Saga of the deleted scenes
iView Author: Gajendra S Shrotriya (Jaipur, India)
Email: gshrotriya(at)yahoo(dot)com
Saga of the deleted scenes
As the deleted scene from Dev D runs on the home page of PFC, I am left wondering why this scene was deleted, as it seemed pretty nice to me. But the important question that came to my mind was had this scene been deleted at the script stage itself it would have resulted in some cost saving. But this does not mean that there would have been no deletions at the script stage. I am sure there would have been several alterations to several scenes before they got finally deleted. Besides, there would have been several which survived the script stage, went into production, incurred the cost and finally had to be deleted at the editing stage.
I read Ashutosh Gowarikar mention sometime back that in Jodha Akbar, lot of sequences / scenes he shot were not kept in the movie. There have been several other instances also that the first cut of the film was five hours long, finally cut down to two and a half hours. So the shoot script would have been double thick than its final cut version. This made me think whether this is the norm and many a great directors too wrote almost double the length of the script they actually wanted to retain on the editing table.
Now coming to the point that if the director can take this decision whether he wants to retain a sequence in the final cut, right at the script stage itself, would it not result in reducing the production cost and the shoot time. At least for low budget film makers, this could be very critical. But then is it possible? I want to pose this question to several esteemed directors at PFC. Could a director attempt to write the final cut and shoot it with no deletions in the final cut? Would it affect the final outcome? With experience, does the length of the first cut get reduced? Only experienced directors can throw some light on this.
Delving into the factors on why the scenes get deleted. What could be they? May be the director wanted an option between few of his scenes. He could not make up his mind on which one to keep or which one would go well with the story. Due to what ever restraints one may have, he could not visualize the final impact, so he decided to go with all he thought were good, knowing that only one of these would make it to the final cut. So here keeping options become the factor for that extra length of the first cut.
Second factor could be that the scene looked excellent on paper but when shot, didn’t turn out the way he wanted it. May be the DOP didn’t get it or there were other technical restraints. So the scene was shot but could not be kept and had to be deleted. Technically week shot. So could not be kept in the final cut. Normally such shots are reshot after finding a solution but reason beyond film maker’s control may not allow that always. So director okays the shot taken but finds it unacceptable on the edit. So deletes it in the final cut.
Third could be having lot of material for the editor. So always take an extra shot so that editor does not complain or may be director wants to decide later on which one would look better. Again this percolates to the same action but Editor’s convenience becoming the factor.
Many film makers say that a good film maker should be capable of deleting shots if they don’t take the story forward, however good they must have been done. Only if someone could explain to me that why that scene was then written and created if it didn’t take the story forward.
Sometimes as we often hear, a powerful actor pressurizes the producer to cut some other actor’s role. But we are not discussing this factor here.
Third party opinions sometimes result in cutting down the length. Some experienced feedback from a veteran. I had read if I remember correctly that length of No Smoking was reduced further on advice of Gulzar sahib when he previewed it and gave his feedback. This is understandable but then such deletions should reduce with time as the film maker grows up.
Inspite of all these factors, the basic one is still remains unaddressed. Why to keep extra scenes in the first place? Removing tit bits of scenes does not result in any major length reduction of the first cut. It comes only from removing a complete sequence from the film. Big production budget may provide this luxury to the film maker but waste is still a waste. Literally every film maker ends up spending the production cost of almost two films for one final tight crisp well edited film.
This discussion holds good when the writer and director is same. He could make last minute changes or could re-write a scene or could create a new scene altogether. What if the writer is someone else? Would the director ask the writer to write double the length of the script so that he could edit the right cut later? Or the director or production house would change the script altogether by adding several new sequences and scenes in an attempt to develop the story as per their conviction. Could the film not end up with all the re-written scenes in the final cut with only few of the original ones being retained? I am sure in this case, writer would not get his final payment, though FWA would have a rule or two to prevent this.
It will be very interesting to know if there exists some film maker who shoots on the exact length of the film with no deletions. To the best of my limited knowledge, I suppose, the length of the first cut would approximately be double with most of the film makers. So if I am attempting a 120 to 150 minute feature, I should write at least 250 to 300 pages for my shooting script, after all my talent and feedback from the creative team brought into play. Experience with my first short film Picnic (…not micro shorts) also testifies it unfortunately, the first cut of which was 35 minutes long shot on the 38 page script. I got it previewed by few close people to test. Based on their feedback including our very own dabba, I decided to cut down several scenes… and the final length now stands at twenty minutes. I had taken some inspiration (J) from 6th sense also but on dabba’s feedback, I changed the whole storyline, removing the 6th sense angle whole together. I will write about this in a separate post. Now I feel that what ever work I am left with, I can proudly claim that it is my original. One sequence I deleted just because I felt that it was diluting the impact. The final cut now may not be the best I would have wanted but it is much better than the earlier version. The deletion of course is justified and there is no question that it makes the film crispier and tighter, hence enjoyable. But the question still remains. Could this not have been done at the script stage? May be I was not experienced enough, but why experienced directors are not able to do this? May be I will get an answer when I make my tenth feature film… or may be not!
Here is the link to one of my deleted scene from short film Picnic for you all to see…
Tags: dabba, Deleted Scene, Gajendra S Shrotriya, Picnic
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
AK… I would appreciate if you could vet / comment on few of the points raised by me here regarding length of the shooting script vis a vis the final cut of the film…
David Dhawan is reputed to shoot exactly how much he needs as he has sound editing knowledge.
The script of Vinay Shukla’s Godmother was lauded as the best edited script by its editor Renu Saluja and I presume it was shot exactly as written.
Also, in the industry, it is kind of assumed to be ‘creative’ and ‘talented’ (at times, especially when the producer isn’t on a tight budget/or the director is bigger than the producer/or is the producer himself) if you shoot more and some more…silly but yes then goes with the rest of the industry quirks!
Fatema… thanks for pitching in
I Guess this is something you learn with experience. I too would appreciate if the exclusive authors could pitch in.
Article reminded me of Unusual record created by Chak De India.
http://www.rediff.com/movies/2007/jul/26bpi.htm
[...it was shot using, ma kasam, a little over 1,500 cans of raw stock!
It outscored Boney Kapoor's Pukar which, thanks to its constant shooting and re-shooting, had consumed about 1,350 cans. If you are wondering what's the big deal, spare a thought for the poor editor; an average Bollywood movie consumes about between 300 and 400 cans...]
Wondering how much scenes must have got deleted/edited
Agent Zac,
CDI had around 30 minutes of deleted scenes, if I am not mistaken, I have the DVD set and most of the scenes are interesting too and add more value to the movie.
.
I remember something about Santosh Sivan’s Asoka, where he had 5 hours of movie shot and he got it re-edited N times to fit in 2.5 hours. I think Star network showed the 5 hour marathon on Asoka. Never seen it though.
Past the usual disclaimer of “I dont know, and I am a common audience member” and all (not even made a short/written a script), I believe it is quite because of a certain external pov that comes into play and which is MUCH better placed to judge the entire effect objectively from the visual output (first cut of the movie) instead of the written output (final draft of the script).
In fact, I remember, during the No Smoking days, AK used to post about his indulgence while shooting (discovering/implementing new/innovative shot selection and stuff like that) and indulgence of his actors (something that I was looking forward to but was edited out, as it wasnt part of the script or as it ‘dint move the story forward’- the Gajraj Rao (the drunk guy outside the restaurant where we first discover Abbas’ missing fingers) part).
Also, many people believe (I dont have evidence to prove) that Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron was largely made on the editing table. There was supposed to be a side track of Anupam Kher as the Disco Killer or something…
I also think once we watch a movie, we tend to figure this part drags etc. So thats how, I guess.
The one thing that fascinates me about Aliens: The Director’s Cut is how the deletion of one scene caused a chain reaction and allowed three other scenes to be shortened because of it. I think it is a must view for any editing student and filmmaker, if only to really understand the tremendous impact deleting one scene can have. Of course, Cameron was under pressure to make the movie short and prefers The Director’s Cut over the original, but I think the original is a great example of economy in editing.
Having said that I know how heartbreaking it can be too. I was editing a friend’s Diploma film and we ended up bringing the run time from about 30 minutes to a little over 18. It was quite hard to do because of the emotion attached to it.
I also remember Spielberg commenting on the screenplay dictating the pace of the movie, and not the editing. He said something along the lines of, if you have made a slow engine, the vehicle will move slowly, no matter what you do it.
i think editing is required due to indulgence of the director to ‘play-safe-and lets-see-later’ in the initial stages,and after re-viewing the final product, the realisation and sense of good film-making prevails over emotional attachments.
CDI had a different track for the semi-final match, which is shown on the DVD deleted scenes. Also, the importance of ‘dahi-chawal’ that Bindiya remembers just before the finals is lost because the relevance of that scene is deleted from the final cut (which, thankfully, is there on the DVD).
As Vishesh has mentioned, the art in editing is, if you have deleted one scene, you have to edit all the other sequences having any reference / relevance to that scene. Else, it becomes slightly confusing as in case of that dahi-chawal of CDI.
sometimes, the director doesnt know the art of under-statement, and keeps hammering the same idea through various sequences. there was an article on PFC some days back abt the art of subtelity.
i strongly think the art of editing makes sense if the director knows how to be subtle. Else, u get movies like KANK…
Thanks guys for your inputs… keep them flowing in…
Gaj i think it is where stiching pants out of 120 cms of cloth and making a cinema differs. We can bound a tailor to stitch shirt, pants etc. by giving exact quantity of cloth piece because other parameters are fixed. I think director should hav liberty to think over the script continuosly and it is a dynamic process of cretivity, afterall he is responsible for his autere statement.
Hi Deepak… welcome on PFC. I agree with you that director’s and tailor’s jobs are different… but the creative continuity has to rest at some point because for producers, specially low budget ones, arriving at a conclusive end is as important… and yes, I would like to know what should be the right or acceptable factor range for the first cut to final cut, when the script has been finalized for production.
Oh I just recalled the case of The Brown Bunny. While I havent seen the movie, Roger Ebert on seeing the original print (I think in the Cannes Film Festival) was repelled by the movie due to its pace and stuff… He gave it a 1 star (I think).
When the movie was commercially released after editing portions and stuff, he gave the movie a 2.5 star. His justification/reasoning being that the editing had MAJORLY helped the movie gain pace and all…