And what’s up with the irrelevant stuff? For example the singer walking down the street in Gangs and singing the score and the rats in this movie. I thought I was watching Willard for a while. Maybe I missed something, but I don’t see any connection between the rats and any other part of the movie. If all these gaffes were intentional, you’d think at some point you’d say, “Oh, I get it now” like the scene where Leo’s holding his wife from behind and she starts bleeding from the belly.

And if we’re seeing this movie from the perspective of Leo, why would he conjure up himself as not being clean shaven? You would think that in 1956, or 1952 or whenever he’s imagining himself, that he would be clean shaven. You might say, “Ah, but that’s the genius. He has a damaged mind.” I’d call that argument a cop out. But then again, I’m just the consumer and I know what I like and I know what to stay away from going forward. And when non filmies like me see error after error, its obvious that someone in the production really just didn’t care.

It’s like building a house in which the front door is slightly crooked. It works just fine and serves its purpose, but too much of a pain in the ass to make it look right, so you just leave a crooked door.

See also, Todd Haynes’ FAR FROM HEAVEN that was channeling the era’s rear-projection work when Julianne Moore was driving around.

No issue with either of those films for their visual look.

As an editor I believe there are occasions when the cutting is unnecessary, and actually causes problems. For example, when you look at the scene in the jeep, Di Caprio is in one shot looking straight ahead, and in the reverse looking at the crazy guard guy. This happens repeatedly in this scene, and I found it really distracting.

There’s an earlier scene with a room full of nurses, guards who are being questioned by Di Caprio. The blocking is atrocious; one shot he is stood up, and seconds later he is at the other end of the room sat by someone. This is more likely poor continuity spawned from the shoot itself however.

Okay, probably not great examples, but it happens several times throughout and as an editor I really notice these things. Other viewers who aren’t so involved or aware of film-making techniques likely won’t notice, but I’m suprised that it’s allowed to pass so easily when other newer filmmakers would be hung out to dry.

I think poor editing is being excused as being part of the plot. Some things are intentional, like the glass of water. But on the most part it’s just an unfortunate trademark of old school film-making.

Suprised more people haven’t noticed the dreadful green screen work?!

I can put a review up yeah, but it might be in a couple of days as I’m planning on spending my Easter weekend watching as many of my unwatched DVD’s as humanly possible seen as my girlfriend’s away. Plus I’m just sitting down to review a Blu Ray I got sent over that comes out on Monday so I kind of have to review that as soon as poss.

I actually noticed a couple of much more obvious continuity errors in Kick-Ass last night, which I really enjoyed too by the way.

I don’t think it was entirely meant to be taken literally, but I also think that Thelma Shoonmaker is very much aware that the bulk of the life of any movie is on DVD/Home-Video/etc., where many people watch films again and again (and again) and you can very much drink there! This is how drinking games start in the first place, not upon first viewing!

I listened to the screenwriter on the Creative Screenwriting podcast and she is very clear about two things:

1) Leo is a patient not a cop
2) Thelma was deliberately fucking with the editing because she and Scorsese knew there were drinking games about their continuity errors“

Again, going to have to agree with Andrew James. 2) is a pretty stupid reason to fuck up the editing. Especially since you can`t drink in a movie theater. I`d really like you to link proof of the second reason.

*Spoiler Alert*
When Teddy Daniels faints after realizing that he`s Andrew Laeddis. He looks like he`s about to faint. Then it cuts to him waking up in a bed later on. Then it cuts back to him fainting. Then back to him in the bed. There`s no way in hell that mistake wasn`t noticed by everyone.