Though I've read a truly great book on the topic "The Conversations", know a few editors, and have experimented with this completely fascinating craft in college, this morning when I woke up, I learned that I must have literally no idea what it means. The American Cinema Editor's Guild pulled the rug out by naming Tim Burton's Eyesore in Wonderland the best edited of all comedies in 2010. I realize that my hatred for the movie is self-feeding, ever-growing and thus deeply irrational but still... I watched it in full and all I saw was interminable rhythmless agonizing ugly incoherence.
The ACE Awards
Best Editing, Drama The Social Network's (INTERVIEW)
Best Editing, Comedy or Musical Alice in Wonderland
Best Editing, Animated Toy Story 3
Best Editing, Documentary Exit Through The Gift Shop ("UNSUNG HEROES")
Best Editing, TV Half Hour Modern Family "Family Portrait"
Best Editing, TV Hour The Walking Dead "Days Gone Bye"
Best Editing, TV (Non Commercial) Treme "Do You Know What It Means?"
Best Editing, TV Miniseries Temple Grandin
Best Editing, Reality If You Really Knew Me "Colusa High"
Perhaps the editors know something we don't? Perhaps Burton's footage from Alice was even more ghastly than what we saw in the final cut and Chris Lebenzon is being rewarded for true sorcery or merely for surviving it? Lebenzon has done fine work in the past -- even on other Burton films! -- so we don't begrudge him his kudos but this year??? When you stop to consider the other nominated efforts (The Kids Are All Right, Easy A, Made in Dagenham, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World) and how well those movies flowed and/or maximized their laughs with exceptional comic timing and/or carved out a magical performance or two, it's enough to make you straight up weep and reach for the booze.
The decision is even stranger when you look at the other winners and find that they are all relatively easy to comprehend as noteworthy work. (For instance, I'm not the world's biggest fan of The Walking Dead but that pilot episode was a master class in cumulative thrills, scary but not cheap-scary cutting, and overall pace.) The same people voted for those achievements. Temporary insanity?
IN OTHER NEWS: Final Oscar Predictions in Craft Categories