10 Things You Didn't Know About Inglourious Basterds
4. It Took Just Two Days To Cut 30 Minutes Of Footage
As is the case with many films nowadays, artistic freedom seems to be tightly controlled by studios that fear that a lengthy film won't appeal to as wide an audience as a shorter one. You only have to take a look at films like Once Upon A Time In America to realise that film length does indeed have an impact on the financial success of a film, and while Inglourious Basterds was never going to be as long as that film, it was still well in excess of over three hours in duration. Tarantino knew that the film needed to be cut to size, and asked the film's post production editor - Sally Menke - to try and whittle the film down to a more respectable running time. Somehow, Menke managed to cut 30 minutes of footage in just two days. That might not sound very hard, but for anyone who is or has been a film student, you'll know that cutting footage from anything, regardless of length, is an absolute pain the backside. Problems with continuity, pacing and structure can quickly arise from trying to edit and cut content from a production no matter how long it is, so accomplishing what Menke did with a Hollywood film? Someone give that gal a medal.
Joe is a freelance games journalist who, while not spending every waking minute selling himself to websites around the world, spends his free time writing. Most of it makes no sense, but when it does, he treats each article as if it were his Magnum Opus - with varying results.
