Looking for Vimeo essay comparing American cut of a film compared to European cut

Jimmy Pierce

Jimmy Pierce

Well-known member
There was a video I saw years ago on Vimeo that showed several scenes from a B&W film in the 50s or 60s showing how the studio cut the film for an American audience and slightly differently for an European audience. The European version uses a more cinema vérité style, lingering on shots of citizens walking in a city and on characters' reactions, whereas the American version gets straight to the point, no lingering. Someone was also narrating the video. It was short, probably under 5 minutes. I believe the film itself starred Henry Fonda but not 100% sure.

Anyone seen this and can send a link, would greatly appreciate it.
 
That's it! Thanks a lot Jim. Yes it's really interesting to see how one film can be cut two ways to serve it's purpose to the audience.
 
We're ADD afflicted cretins here in the States. I started watching Downton Abbey several years ago on Amazon and they're the original BBC versions. I was sorta surprised to learn that the versions shown here in the US on PBS, even though they're on PBS, were re-edited for the US market, with scenes and dialog chopped down. What does that say about us as a whole, if the programming on educational TV has to be dumbed down for us?
 
Run&Gun said:
We're ADD afflicted cretins here in the States. I started watching Downton Abbey several years ago on Amazon and they're the original BBC versions. I was sorta surprised to learn that the versions shown here in the US on PBS, even though they're on PBS, were re-edited for the US market, with scenes and dialog chopped down. What does that say about us as a whole, if the programming on educational TV has to be dumbed down for us?
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That's anti-American! Don't put down the U.S. - it is the most successful film industry in the world, and travels the best. Sure, Bollywood puts out more product, but which industry has product that's successful all over the world? That's right. Including in Europe. If the Europeans are so much better, then how come American films and TV shows (and music) dominate Europe by far compared to any domestic product from their own countries? They have to pass LAWS to put their own films ahead of the U.S., and have percentage requirements for TV - apparently the French, British etc. much prefer U.S. shows/films/etc.!

C'mon. Now, wrt. Downton Abbey, maybe the reason the American version has "scenes and dialog chopped down" is because the original version drags and has poor pacing. For that matter a lot of U.S. films/shows have the same problem - I constantly find myself thinking "that should have been CUT!!!", and "GET ON WITH IT!!!", "BOOOORING!!!" etc. The problems is not even so much editing though that can also be an issue - less is more - as much as poor dramatic structure, tension and content - don't make a boring scene in the first place, then you won't have to cut as much. ADD is a poor excuse - make content that actually HOLDS the audience attention and suddenly there's no ADD - but when you show boring-a$$ content, yep, I switch channels around. It's not about fast cuts or short scenes - you can have really SLOW scenes, which are nonetheless filled with dramatic tension and keep you at the edge of your seat. Slow, fast or inbetween - HOLD MY ATTENTION! That's YOUR job, as content creator. Don't blame the audience - ever.

No doubt there are European films with a sensibility that you won't find here, and I love those, but it doesn't have to be all one or the other. Why not enjoy the best of both? Basically, I don't agree that somehow U.S. audiences are dummies compared to Europeans - sure, we've got our dummies segment, but so do they over there.

And some of it is a matter of taste. I personally thought the first season of Downton Abbey was OK (not spectacular, just OK), and then very rapidly turned into a soap opera with implausibilities and characters which didn't ring true - but that's just me, I wouldn't waste my time beyond the first season, so any cutting is a win as far as I can see. YMMV, to each their own.
 
OldCorpse said:
That's anti-American! Don't put down the U.S. - it is the most successful film industry in the world, and travels the best. Sure, Bollywood puts out more product, but which industry has product that's successful all over the world? That's right. Including in Europe. If the Europeans are so much better, then how come American films and TV shows (and music) dominate Europe by far compared to any domestic product from their own countries? They have to pass LAWS to put their own films ahead of the U.S., and have percentage requirements for TV - apparently the French, British etc. much prefer U.S. shows/films/etc.!

C'mon. Now, wrt. Downton Abbey, maybe the reason the American version has "scenes and dialog chopped down" is because the original version drags and has poor pacing. For that matter a lot of U.S. films/shows have the same problem - I constantly find myself thinking "that should have been CUT!!!", and "GET ON WITH IT!!!", "BOOOORING!!!" etc. The problems is not even so much editing though that can also be an issue - less is more - as much as poor dramatic structure, tension and content - don't make a boring scene in the first place, then you won't have to cut as much. ADD is a poor excuse - make content that actually HOLDS the audience attention and suddenly there's no ADD - but when you show boring-a$$ content, yep, I switch channels around. It's not about fast cuts or short scenes - you can have really SLOW scenes, which are nonetheless filled with dramatic tension and keep you at the edge of your seat. Slow, fast or inbetween - HOLD MY ATTENTION! That's YOUR job, as content creator. Don't blame the audience - ever.

No doubt there are European films with a sensibility that you won't find here, and I love those, but it doesn't have to be all one or the other. Why not enjoy the best of both? Basically, I don't agree that somehow U.S. audiences are dummies compared to Europeans - sure, we've got our dummies segment, but so do they over there.

And some of it is a matter of taste. I personally thought the first season of Downton Abbey was OK (not spectacular, just OK), and then very rapidly turned into a soap opera with implausibilities and characters which didn't ring true - but that's just me, I wouldn't waste my time beyond the first season, so any cutting is a win as far as I can see. YMMV, to each their own.
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Lol...

Oh, you weren't kidding?
 
I certainly am not kidding, though now I'm suddenly thinking that I owe you an apology, because you clearly wrote a piece of satire - how silly of me not to see the obvious! What you wrote is such a caricature that it only can be satire on the theme of "stupid americans". Well played, sir, well played!
 
OldCorpse said:
C'mon. Now, wrt. Downton Abbey, maybe the reason the American version has "scenes and dialog chopped down" is because the original version drags and has poor pacing. For that matter a lot of U.S. films/shows have the same problem - I constantly find myself thinking "that should have been CUT!!!", and "GET ON WITH IT!!!", "BOOOORING!!!" etc. The problems is not even so much editing though that can also be an issue - less is more - as much as poor dramatic structure, tension and content - don't make a boring scene in the first place, then you won't have to cut as much. ADD is a poor excuse - make content that actually HOLDS the audience attention and suddenly there's no ADD - but when you show boring-a$$ content, yep, I switch channels around. It's not about fast cuts or short scenes - you can have really SLOW scenes, which are nonetheless filled with dramatic tension and keep you at the edge of your seat. Slow, fast or inbetween - HOLD MY ATTENTION! That's YOUR job, as content creator. Don't blame the audience - ever.
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Some good recent examples IMHO include Sicario and Ingorius Basterds.
 
Back in the 60s & 70s, European critics and filmmakers would comment about driving shots and "shoe leather" shots in American movies. European films on much smaller budgets than Hollywood productions could not afford big establishing shots of locations, helicopters following a car down a country road as the soundtrack swells, etc. I recall one such critique of the title sequence to an American movie, I think it was the Goldie Hawn & Chevy Chase film Foul Play, with an opening title sequence of Helicopter shots of Goldie Hawn driving her VW Bug along the California coastline while Barry Manilow's "Ready to Take a Chance Again" playing. The gist of the critique was that it was basically a music video commercial for the song (it kinda was -- written for the movie and I think she actually sings along to it so that it was clearly planned as integral to the film) and that the budget for the sequence could have paid for half a Euro film's production.

So it cuts both ways.
 
American audiences grew up inundated with film and TV. When I was making educational gallery films for an art museum, pacing and shot lengths that worked for pre TV aged audiences were too slow and lingering for the TV generation. But it wasn’t ADD.
The younger audiences actually absorbed and learned more from the faster paced versions than older people did with either version. I think it is a result of a better developed more sophisticated sense of visual language in American culture.
Mind you that does not speak to quality of content, just how it is communicated visually. A scene that a French filmmaker might cover with spoken narrative and simple cinematography might be constructed almost entirely with visuals by an American to tell the same story.
 
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Mitch Gross said:
Back in the 60s & 70s, European critics and filmmakers would comment about driving shots and "shoe leather" shots in American movies. European films on much smaller budgets than Hollywood productions could not afford big establishing shots of locations, helicopters following a car down a country road as the soundtrack swells, etc...
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Furthermore, most Euro films do their audio in post, without he overhead booms for the live recording. It allows a much wider framing, where in fact, most of the film is with few closeups but with far more continuous takes.
 
It's perhaps a shock to read that American standards are known to require this treatment, but it's not new. TV wise, the BBC here have for many years sold our TV shows to the US market, and they have always had to be re-edited. Not just grown up progammes, but kids stuff too. Sci-fi suffered badly as well. Now we can read the history, we find that laughter tracks were needed to help audiences engage with comedy, and plot simlification in programmes like the original Thunderbirds - which even had to have script changes to make them palateable to US audiences, and see voices changed to American because of their on-screen status - English voices retained for some characters, but Americanised for the characters in charge. Even Dr Who had to be Americanised for US sales. Us Brits of course accepted US products in the US form - like Friends, with no requirement for changes. As an outsider to American likes and dislikes, I do have the opinion that for the average comsumer, they have to be helped and supported when movies or TV requires additional thought. Kind of like breakfast cereal. You don't actually need the quantity of milk, but making it runnier eases swallowing.

The anti-American reception was sadly, expected. The sheer indignation is so American. You know it's the best in the world, so are jaw dropped at any acusation that maybe, just maybe, other countries might think differently. Nobody ever has creiteria for best, apart from quantity nowadays. So the most watched = the best. If you are in a market that needs simplification for greater reach - that's fine, but don't try to convince the supplier that the mistake is theirs for providing a product that needs to engage the brain a little more.


I actually find Downton slow paced, and a little complex, and I don't watch it - but I love the idea that for the US market, you just chop out the boring bits because the average consumer can't keep up. I supose the folks in Deliverance, if there was a Deliverance 2020 would have Netflixs, and that's scary. Maybe in this age of widening participation, standards need to cope with every market, which means dilution. I'm truly sorry if this simplification and additional editing is required to cope for not lack of intelligence, but lack of willingness to think.
 
A less controversial, but perhaps equally accurate way to frame the discussion is Entertainment vs Art.

On the European side, I think it's much easier to get funded under the 'Art' label via various cultural funds and/or small media companies. A hunch tells me that Art movies are also typically cheaper to make. Unfortunately, while many self proclaimed auteurs think that shabby clothes, a pack of cigarettes and a bridge in Paris is all you need, they couldn't be more wrong. Exactly due to the lingering shots in films of this nature and the lack of budget, the craft you need to have to make it interesting is substantial. It can be done, but many have failed.

The Entertainment side is perhaps more forgiving? Here, movies can be silly and whimsical or straight up not make sense. They just need to appeal to their target audience. Success is measured in money and big budgets are easy to understand, since it's all under the assumption that return on investment will be greater still.

Of course, there are all sorts of films both in the US and in Europe. But the Hollywood machine is called the Entertainment industry for a reason.

Maybe it is craft then, that is the smallest common denominator? It's possible to produce great movies in all genres, as long as one understands what's being made and for whom. And since it's a grayscale anyway, it might be possible to take something that started out more on one side and turn it into something else, albeit with quite a bit of cutting.
 
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