Archive
20-12-2002, 12:14 AM
Bill Bennett and Henry Dangar spoke at the ASDA Conference
about their work on "Kiss or Kill".
ON SUNDAY, 21 September 1999 at the AFTRS, Bill Bennett and Henry Dangar spoke at the ASDA Conference about their work on "Kiss or Kill". The theme for this year's conference was Screen Teams, focusing on the collaborative and creative teams from which cinema is produced. Following is but a brief snippet of what was said.
Denny Lawrence, who chaired the session, opened by quoting David Mamet (playwright, scriptwriter, film director): "Film is a collaborative medium. Bend over." Whilst we can all identify with the truth of this statement at various points in our careers, the working relationship between Bill and Henry does not function in this way. It quickly became obvious during this session that they shared a mutual respect for each other's skills, and trusted each other's ability to make the film work.
Kiss or Kill
Bill revealed that the idea behind the cutting style for "Kiss or Kill" came from a commercial he directed during pre-production. The commercial enabled him to test an idea he had, and he used it as an experiment to see if it would work.
Henry said that when he saw this commercial, he knew that he was in for a challenge. Bill rang him about one month before the shoot to discuss working on the project and then actually didn't see him until after the shoot! When he came to take his first dip into the raw material, there were doubts for him about what to do with it and how it would fit into the whole scheme of things.
After Bill had seen Henry's first cut scene (After Al and Nikki have fled Adelaide, they stop to get petrol, chips and cigarettes at a desert truck stop. Al confronts Nikki about how many tablets she gave the guy at the motel), he stopped looking at the rushes. Having already worked out the film's structure intellectually, Bill shot the film instinctively - no preparation of storyboards and no preparation the night before. He was led by what happened on the day. As to the cutting, he was never looking to justify the cuts. In going for another "angle" on a scene, he would change the lens size, the framing or the performance by small increments only in order to let the emotion justify the cut.
Henry added that because the camera was "alive" (that is, hand-held), it gave the illusion that there was more coverage because the shot was continually changing. In fact, there was only about a ratio of 13:1. He said that they approached the film like a documentary, because it was all shot "from the hip" and there was no continuity person on set. Even so, there was a strong sense of discipline and he was able to edit confidently just using the dialogue flow. There was never a problem making sense of what was being said, or what was happening in the scenes. Bill said that the basic principles of continuity still had to be adhered to on a larger scale, even though on a micro level they could disregard it.
The film is currently in release around Australia and is enjoying good critical reviews.
- Jenny T. Ward
about their work on "Kiss or Kill".
ON SUNDAY, 21 September 1999 at the AFTRS, Bill Bennett and Henry Dangar spoke at the ASDA Conference about their work on "Kiss or Kill". The theme for this year's conference was Screen Teams, focusing on the collaborative and creative teams from which cinema is produced. Following is but a brief snippet of what was said.
Denny Lawrence, who chaired the session, opened by quoting David Mamet (playwright, scriptwriter, film director): "Film is a collaborative medium. Bend over." Whilst we can all identify with the truth of this statement at various points in our careers, the working relationship between Bill and Henry does not function in this way. It quickly became obvious during this session that they shared a mutual respect for each other's skills, and trusted each other's ability to make the film work.
Kiss or Kill
Bill revealed that the idea behind the cutting style for "Kiss or Kill" came from a commercial he directed during pre-production. The commercial enabled him to test an idea he had, and he used it as an experiment to see if it would work.
Henry said that when he saw this commercial, he knew that he was in for a challenge. Bill rang him about one month before the shoot to discuss working on the project and then actually didn't see him until after the shoot! When he came to take his first dip into the raw material, there were doubts for him about what to do with it and how it would fit into the whole scheme of things.
After Bill had seen Henry's first cut scene (After Al and Nikki have fled Adelaide, they stop to get petrol, chips and cigarettes at a desert truck stop. Al confronts Nikki about how many tablets she gave the guy at the motel), he stopped looking at the rushes. Having already worked out the film's structure intellectually, Bill shot the film instinctively - no preparation of storyboards and no preparation the night before. He was led by what happened on the day. As to the cutting, he was never looking to justify the cuts. In going for another "angle" on a scene, he would change the lens size, the framing or the performance by small increments only in order to let the emotion justify the cut.
Henry added that because the camera was "alive" (that is, hand-held), it gave the illusion that there was more coverage because the shot was continually changing. In fact, there was only about a ratio of 13:1. He said that they approached the film like a documentary, because it was all shot "from the hip" and there was no continuity person on set. Even so, there was a strong sense of discipline and he was able to edit confidently just using the dialogue flow. There was never a problem making sense of what was being said, or what was happening in the scenes. Bill said that the basic principles of continuity still had to be adhered to on a larger scale, even though on a micro level they could disregard it.
The film is currently in release around Australia and is enjoying good critical reviews.
- Jenny T. Ward