The Art of Editing

For this assignment I chose to analyze a scene from one of my favorite action/cop thriller films, Bullitt (1968). I scene I chose to analyze was the famous car chase scene near the end of the film. I scene starts of quite slow, introducing the audience to the first car involved in the chase. The audience is shown a number of fixed camera positions following the car going up and down very San Francisco like streets. Then we enter the car; there are 4 or 5 short cuts of the driver and the passenger in the car clearly looking for something. Then there is a series of POV shots showing at the characters in the car looking down the road and then of the cars and other activity in the direction they look. We are then introduced to Steve McQueen’s car in a very creative way. The driver of the other car looks in his rear view mirror and McQueen suddenly appears from the other side of a hill. We then jump from the mirror, to the driver of the car, and back to the mirror, beginning to add suspense with short, violent cuts.
Finally, we get close up of the driver of the first car buckling his seat belt, letting the audience know that the chase is about to begin. Shortly after this shot the music kicks in and the chase is on. The editor does a terrific job of creating suspenseful and edge of your seat type of scene. The shots are short and jump constantly from car to car, driver to driver, creating a chaotic like mood. The editor moves from long, tracking shots of the cars going by, to close ups of the drivers in the car, constantly cutting and holding shots for no longer than 3 or 4 seconds. The chase finally ends with a spectacular explosion (like any car chase should end) and again the editor of the film has put together, through the use of extremely short shots and a back and forth cutting, an extraordinarily suspenseful and thrilling chase scene.