Billy Goldenberg, A.C.E. and Ben Affleck Say Hello to HD.
by Nancy Jundi as originally published by CinemaEditor
Billy Goldenberg, A.C.E., has a magic touch. It’s evident with films like ALI, THE INSIDER, PLEASANTVILLE and HEAT under his belt. His work with Michael Kahn, A.C.E., on ALIVE haunts me to this day. And by haunt, I mean I’m still uncomfortable around certain cuts of meat. Goldenberg is currently working on Ben Affleck’s directorial debut, an adaptation of Dennis Lehane’s bestselling novel, GONE, BABY, GONE. He’s a natural fit on the project considering it is one of the first features being cut in Hi-Definition. Fresh off of MIAMI VICE, which was shot on HD Video, he’s also familiar with helping to translate beloved literature for the screen. His talents on SEABISCUIT, a bestselling novel as well, earned him an Oscar nomination.
Ben Affleck can best be described as a modern day renaissance man. Actor, director, producer, Academy Award winning writer – the man has a lot of hats. With his very own system in next room, I was taken aback by his affinity for editing. From all the “news” you do hear about him, it was refreshing, and an honor, to learn more about the techie side of Ben that you don’t hear about everyday, if ever.
In their first interview on the project, Goldenberg and Affleck discussed their early years with the art of editing, cutting in Hi-Def, and the journey of turning literature into film.
Billy, how did you get your start in editing?
BG: I went to film school because I wanted to be in the movie business, but didn’t really know what to do. So I took this class called Experimental Video with a teacher who was on loan from Cal Arts named Ed Cornell. We did a bunch of short, experimental videos. I waited until the end of the year to show him anything. I was sort of procrastinating – it was a whole years worth of work at one time. He thought I had a real aptitude for editing. So I moved here and tried to be an editor. I started working with some guys who were in television, but also a guy who was a feature film editor named John Wright who went on to cut SPEED and HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER. I got to meet a lot of feature people and then I started working for Michael Kahn who is Steven Spielberg’s editor. He became my mentor and taught me how to be an editor, how to act in the room, etc.
Ben, rumor has it you’ve got a history with editing…
BA: It’s a very poor man’s history. I’ve always been really into computers and I’ve always been interested in movies. Around the early 90’s, computers were just starting to get video capture boards. The thing to do as an actor was to make your reel. You would do that on an old school AB Switcher video tape editor. I’d go over to Lightning Dubbs with an arm full of tapes and they’d make me a reel, but it was third or fourth generation and didn’t look good. That motivated me as well as my interest in emerging technology of computers and media. I had this idea that I could build my own non-linear editing system using a PC. I knew that Avids were out there, they had come out, but they were for Macs and a hundred thousand dollars plus. They were well outside of anything I could get a hold of. I had done one little student film that I edited on an Avid, literally, between two and for in the morning. Like a mad scientist, I was using these ultra wide SCSI 2 drives and they still weren’t fast enough. I was dropping frames. That was kind of the weak link. The capture boards weren’t great and the audio capture boards couldn’t capture at CD quality and RAM was really expensive. I did get it up to the point where I was using Adobe Premiere and I could capture in small amounts. I was trying to make a little money doing other actors reels, but it was a disaster. It was drop framing so much that I had to capture over and over again so it wasn’t really productive. I definitely liked it and got into it. So I appreciate what Billy does from many, many points of view.
Billy, do you have any advice for those starting out?
BG: To become a good editor it’s a little easier now with all the access to iMovie and Final Cut Pro. I started cutting on film. To have a quick film editing system in your house was impossible. Now, learning how to put images together you can do on your own, but to get into the feature film industry, there are a couple different ways. Start as a PA or an apprentice and work your way up hoping you get hooked up with the right people. Or you can start as a commercial editor or music video editor who goes onto features and takes you with them.
What do you think of that, people who have learned on their own with iMovie, etc.?
BA: I know how to make the in marks and the out marks and move little bins, but that doesn’t make me an editor.
BG: I’ve found, for the most part, it’s actually made people better understand how important the editor is rather than less. A lot of people try to do it themselves and throw their arms up in the air. There are exceptions, but a lot of people who try to do it see how hard it is and realize it’s a lot more difficult than they thought. It’s not just learning how to work the machine, it’s learning how to tell a story with images and it’s more of an art form than just pushing buttons.
What is the working relationship like?
BG: Like most good directors, Ben spends a lot of time in the editing room trying to mine the best out of the material. It’s a lot of slogging through and hard work. People often get bored of it. I’m having a really good time and it is material I’m drawn to because I like dramatic movies.
BA: Basically since Billy started it’s been him going through the footage and cutting. I was so struck by how good it was that I almost felt like going home! It’s really been fun to sit with him to just find stuff and redo it and redo it. I’ve seen how talented he is and how well he understood the material and the movie.
Ben, how has being the writer, director and now being in the editing room changed the way you viewed filmmaking as an actor?
BA: It’s changed my perspective in a lot of ways. Mostly what it’s done has given me an appreciation for what folks in this business do. The individual jobs and how important those are. I think being a smart and good director is about creating situations where other people can excel and help make your movie better. People who care a lot about their job and are really good at it – letting them be good at it and benefiting from it. I’ve been on a lot of sets and had a lot of experience with that and working with other actors. It actually speaks to what Billy was saying about people who have a limited amount of experience, in fact, have a greater appreciation for it. Because I know how to use this interface in a limited capacity and can fix minor technical problems that come along, because I can take a picture, make an exposure, shoot film and develop film, shoot digital and produce it – I have a much greater appreciation for what John (Toll, cinematographer) told us and for what Billy does. I actually know what it’s like; I don’t just look at it and think he’s clacking away. I understand the overlap of art and science. Part of it for me has been like a secret. Guys who are really talented, who do stuff that I would like to do better than I am, kind of have to hang out with me. So I get to learn editing from Billy and ask why he’s trimming where he is. Starting with an appreciation, I’ve learned to tell people to do their job as best as they can. There are directors I’ve seen who want to sit on it and kind of control everything. It’s going to be your movie, you’re the director, you’re going to direct the movie, no one is taking that away from you. I adapted it, but it’s also based on a novel that another person wrote and Billy’s going to cut it and John shot it and the sound is recorded by someone else. They all did those jobs, I didn’t do their jobs for them, but I benefited by it and I think people do best that way.
HOLLYWOODLAND was Allen Coulter’s first feature. Did he give you any tips?
BA: Yeah, but he was a director by trade for many years. I certainly didn’t consider him to be starting off by any means. I did ask him a lot of questions and he gave me a view finder as a wrap gift. I’ve learned a great deal from a lot of directors I’ve worked with. I learned a lot from Marty Brest, who I consider a truly brilliant guy, one of the smartest, most brilliant guys I’ve come across in this business. A lot of brilliant people I’ve come across have been the editors. You’re at the end of the process and the movie is really taking shape. Most of the directors I’ve worked with have been really collaborative and like I said I certainly believe in a director’s authorship. So if they said ‘hey come in the editing room,’ I don’t ever try to abuse that privilege. As a consequence of that, I’ve been impressed by almost every editor I’ve met. When I see what they deal with – especially when I’m sitting there looking at the director and thinking to myself ‘it’s too long!” So you pull the editor aside and ask ‘why is this 2:45?” I’ve had an immerging appreciation for editors from there.
Billy, you worked on MIAMI VICE which was shot on HD, but cut on a Meridien. How does this feel cutting on HD?
BG: We had a Nitris on MIAMI VICE for our on-line only and for screening with a 2K projector so we were able to screen the movie in the office in Hi-def. Now I’m actually cutting in Hi-def which is like a dream. You can actually see the actors’ eyes which is the biggest thing. There’s no degradation of the image, there’s very little compression, not like a regular Avid with 14:1 compression. So you can see things in the images and the actors’ eyes you don’t normally see until you get to the big screen. It saves time and it’s a pleasure to not be surprised as much when it’s projected. Since I’m cutting on a Nitris, it’s pretty much seamless in terms of moving from the Media Composer to this Nitris because our technicians were able to hook up a Mac keyboard even though it’s a PC system. They had software that made all the buttons the same as I’m use to. I have great monitors with high resolution and unfortunately now I’m spoiled. However, a lot of people will say it’s really expensive and it takes up a lot of storage.
BA: It takes up a lot of storage, but it’s really worth it. I was a big advocate and really, really wanted it. I knew it would be helpful and that Billy would like it. It’s great and definitely the next evolution. In five years, there will not be a director on a major film that will accept not cutting on this. To go from this back to a Meridien – that you won’t be able to see the colors on or how the shots look – won’t happen. Most folks will do a DI and you can see everything there, but you can do a lot of color correcting in the Nitris here. You can see how stuff works and do limited effects. You get to see what the movie is really going to look like and to me that’s important. It’s like when there were little 4” black and white monitors on the set – you don’t see them anymore because people want to see the movie that they’re making because it’s a visual medium. It’s a little bit expensive because Moore’s Law says twice as fast and half as big every 18 months. We have 600,000 feet of film on 10 TB which we have mirrored and on a Unity. The long and short of it, it’s a little bit pricey, but I really have been impressed by the Symphony Nitris interface and the software I think is great. The workstation stuff and the iO boards are all integrated great. Honestly, I’ve had far, far, far more problems with my everyday laptop at home than we’ve had here doing this. It’s pretty remarkable when you consider how much data it’s pushing in and out.
BG: I’d say this crashes far less than a Meridien. You would think it would be more considering it’s the next step, but in terms of what I’m used, to it’s less.
BA: People just don’t know…Those guys who do the big movies who see this are going to start wondering ‘oh what is this?’ I’ll show the movie to the cinematographer for the first time in this room. I mean this is how it looked when we went through and timed it and went through and projected little pieces just to look at coloring and detail. That’s pretty impressive; you can definitely see this as the ‘wave of the future,’ as they say.
BG: As soon as they can get storage to the point where you can get a million to a million and a half feet into one Unity, you’ll see a change. I mean, had Miami Vice been shot on film, we’d have had 2 million feet and it just wouldn’t have fit.
BA: In a couple of years, that’ll come down, too. If you’re Jerry Bruckheimer and you’re doing such a volume of work, it could make sense to buy the big, combined Unity systems and just move things off and on. Just being a techie, I would buy all of the systems to cut on HD because you have the movies to support it.
Ben, what prompted your decision to actually purchase the systems rather than rent them?
BA: I really like it and I’ll do other documentary projects and some HD stuff. In the event I’m fortunate enough to get hired to do another movie I’ll get to cut on this again.
In the foreward for Gone, Baby, Gone Lehane stated that he had changed some of the locations to benefit the story. Ben, being from Boston, did you change anything back?
BA: He was responding to people that would be sticklers. The stuff he changed was like moving the Quincy Quarry closer to Germantown and moving around some diners. To be honest, the book is so complicated and filled with so many twists and turns that if you were to do a faithful adaptation, you’d have a six hour movie. I ended up changing a lot of things to connect and simplify them. The stuff I took out was not to get back to a sort of purity, but rather to keep from having a four hour movie. You can’t put everything in.
Billy, did you read the book?
BG: I consciously didn’t. I only wanted the screenplay in my head. When I did SEABISCUIT, I read that and a few times I’d think ‘in the book.’ The director would say “this isn’t the book.”
BA: That’s actually a good thing. I did read the book and all 40 drafts of the script and know every back story on each decision. Billy has a clean perspective and knows only what does and doesn’t work.
How important was it for you to shoot entirely in Boston. GOOD WILL HUNTING only had 14 days, correct?
BA: You’re right; we had 14 days in Boston which we had to really fight for. We had 8 weeks in Toronto with all the exteriors in Boston and one or two interiors. This is a very Boston movie for two reasons – one is that I shot a lot of transitions and a credit sequence. I wanted to use a lot of what you would call documentary footage of Boston and the people who live there. I wanted the city to be a character in the movie and the locations to form the way it feels. A lot of times the places we went we would use the people who were there rather than casting extras. Two, it really helped the actors who weren’t from there to get that vibe. It was hugely, hugely important.
Boston just passed a tax benefit for filmmakers didn’t they?
BA: They did. I think we were the first or second movie to avail ourselves of that. Boston has had a bad reputation and they need to do everything they can to combat that. They have a beautiful city and people want to shoot there. They really need to keep that up.
Dennis Lehane actually lives in Boston. Did he ever visit the set?
BA: He did. He’s a big fan of Ed Harris and Morgan Freeman. He came down to meet them. He wasn’t there everyday, but he was very cool and had an attitude that made me very comfortable. He’s become a very well known author after the towering success of Mystic River, both literary and cinematic. He felt that he sells the book and that’s how it goes. Which I think is good. The best piece of advice I got while I was adapting it was that the book is still the book no matter what you write. You’re not going to change that, you’re not taking away from it; it’s still on the shelf. It’s a separate thing. You’re doing the adaptation. Dennis had a similar sense. He read the script, there was stuff that was different and stuff that was faithful. If he hated anything, he was gentlemanly enough to never let me know. His presence and graciousness was appreciated. He came out and gave us his blessing.
For an otherwise dark drama, there are a lot of comedic one-liners in the book, mostly from Patrick (played by Casey Affleck). Did you incorporate any of that into the film?
BA: This is a bit darker version. The beginning of the film is a bit lighter, but as the case goes on, it gets deeper and darker. Casey has that sarcastic dry humor and can pull off those one liners, but this was definitely the darker version of the book.
How close to the script are you cutting?
BG: I think we’re pretty faithful. A good screenplay is hard to move the pieces around because they’re there for a reason. They’re put in that order very specifically as one thing builds on to the next; when you can move scenes around, that’s usually not a good thing. There shouldn’t be independent parts. We were just talking about how there haven’t been any huge parts we had to take out or revamp.
Where are you looking for the runtime to wind up?
BA: As an actor there have been times where I would work with the director on a movie, they’d do a cut, I’d come to a screening and half way through I’m bored, and then I start to resent it. I resent the movie, the filmmaker, I hate it, and I don’t want to watch it anymore. I’m in it; I’m ostensibly supposed to like the movie. It’s become a thing I’ve noticed about some directors, their inability to let go, to keep them long or to have a preciousness. I always thought that if I direct a movie, I am not going to do that. I’m going to have ruthlessness. What’s best for the story? I’m the audience, don’t let it be boring. There are just so many times when I’ve been in a scene that I like and the music is good, but it’s just unnecessary and it can be cut. It should be cut. I set a certain loose running time in my head and knew I didn’t want to screen it for the studio any longer than two hours. We got it right around 1:59 and I’ve always had that in my mind while writing and shooting. Length has always been important because another problem is that when you shoot, you’ll spend weeks and weeks on stuff that has to come out. So, essentially, you have a ten week shoot that you can only use seven weeks of, which is a maddening waste. Say you shoot 8 weeks to use 7 weeks. You get that much more time for takes, set ups, preparation for each of those days improving the actual movie itself instead of shooting whole set pieces that are never going to be in the actual movie. So I tried to have that discipline. I think the assembly was around 2:30 and were able to take out about a half hour without a lot of pain.
How long did it take for you and Aaron Stockard to adapt this script?
BA: I got the rights back when THE SUM OF ALL FEARS came out and I was shooting DAREDEVIL. Aaron would take one part and I would work on another. When we finished, we would call one another and bounce ideas off of each other. In a way, we’re still writing the movie now. I mean, editing is as important a part of writing as writing is. In a way, we’re really editing a screenplay on the Avid now.
Any ideas on a release date?
BA: I’m not the one making the decision, but I’d say maybe September or October of ’07.
