13 Hours (5 Master Editing Technique Mini-Analysis)

 

           In the movie 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi, an attack happens on a U.S. compound in Libya, a security team struggles to make sense out of the chaos. The Ambassador's compound is attacked by hordes of heavily armed locals. The only forces willing and able to defend it are six CIA contractors. The movie is filled with action thriller that makes the audience want to stand on their feet. The movie is flourished with editing techniques, camera movements/angles, and much more.

            In the movie contrast can be found, the majority of the time it's found when action is happening. Especially in shootings, the director wants to often show the back and forth of two different scenes. To be more specific, in the movie Jack Silva (main character) and Rone are found together confronting a group of armed men. While confronting each other and increasingly raising tension, contrast (editing technique) is sought to happen, while the two soldiers are talking to the armed men, a group of other armed soldiers can be found driving recklessly fast in a pick up truck, some can conclude that they were rushing to the scene of where the tension was happening. A contrast cut is a strategic type of cut that put together two different scenes. The camera was showing back and forth cuts between the pick up truck and the armed confrontation. The director does this because he wants to build suspense amongst the audience. Video editors create the contrast cut so that they can create a sense of dissimilarity that heightens the emotion of a scene or emphasizes the intention of particular moments. By the spectators watching this contrast, they can already foresee a possible shootout happen between parties.

            Blood is obviously inevitable in these type of movies. It can been seen that blood can act as symbolism. Just by seeing blood dripping down a soldiers body it shows that a catastrophic event has happened or is happening. An establishing shot of the consultant not just represents the location of the area but also gives an insight of where a shootout might occur in the future or any second depending on the tone of the scene. The consultant gets attacked and the Ambassador eventually dies from all the suffocation inside the building because of the fire that was set off by the rebels. While the ambassador was looking towards the door knob, anxiously waiting for any possible intruders a POV shot happens. The director used the POV shot in this particular scene because he wanted the audience to somewhat go through or feel the characters tension. In this specific scenario the POV shot was shaky showing that the ambassador was hurt and was having difficulties breathing. As the contractors returned all bloody up from the deadly attack to the base, Boon was left badly scraped and with major cuts. Boon entered the shower and the bath was just getting flushed down with blood. A close up shot of the flesh coming down was taken and then a cut happened to a close up of one of his wounds where blood was gushing out. The blood and wound acted as symbolism. The director wanted to convey a message of the reality of war. Generally sometimes blood can just be symbolized as death.  

                   The movie 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi, is an astonishing action movie that makes the audience feel like they are rideing along the events. The director uses some of the master editing techniques to specifically convey a message to the audience.