about other par ts of the film while the editor's making that cut and splice. It also made you commit a lot more to the frame you chose to cut on. "There was something vaguely monastic about the whole process. But I've changed completely! I love not caring that much about what frame to cut on, and I'm thrilled by the speed with which you can see differ- ent versions of the same scene." POST: Do you like the post process? DEMME: "I love it. You don't have to worr y about the weather, or the collective temperaments of ever yone involved in the shoot, or acci- dents or the actors' health or getting exhausted [laughs]. I just adore the magic of seeing what happens when different images are juxtaposed with each other and you add sound and music — the magic of a stor y unfolding through editing. It's so exciting for me, and I feel I have a bit of a gift for post, and I'm very comfortable doing it. "The one thing that's a pain in the ass to me about working in digital — and it's really the only thing, and it's fine because at the end of the day you wind up with something you love very much — is the way you have to color correct online, and you put a huge amount of work into fashioning the most beautiful color palette that you can, based on the im- ages you have, but you always know that you're going to have to do it all again once the online is complete and the data is sent to the lab and they start striking film prints. So you kind of per- fect it one way, knowing you'll have to change it, but you also know that that's the final dy- namic that enhances the look of the film one more time — mak- ing the transition to film. And light will now travel through a print and that's how the image will end up on screen at cinemas. So it's kind of, 'Gee, it seems like a ton of work!' In the old days it seemed easier.You cut the negative, worked with the timer and got a couple of answer prints and there it was." POST: How many visual effects shots are there and who did them? DEMME: "Most of them were done by Brainstorm Digital in New York, and it was mainly clean-up and removal of behind-the- scenes operators, that sor t of stuff. There were no illusions. XFX Inc., also in New York, did some work, and we also used Tchya! in London." POST: You've done documentaries on The Talking Heads and Neil Young, and shot many music videos, so music and audio obviously play a big role for you? DEMME: "It's vital, and I'm ver y proud that we also managed to do something pretty different in this film. All the music you hear was actually playing live while we shot the scenes you're watching. It might have been in the room, or in another room or just outside the house, but it's all live. "So we needed a par ticularly gifted group of musicians on hand, so that what they did was indeed contributive, and all the guys in the 'house band' you see rehearsing for the wedding are guys I worked with on the soundtrack to the Jimmy Car ter docu- mentary I did last year. Then we did the mix at Sound Lounge on Fifth Avenue in New York. It's a ver y small, stripped-down lovely studio, and Paul Urmson, who's a sound de- signer and effects editor that I've worked with on many films, led the team, and we spent just under a month on the mix." POST: Did the finished film match the vi- sion you first had on reading the script? DEMME: "Yes, the emotions I feel from the film match the emotions I felt when I read the script. I'm so in love with documen- taries that I'm not very interested in making fiction now." POST: What's next? DEMME: "I just star ted shooting a docu- mentar y in HD about Bob Marley. Declan [Quinn] and I went down to Wilmington, Delaware, where [Marley's] aunt Amy lives, and she's the real sur viving link between Bob's childhood and all his relatives, and we had an amazing weekend. Sound Lounge's Tony Volante and Paul Urmson handled the mix, working on a Digidesign ICON system. . PostWorks in New York City provided post production services and a digital intermediate.

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