Jack Sparrow's Entrance in Pirates of the Carribean

In Jack Sparrow's first appearance in Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, I noticed some interesting use of shots. First of, the majority of the shots used were medium to close up shots that showed a lot of the background without making a pointed effort to zoom in on the face of the subject. The series of shots from 0:04 to 0:24 give the illusion that Jack is standing on a great ship only to reveal that he is on a very small boat with one mast and an unfortunate leak. These shots were medium to close up and did not have any continuity issues.

Moving to when Jack is walking from one side of the boat to the other, they chose to use a wide shot to show the small size of Jack's vessel and give a more dwarfed showing of what one would have initially imagined to be a large ship. There was good continuity watching Jack's hand placement from 0:26-0:28, however, it could have used an extra frame or two on either the wide or the medium shot in order to have a little more smoothness on exactly where the hands were at that point in time. Also for when jack sits down a few seconds later, it goes from that same wide shot to a medium. His sitting position was ever so slightly off from one cut to the other.

From that point to about 0:54, the shots seem to be nearly seamless as editors usually want to go for as it follows the flow of the music. Continuing on, there is a long wide shot that shows the people looking towards the incoming Jack Sparrow. What I believed the film is trying to get across tot eh viewers at this point that even though he seems to be comedic, Jack Sparrow is about to play an important role throughout the movie. It gives a lighthearted feeling to what normally could be perceived as an epic entrance.

There is another continuity error right as Jack steps foot on the docks at Port Royal. It appears that he steps off of the mast of his boat with his right foot leading but when he actually steps onto the wood of the dock, he lands with his right foot. I couldn't figure it out which foot he initially led with, but it looks like that could be an editing error.

The rest of the scene is a mid shot and there are no more issues with it. The movie itself is a great watch with excellent editing techniques and a good attention to detail.

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The Rule of Six

In video editing, there are many important details that go into producing a good quality piece. These six parts are as follows: emotion, story, rhythm, eye trace 2D plane, and 3D space. All of these things appropriately portioned out can lead to a successful film.

Emotion should take up 51% of the production. The reason this is so important is because one of the main objectives of films is to have the audience feel the emotion you want them to feel at each certain point in time.  Each of the other elements mentioned may need to be sacrificed at times in favor of getting the right emotional response.

The story portion is the second most important and pretty self explanatory. You want your viewers to have a story that they are essentially reading along with throughout the film to give them something to follow and eventually talk about. This takes up about 23% of the film.

Film Rhythm covers the timing of the cuts. Whether to make an invisible cut that flows during the lines of one of the characters to a reaction shot or to make a purposefully jarring cut to illicit a response of surprise or upset.

The eye trace in film takes up less than 10% of the piece because it is more of an unspoken and unseen continuity. Eye trace follows closely with the 180 degree rule, keeping character gazes and shot angles flowing along the same plane, which leads us to the next portion of the rule of six.

The 2D plane is the cuts of the shots themselves. Whether it goes from a close up of one character to another or the beginning of the next scene starting at a wide shot. This plane takes up a mere 5% of the film, but when done well can boost the emotional portion of editing.

Finally, the concept of 3D space lords over 4% of the Rule of Six. Even though the audience is viewing on a 2D format for the majority of films, the background and depth of the objects in the background contribute to the production of a good film. Two dimensional space affects and can even make the 3D plane even better.

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The Importance of Sound Editing

         As important as visual edits are in any film, there is one thing that helps bring it all together – the soundtrack. Sometimes what helps make a scene memorable or really emotional is the music within the scene. Apart from the obviously important diegetic sound designed for both audience and characters to hear, non-diegetic sound, designed only for the audience plays a unique role in the scene.

Whether you are a fan or not, you will most likely recognize the theme for Star Wars. As a true testament of how important non-diegetic sound is in a film, there was a study conducted in which two set of people saw the film: one group saw it with the soundtrack, the other without it. The group that saw the film with soundtrack gave it great reviews, while those that saw it without the soundtrack did not give the film much praise. With out the sound the other types of sound become more apparent and do not give it the emotional push that a scene requires.

         If we look at the following video of the final scene in Star Wars, the non-diegetic sound really helps bring the conclusion together as our heroes celebrate their win.

If we watch the same scene without the non-diegetic sound, the scene almost becomes something entirely different.

The first thing you notice is the awkwardness of the character’s silence and smiles. The room tone is clearly heard making the sound almost uncomfortable. Chewbacca’s growl also sounds different and instead of strong and proud, it sounds almost as if he were in pain. The laughter between the characters resonates through the cut and gives it an insincere feel to it. The final portion where the troops clap also sounds empty, with no real emotion behind it.

By comparing the same scene with and without music, you can clearly see the importance of sound in editing, in this case the importance of non-diegetic sound. The right score has the ability to bring emotion and give life to a cut as evident in this particular scene from Star Wars. Although most films have a specific sound editor, it is important to remember that the right combination of video and audio edits is what can turn a mediocre cut into an outstanding cut.

Rule of Six in the Avengers

In his book In The Blink Of An Eye, Walter Murch explains the importance of the “rule of six,” which are criteria for a good cut. He breaks down the criteria into percentages: emotion covers 51% of the importance, story is 23%, rhythm takes 10%, eye-trace is 7%, two-dimensional plane of screen is 5%, and three-dimensional space of action is 4%. 

Marvel's The Avengers actually takes full advantages of the rule of six to create one of the most powerful scenes in the movie. The Avenger's tells the story of some of Marvel's greatest superheroes coming together for the first time to defeat a foe who would be too powerful for them to take on by themselves. As the story continues we are shown how these different heroes fail to collaborate with each other and fall victim to the villain's plan. At this point something big needs to happen to bring our heroes together, that is where fan favorite, Agent Coulson, comes into play. When he tries to take a stand against the villain, he is stabbed and dies. 

Murch would say that this death scene is a perfect example of the “rule of six,” because it follows the criteria perfectly. For starters it stays true to the emotion of the moment, as fans become excited to see their favorite character stand up to the villain only to see him stabbed a second later. His death allows for the story to advance as it gives the heroes a reason to put their egos aside and ban together to avenge their fallen ally. It occurs at a moment that is rhythmically right and keeps eye-trace at all times as the villain walks around the room. Finally it respects planarity and the three-dimensional continuity of space. But as Murch emphasizes, the most important thing here is the emotion behind the scene. This scene is not only felt by the audience, but also by the characters. Once Coulson is announced dead, our heroes are seen mourning their comrade. Soon afterwards we see them getting ready for the counter attack that helps advance the story. This advancement in story and emotion behind the death is what truly makes this scene a perfect example of the “rule of six.”

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