Angus Wall, ACE, and Kirk Baxter, editors of the David Fincher-directed The Social Network, won the Association of Cinema Editors (ACE) Eddie Award for best edited dramatic feature at the 61st annual ACE Eddie Awards ceremony on Saturday (2/19) at the Beverly Hilton.
Wall and Baxter, who cut commercials and branded content via editorial house Rock Paper Scissors, are also in the running for an editing Oscar on the strength of The Social Network. Winning the ACE honor bodes well for their Academy Award prospects as four out of the last five years the Eddie winner has gone on to earn the Oscar.
Wall and Baxter topped an Eddie field of nominees that also consisted of: Tariq Anwar for The King’s Speech; Pamela Martin for The Fighter; Lee Smith, ACE, for Inception; and Andrew Weisblum, ACE, for Black Swan. All these Eddie nominees–except for Smith–have also been nominated for this year’s editing Oscar. Editor Jon Harris is the other Academy Award nominee for the movie 127 Hours.
Chris Lebenzon, ACE, topped the feature film, comedy or musical category for Alice in Wonderland. Ken Schretzmann and Lee Unkrich, ACE, earned best animated feature film distinction for Toy Story 3.
And best edited documentary honors went to Tom Fulford and Chris King for Exit Through the Gift Shop.
The winning half-hour series for TV was the “Family Portrait” episode of Modern Family, cut by Jonathan Schwartz. The best edited one-hour series for commercial television was The Walking Dead‘s “Days Gone Bye” edited by Hunter Via.
The best edited one-hour series for non-commercial television was the Treme episode “Do You Know What It Means” cut by Kate Sanford, ACE, and Alexander Hall.
Temple Grandin was named best edited miniseries or motion picture for TV, the editor being Leo Trombetta, ACE.
And the best edited reality series was If You Really Knew Me‘s “Colusa High,” cut by Rob Goubeau, Jeremy Gantz, Hilary Scratch, Ken Yankee, Mark S. Andrew, ACE, Heather Miglin, John Skaare and Paul J. Coyne.
The Eddie student competition was topped by Ruben Jacques Sebban of the American Film Institute.
Oscar Nominees Delve Into The Art Of Editing At ACE Session
You couldn’t miss Sean Baker at this past Sunday’s Oscar ceremony where he won for Best Picture, Directing, Original Screenplay and Editing on the strength of Anora. However, earlier that weekend he was in transit from the Cesar Awards in Paris and thus couldn’t attend the American Cinema Editors (ACE) 25th annual panel of Academy Award-nominated film editors held at the Regal LA Live Auditorium on Saturday (3/1) in Los Angeles. While the eventual Oscar winner in the editing category was missed by those who turned out for the ACE “Invisible Art, Visible Artists” session, three of Baker’s fellow nominees were on hand--Dávid Jancsó, HSE for The Brutalist; Nick Emerson for Conclave; and Myron Kerstein, ACE for Wicked. Additionally, Juliette Welfling, who couldn’t appear in person due to the Cesar Awards, was present via an earlier recorded video interview to discuss her work on Emilia Pérez. The interview was conducted by ACE president and editor Sabrina Plisco, ACE who also moderated the live panel discussion. Kerstein said that he was the beneficiary of brilliant and generous collaborators, citing, among others, director Jon M. Chu, cinematographer Alice Brooks, and visual effects supervisor Pablo Helman. The editor added it always helps to have stellar acting performances, noting that hearing Cynthia Erivo, for example, sing live was a revelation. Kerstein recalled meeting Chu some eight years ago on a “blind Skype date” and it was an instant “bromance”--which began on Crazy Rich Asians, and then continued on such projects as the streaming series Home Before Dark and the feature In The Heights. Kerstein observed that Chu is expert in providing collaborators with... Read More