“The Editor is Both a Midwife and an Illusionist” Interview with Frédéric Thoraval

Frédéric Thoraval is a film editor who accompanied the birth of a certain French action cinema in the 2000’s (working with filmmakers like Luc Besson and Pierre Morel), and then moved to Hollywood. He was recently nominated for an Academy Award for the film Promising Young Woman by Emerald Fennell. In this interview, he tries to view his own practice, style, values and career with a critical eye. What remains of cuts, continuity, narratives and ethics in today’s editing work? Shall we subscribe to the hypothesis of a global rise of discontinuity, post-continuity, ellipsis poetics or any other commonplace of contemporary film aesthetics? The purpose of this talk is to answer these questions and a few more, relying on professional experience and concrete examples.