I was watching Gimme Shelter for the billionth time the other night and I wondered what it was about that film that is so enduring. I came up with several reasons: The Maysles’ masterful cameras capture The Rolling Stones at the peak of their powers, capture an era, and capture an out of control event and a horrifying moment.
Of course that footage needed to be edited, and it was, and brilliantly by Charlotte Zwerin. It was Zwerin who decided to incorporate the scenes of Jagger and Watts watching the concert footage. It’s hard to imagine the film without these scenes, but if you try hard enough, you can envision it. Go ahead, try.
Are you done? It’s not as good, right?
Here’s a quote from Stephen Lighthill, one of the cameramen at Altamont:
”The real hero of the making of the film was Charlotte Zwerin, who edited it and got a directing credit. I was stunned with what she got out of my footage. She compressed it and gave you a sense of a buildup of tragedy that you otherwise wouldn’t have.”
from “Gimme Shelter”: The true story. (Salon.com)
Good editors know more than what buttons to push on an AVID or Final Cut Pro system. Good editors know about story. And just as good D.P.s will see things a director doesn’t see, a good editor will see story opportunities where a director might not. There can be a number of reasons why a director has a blindspot, and it’s a rare one who doesn’t have one; I’m always a bit suspect of films written, directed, and edited by the same person. (Excepting the Coen Brothers, but they’re two people.) Right now, I’m going through the interviews, choosing selects (or selex, as editors like to spell it) based on the film’s themes–the project’s goals, how the subject became interested in this work, who influenced them, what are the project’s challenges, what setbacks did it encounter, what successes, etc. I’ll put something together that has some kind of arc, some kind of story, but it will be the editor who will bring the story to life. That’s what makes good editors worth their weight in gold.
It’s easy to see why the Maysles gave their editors director credit.
For an insightful article on how Gimme Shelter was received at the time of its release and how it fares today, make sure to check out the Salon article.