Beauty of a craft lies in the ability of its creator. If the artist is not talented, even the finest material cannot make it appealing. The same holds true for cinema. Some movies fail at the box-office when they fail to touch a chord with the viewers. A lot depends on the craftsmanship of the film editor.
“An editor must try to communicate the emotion of the story to its audience by properly cutting and fusing scenes,” says Nikhil Venu, an upcoming freelance film editor, who is currently working on Asha Black. Asha Black, a bilingual film directed by John Robinson is the fourth film project of Nikhil. Having completed the Tamil version, he is currently busy working on the Malayalam edition.
Matinee, Paisa Paisa and Pigman are the other movies he has done. According to him, editing differs for various industries. “Time and speed of narration differs with each audience. For instance, a commercial Tamil movie requires fast paced narration; whereas a Malayalam film requires that the emotions are projected well. Paisa Paisa was one of my toughest editing experiences. The story was set in one day. So I had to be careful about time frames,” says Nikhil. Editing is an art. Every editor has different perspectives. But, for Nikhil it is about avoiding jerks during editing. “The viewer must not feel the transition,” he adds.
Nikhil has also done the spot editing of Chaappa Kurishu. “Spot editing helps reduce confusion during studio editing. It can help us calculate the duration so that the story flow remains intact. I believe in realistic editing. Annayum Rasoolum and Paradeshi are two fine example of this,” adds Nikhil.
Nikhil comes from the ad world. He was a freelance ad film editor before. Ad films moulded the editor in him and opened the avenues of cinema. “I was a designer first. Later I moved to editing and worked for brands such as Poppy and Rubco with Titto Sunny. I started getting film offers after makers saw these ad films,” he says.
Besides ad films and feature films, he is a corporate filmmaker too. The young editor hopes to direct a feature film in the future.
