What did 5 of essentially the most critically acclaimed Asian motion pictures that premiered at this 12 months’s Cannes Movie Pageant have in frequent? All of them have been edited by rising Taiwanese studio Slicing Edge Movies.
Formally established solely in 2022, the corporate includes a small group of movie professionals who’ve labored collectively for over a decade. They’re co-led by French editor Matthieu Laclau (Contact of Sin), recognized for his long-running collaboration with Chinese language auteur Jia Zhangke, and Taiwanese producer Justine O. (The Chinese language Mayor, Black Canine), whose work has nabbed a succession of pageant prizes lately. The corporate says its latest successes level to the maturity and increasing attain of Taipei’s post-production sector, which has been buoyed by regular authorities assist and a rising fame for high-quality work at globally aggressive costs.
“Taipei’s post-production scene is unquestionably having a second,” says Laclau. “For VFX, enhancing or shade grading, the competency of the individuals and the standard of the work that’s out there are extraordinarily excessive now. We hold listening to from administrators about their constructive experiences and the way a lot they want to come again to do put up in Taipei.”
Slicing Edge Movies is undoubtedly on a roll. The corporate’s titles in Cannes this 12 months included arthouse favorites like Jia’s Caught by the Tides and Cambodian director Rithy Panh’s Assembly with Pol Pot, each in the principle competitors, in addition to Chinese language director Guan Hu’s offbeat drama Black Canine, which gained the distinguished Un Sure Regard prize (all three titles have been edited by Laclau). Firm co-founder Tom Hsin-Ming Lin, a veteran Taiwanese editor recognized for his distinguished work within the documentary area, additionally edited the Indian characteristic drama The Shameless, whose star, Anasuya Sengupta, took house one of the best actress honor within the Un Sure Regard part. Junior group member Jenson Tay Yi, in the meantime, edited her first characteristic, the Taiwanese noir drama Locust, which was effectively acquired in Cannes’ Critics’ Week part. Firm staffer Yann-Shan Tsai additionally reduce the Taiwanese-Bralizian comedy Sleep with Your Eyes Open, which gained the FIPRESCI Prize on the Berlin Worldwide Movie Pageant earlier this 12 months. And Slicing Edge saved the second going on the lately wrapped Shanghai Worldwide Movie Pageant, the place Wei Shujun’s household drama, Largely Sunny — edited by Laclau — gained one of the best actor prize for its star Huang Xiaoming.
As within the West, it’s considerably unusual for movie editors in Asia to band collectively beneath a shared firm umbrella. The much more frequent strategy is to work independently on a project-by-project foundation. However Slicing Edge says its collective construction has allowed its group to leverage their tastes and trade contacts, whereas additionally matching every editor’s strengths and sensibilities to the initiatives and administrators that go well with them finest.
Eddie Peng in ‘Black Canine,’ winner of Cannes’s 2024 Prix Un Sure Regard
Cannes Movie Pageant
Producer Justine O. says she primarily operates because the enhancing collective’s “housekeeper” — “as a result of I do know precisely what sort of movie is correct for every individual,” as she places it. “Generally the director’s persona and the character of the movie require two or three editors to work collectively; different occasions, it’s extra intimate and there’s one individual on the group who’s one of the best match for the undertaking at hand. We’ve numerous belief between us from working collectively for thus a few years, so we all the time talk about the whole lot brazenly and work to search out the answer that’s finest to maintain the movie transferring ahead.”
Lately, the Taiwan Institute of Cultural Affairs (TAICCA), a government-backed middleman group that promotes the event of Taiwan’s content material industries, has grown into a strong movie funder, selling and co-financing worldwide co-productions that meet specified thresholds for Taiwanese trade participation. Slicing Edge has assisted initiatives with hitting TAICCA’s necessities for grant funding by referring different post-production firms and professionals from inside the Taipei trade. Such actions have concurrently helped the enhancing home additional broaden its undertaking base past the Chinese language-language trade the place it received its begin.
“Loads of very skilled Taiwanese VFX supervisors, composers and different post-production professionals who have been working in Hollywood got here house to Taipei throughout COVID — and as an alternative of going again, they’ve arrange firms right here,” says Laclau. “So, one other manner we can assist, as editors, is to counsel good Taiwanese groups to satisfy a director’s wants for his or her film,” he provides.
Slicing Edge’s various slate for the second half of 2024 contains: The Beast Inside, a U.Okay.-shot horror movie starring Package Harrington and set for a U.S. launch through Common Photos on July 26; South African director Pia Marais’s Transamazonia, which was shot within the Amazon; French characteristic Sang Craché Des Lèvres Belles, directed by Jean-Charles Hue; and Eric Khoo’s Japan-set drama Spirit World, starring Catherine Deneuve; together with a handful of high-profile Taiwanese and Chinese language titles.
Laclau provides: “We received our begin with high-quality pageant movies, however we’re all the time on the lookout for new challenges. What connects our work at this level — whether or not it’s one thing arthouse or extra industrial — is filmmaking that permits us to strive one thing new whereas nonetheless connecting powerfully with the viewers.”
Zhao Tao in Jia Zhangke’s ‘Caught by the Tides,’ which was edited by Matthieu Laclau on behalf of Slicing Edge Movies.
Cannes Movie Pageant