Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/462877
29 WINTER 2015 / CINEMONTAGE Most of his editing cues, Goldenberg says, were taken from the structure designed by Moore, who chose to tell Turing's story in nonlinear fashion, jumping from near the end of his life, to the primary story of his work for the British in cracking the Nazi code that allowed the Allies to shorten the war, to flashbacks earlier in his life. "Turing was attracted to solving puzzles, so Graham wanted to create a puzzle that the audience would figure out as we go," Goldenberg relates. "And that is why he decided to make it nonlinear. Morten and I moved certain things around to make the story clearer. Initially, the 1950s and 1920s storylines were always combined, but we found that was a bit too long away from the main 1940s story and hurt the main narrative drive. So we separated them, and moved them around to help one time period inform the other. "It's one story told in three time periods," the editor continues. "It takes the movie out of straight biopic mode and makes it into more of a thriller about someone's life, and what makes them who they are. So you have all these beautiful layers, yet it doesn't overwhelm you, and that is a credit to Graham; he is a terrific writer and collaborator, and we had him in the editing room a lot." Cross says he is "overwhelmed" to be nominated, pointing out it is unusual for a small-budget, indie drama to receive award recognition in technical categories, as Whiplash has been for editing, as well as sound mixing. Indeed, he says the collaboration between the editorial and sound departments was "closer than typical" on the film, due to the creative need to craft the illusion that lead actor Miles Teller was, in fact, playing the drums — which were perfectly synchronized to a soundtrack that included production drumming by Teller himself combined with pre-recorded studio drumming. Additionally, Cross found himself having to frequently depart from the editing methodology he developed for particular sequences when he cut the original short, in order to make Fletcher, the music teacher played by Supporting Actor nominee J.K. Simmons, intimidating as hell. The strategy worked, thanks to Simmons' fine acting and solid editing choices, but Cross admits that duplicating key scenes from the short, in which Fletcher's true nature is first exposed, were the hardest part of his job. "My first cut was close to the short in terms of the cuts, how long I stayed on shots and the choice of angles and sizes," he says. "But when we watched it, it didn't work — there was no suspense or tension and the characters weren't interacting properly. Fletcher didn't seem that scary or intimidating. Miles was a different actor, playing it differently, and Simmons wasn't playing it exactly as he had the first time." Eventually, Cross made Fletcher more intimidating by employing a different cutting pattern to make his actions more brutal. "That meant more smash cuts and, in the scene where he slaps Andrew's face, on the impact of the slaps," he explains. "I took frames out, so that the slaps to the face would feel more forceful," he explains. "It also had to do with cutting to reaction shots of the other musician's faces and how long we held those faces." f Editor's Note: The Oscar-nominated picture editors will take part in "Invisible Art Visible Artists," a panel discussion at the Eqyptian Theatre in Hollywood on Saturday morning, February 21, the eve of the Academy Awards. See ad on page 43 for more information. Tom Cross.