by Erica Ginsberg, Docs In Progress® Executive Director
Kurt Engfehr is an award-winning editor with experience in all areas of film and video production, including reality television, music videos, promos, stop-motion animations, short fiction films, and documentaries such as A League of Ordinary Gentlemen, a feature documentary about pro-bowlers which won the Audience Awards at the 2004 SXSW Film Festival and Cinderella Season, the Emmy-winning HBO documentary about a season-in-the-life of a college women’s basketball team. Engfehr won the American Cinema Editors Eddie Award for Best Documentary Editing for his work on Bowling for Columbine. He was also editor and co-producer of Fahrenheit 9/11 and was senior editor on Michael Moore’s television show, The Awful Truth. He is currently editing and co-producing, Trumbo, a documentary about Dalton Trumbo, the blacklisted writer who was one of the Hollywood 10 during the Red Scare of the 1950s and is the producer and supervising editor on No Manifesto, a documentary about the Welsh band Manic Street Preachers. We caught up with the very busy Engfehr in August 2006.
Q: How did you get into documentary filmmaking?
I stumbled into it. I was a promo and reality TV show editor working at MSNBC, HBO and others when a friend gave me a name and contact at Michael Moore’s show The Awful Truth that was just starting to staff up. I sent in a demo reel and a resume, got called in, met with MM, we hit if off and a few weeks later, I was hired. I spent nearly a year working on that show and another project for MM that didn’t air in the US.
I then became a partner in a small post house working with most of the major broadcast and cable networks doing show opens, promos and whatever editing came along. Then, about a year and a half into that, I got a phone call from MM. He was trying to finish Bowling for Columbine and had gone through two editors and wanted to know if I could come in for 4 months and help finish BFC up. Eighteen months later, BFC was released and I had a new career as a documentary guy.
Q: What is your process as an editor? Do you prefer to work to script or concept?
I’m a chameleon. Very rarely am I on board early enough in the project to have control over when and how things are done so I find myself having to adapt my work methods to situations I did not create. That’s always interesting. Sometimes you learn things, both good and bad, like how NOT to do something.
I’ve never had a script, or even an outline while editing a documentary. Usually there’s an idea, perhaps a mandate, and sometimes a goal that someone would like to achieve. But, in the end, the process of discovery, for both the film and the filmmakers, is what dictates the final result. For me, the editing of a film is very organic. It comes out of the footage and the interaction with the director and what we hope to accomplish.
Q: When a director is approaching potential editors, what are the most important questions
to ask? What do you as an editor most want to know from a director?
The questions, on both sides, are really basic: What have you worked on in the past? Can I see something of yours? Why do you want to do this movie? Are you available? If not now, when? Often, I ask more questions of the director and/or production team than they ask of me. I want to know that they are serious about making the film, that it’s not just a hobby or something to do until a “real” job comes along.
Usually I like to see something, a trailer or some footage or a rough cut. I’ll make decisions based on footage. If I think it’s not far enough along, I’ll tell people that. If I’m notinto the subject, I’ll tell people that, too. I also like to talk to people to get a feel of what they expect from me (how much input, how many bright ideas, how much producing-type help) and why they think I’m the editor for them. A lot of times, they’re just looking for an editor and my name comes up first. In reality, often there’s a better editor for them based on the material or the situation. I’ll pass on jobs that I feel aren’t right for me and hopefully I know someone who would work out and I’ll be able to pass their name on.
Q: Often problems encountered in post-production arise out of problems in production. As an editor, what would you recommend every director focus on in order to make the editor happiest?
Every production seems to have a different set of problems to overcome. From bad camerawork to buzzy or non-existent sound to having no b-roll for an interview, it seems that at some point, if something can go wrong, it will. From my perspective, nothing beats good, solid production values: steady camerawork that’s in focus, clean sound and coverage that’s usable for editing, including various angles and b-roll. If I get that, I consider myself lucky.
Beyond that, things like avoiding boring shot set-ups (don’t interview someone on a couch or with a plant behind their head), using the right mic at the right time (learn to love the wireless), and learning how to white balance the camera. Also, it’s important for everyone on the production to understand and remember what the parameters of the job are. Nothing is worse than working on a 24P film and getting a bunch of footage in that’s 30i. That hurts deep inside your bowels. Same with audio. Nothing should not be 48k! I never want to see the words 32k on my edit screen. Ever. Those are the kinds of things that help an editor!
Q: You have worked both as a producer and an editor. How do you feel about filmmakers taking on multiple roles – especially emerging documentarians who may be doing so by economic necessity?
The only way to successfully perform the roles of producer, director and editor on a film, especially for a relatively new documentarian, is to NOT do all those roles. At the beginning of a project, often it is most expedient, cost effective and easiest to just do everything yourself, however, the closer the project gets to becoming a completed film, the more help one needs.
In a strange twist of fate, in some ways the job of director is the easiest one to master if only because it’s the director who usually starts a project and often the director chooses a particular project because of a base of knowledge about the subject. However, while the director often has knowledge about the subject, he or she may have very little knowledge about filmmaking and about the roles of the producer or editor. And while those roles can be learned, and performed adequately with a minimal amount of training, near the end of the process, there are many small details that can add time and expense to the project that the documentarian will not know.
In some cases, it is possible that the lack of higher level producer or editor knowledge could place the project in jeopardy and in some instances, the documentarian will not be able to finish the movie on their own and if they do, it will contain so many deficiencies that it will not get accepted into festivals or TV channels.
I suggest that, at a certain time, possibly near the end of principle shooting, the determined documentarian will begin contacting experienced producers and editors in order to bring to the project knowledge and experience that the documentarian does not have.
Now, oftentimes, it is helpful to get advice before that point. Many projects wouldn’t even get off the ground if it weren’t for a producer giving helpful tips to a novice director along the way. Everything from how to interview people to what kind of camera to use are things that seem easy to experienced filmmakers, but can easily trip up a beginner.
The previous advice however, is not valid if the documentarian in question has already performed some of the functions on other projects. In fact, I would recommend that someone who is interested in making a documentary work on other people’s productions first in order to understand the process of filmmaking and to get a handle on what the documentarian may or may not be good at doing.
Q: Presumably films like Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 9/11 involved hundreds of hours of footage. At what point in the process did you start logging and editing?
I was actually the third editor on Bowling for Columbine, so that was an interesting experience. BFC had about 150 hours of original shoot footage and about 1,000 hours of archival, of which probably 200 hundred hours was loaded in. When I started, there were about 60 hours of shoot footage and 100 hours of archival loaded in. Sometimes I log and load, but not too often. I had people logging archival tapes and writing out quick synopsis and good lines. I read those and decide if I want them loaded in or not. Sometimes, later on, if I’m in a jam, I may remember a story or a line from a log and then load it in. I try not to have my assistants log, because I like them to load and then, do some editing. Logging takes a long time and if you (the editor) take the time to work with the logger at the beginning, show them what you’re looking for and give them responsibility, I find that they usually rise to the occasion.
Fahrenheit 9/11 was WAY more complicated. Editorial consisted of four Avids on Unity, three editors and five assistants. It was so complicated that I’m sure that situation will never be recreated again so any words of wisdom I have will not matter to any other editing situation.
The movie, League of Ordinary Gentlemen, about life on the pro bowling tour, is an example of a more normal editing situation. The production team had hired a logger/loader who was loading for over two months before I started. When I came on board, she continued to work, coming in during the mornings, loading before I came in, then logging during the day. I brought an assistant on board who worked nights while I worked days. That’s how you share one Avid with three people.
When I started, the production had been filming for over two months. I watched most of the footage, which took about three weeks and put together a trailer for fundraising purposes. The trailer took about two weeks. Shooting continued for another two months followed by two weeks of pickups a few months later. All told, there was about 350 hours of original shoot footage with about 75 hours of archival. I edited for about eight months off and on, getting a cut done that everyone was happy with. After I finished, the director got a couple of interviews that he’d always wanted and then wanted to do some tweaks, so my assistant put in another two months. It was a lot of tweaks.
Q: So it sounds like you had a very good assistant to put that much trust in his work?
While we shared an Avid, I’d work from 10-6 and he’d come in at 5, hang with me for an hour, see what I’d been working on. Then I’d give him an assignment or two. He works on that and does whatever loading or assisting stuff he needs to do. It was a nice arrangement.
I like to give assistants lots to do, and I don’t mean loading. There are always little projects that I have kicking around in my skull, things that I think might be really cool, but will take a long time or a lot of grunt work to get to a point where I can decide if it’ll be good or not. A good example is in League. I thought it might be fun to see the evolution of bowling through the styles of clothing and haircuts through the years. The TV shows taping of bowling matches haven’t changed much in 50 years. I suggested that we use one angle from the side, starting out at the beginning of the approach in the 1950′s and finishing up at the foul line in the present day, dissolving from one bowler to another to another. It was a real bear of a job, with the assistant needing to look through tons of shows, searching for just the right shots from the right angle, then stringing them together so they formed a fluid whole. It took a few days, but it turned out great and it’s in the movie with no changes after the first cut he did.
Q: Particularly with the Michael Moore films, you’ve had to balance scenes of great tragedy with more comic elements. How do you effectively balance the story structure to represent two (or more) extremes of emotion without doing injustice to either emotion?
After Fahrenheit 9/11 won at the Cannes Film Festival in 2004, we went back in the edit room. We decided that even though it won the Palme d’Or, it was too long and not funny enough. We had 10 days to do our changes. We took out seven minutes of boring and then added four minutes of funny. Some of these scenes added included the Dragnet scene and the Shiny, Happy People section.
In my experience, and in my style of editing, one cannot have humor without seriousness (or is that vice versa? I’m not sure). Either way, given my druthers, I like a good mix. I find nothing punctuates tragedy like a good laugh and nothing makes a laugh funnier than tragedy. Now, a lot of people don’t like this approach. They find this need to be both funny and serious to be counterproductive and somewhat alien. They think humor takes away from the message they’re trying to convey. I will usually try to explain that my experience is that humor helps get the message across. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. To them, I say, oh well.
Q: When is the right time to get feedback from outside sources on a work in progress?
I think every time you screen rough cuts, you need to bring in some outside perspectives. And to have different people watch those cuts. However, at some point, it’s good to have people from early screenings watch later ones to get their opinions on the evolution of the cut.
Q: What’s been the most painful thing you’ve ever had to cut out of a project? How do you deal with losing stuff that’s grown on you?
There are too many things that I’ve cut out to comment on that. And, sometimes, you console yourself with the notion that it’ll eventually be in the DVD extras. And if it’s not, then there’s nothing you can do and hopefully you have it on a rough cut and every so often, you pull it out and watch it.
Q: Do you ever feel creatively stuck? How do you keep yourself motivated?
I get stuck all the time. When it happens, I go for a walk or drink a milkshake. Sometimes I go and edit a scene that has almost nothing to do with the movie I’m working on. Something that’s fun and only for me using footage that probably wasn’t going to be in the movie. An example is the montage of bowling footage under the opening titles in BFC. I did that at 2am one Saturday night after a full day of editing where, at the end of the day, I felt that I hadn’t done one edit that was worth keeping. I felt like an idiot. I felt like I could never edit anything again, that I should just quit and get a job waiting tables. This one night, however, I decided to edit something that I knew wasn’t going to be in the film, something fun, just for me; to remind myself that I’m capable of editing a sequence that works. So I grabbed a bunch of old archival bowling footage, slowed it down 50% and put some church organ music under it. Took me half an hour and I left happy. The next day, my assistant told MM about my little bowling sequence and he insisted he watch it. So I showed it to him. He laughed, pounded the desk with his hand and said that was going to be the new open for the movie. We changed the music and basically, that’s what’s in the film.
Q: We often talk at Docs in Progress about the importance of story structure in documentary as being as important as it is in fiction films. What can documentary filmmakers and editors learn from fiction films in terms of editing?
The importance of telling a story and of having characters that you care about. In order to get a handle on the many, many possible storylines that make up a documentary, I sometimes find it helpful to use fiction films as rough templates in the beginning of the editing process. I don’t attempt to recreate the fiction film using the elements from the doc I’m working on, but to use the fiction film as a guide as I attempt to pull together the story of the doc. If, in a certain fiction film, the main character started here and ended there, then perhaps, in the doc, if the main character can make a similar journey, then it will have more resonance or at least give me a chance to tell a story. We may not eventually like that story, but at least we had something to work against and often, making a decision, even if it’s to say, “I don’t like that” is the most important thing one can do, especially at the beginning of the process.
Q: How would you define “documentary”?
Anything that’s not completely scripted and at least mostly true.
Q: What documentaries should every aspiring documentary filmmaker see?
Dig
Gimme Shelter
Lost in La Mancha
The 7-Up series
Murderball
Sherman’s March
Tom Dowd and the Language of Music
The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg
Roger & Me
Hearts and Minds
Hearts of Darkness
The Mayor of Sunset Strip
When We Were Kings
Those are off the top of my head. All are great and all can be learned from.
Q: In the great Avid vs. Final Cut debate, where do you stand?
Avid all the way, baby!
Q: What’s the best advice you ever got?
Shortly after I started on BFC, Michael Moore and I got to talking about what we wanted this movie to be and how we wanted it to be received. He then got some 3 x 5 cards and wrote out a bunch of little sayings and ideas that kind of became the guiding principles. My favorite one was: Is this a date movie? That was brilliant. It spoke to the idea of making a movie that was intelligent, informative, yet entertaining.
Q: Is there anything else you would want our readers to know about you or the craft of editing?
Everything that makes up your life ends up going into your editing. There should be no separation between you and your editing.
© October 2006, Docs In Progress®. This article may not be reprinted without permission.
