I've summarised my keynote speech at the annual awards of Australian Screen Editors at newmatilda today, where I argued that film critics should never give awards for editing because they're not qualified to judge. Comments at the end of the full article rather than here, please.
Extract:
"....I was knocked out by Anthony Buckley's extraordinary editing in the recently restored 1971 Australian classic Wake in Fright, directed by Canadian Ted Kotcheff. The gambling in the pub and the kangaroo shoot are nightmarish sequences that will remain imprinted upon the minds of anyone who sees them.
Buckley, who would go on to greater recognition as a film producer, edits expressionistically here. He presents intense, almost jagged montages that assault the viewer. Watching these scenes, you know you're watching something that's been edited, in the same way you watch Citizen Kane and become quickly aware of the way it's been directed.
More frequently, however, an editor‘s job requires the assembly of sequences that don't draw attention to the way they've been spliced together — even most of Wake in Fright works in this way. An alert critic may be slightly more alert to this than the average filmgoer — but not by much..."
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