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Films such as Top Gun, Mars Attacks and Sleepy Hollow—many box-office hits bear the signature of internationally renowned film editor Chris Lebenzon, ACE, eDIT says of this year’s honorary-award recipient.
Chris Lebenzon was nominated twice for an Oscar for his work on Tony Scott’s Crimson Tide and the classic Top Gun. He also edited Scott’s films Days of Thunder, Enemy of the State, Déjà Vu and, most recently, The Taking of Pelham 123.
For director Tim Burton, he worked on Mars Attacks, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Corpse Bride, Big Fish, Planet of the Apes, Sleepy Hollow, Ed Wood, Batman Returns and Sweeney Todd, for which he received the ACE Eddie Award. His current productions with Tim Burton are Alice in Wonderland and Frankenweenie.
Lebenzon was also responsible for editing blockbusters by producer Jerry Bruckheimer, including Michael Bay’s Armageddon and Pearl Harbor and Dominic Sena’s Gone in 60 Seconds.
Festival Honours are the highest distinction presented at the three-day international Filmmaker’s Festival. The festival is organised by the State of Hesse, the Hessian State Authority for Private Broadcasting and New Media, and the City of Frankfurt am Main, together with international film associations, the American Cinema Editors association ACE and the European Federation of Cinematographers Imago.
Chris Lebenzon’s filmography is impressive: films edited by him have grossed more than two billion dollars at cinemas worldwide. He has also succeeded with his art across highly diverse genres—action/adventure, drama, film musical and animation.
He is currently working on Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland, his first stereoscopic 3D production.
His interest in cinematic narration and storytelling led the Californian into the film industry, and since the late 1970s he has been responsible for editing more than 40 cinema films.
A decisive turning point in his career came in 1985 with the offer to work alongside Billy Weber as editor on Tony Scott’s film Top Gun, which has since become a genre classic. Top Gun brought Lebenzon his first Oscar nomination and led to a close collaboration with Tony Scott that continues to this day.
“There is a strong familiarity and intimacy between directors and editors, and when you meet someone with whom it really clicks, you want to continue working together,” says Lebenzon.
The editor made the technological transition in his craft from the editing table to computer-based Avid editing while working on Tim Burton’s Mars Attacks. “It is faster, and the enormous quantities of film data are easier to organise and select on a computer,” Lebenzon explains.
Although every film is unique, his approach to individual films is essentially always the same: “I try to imagine the audience for this film, select the best material and the best moments, and then try to find the right rhythm for the film.”
Oscar-winning editor Tom Rolf will conduct an individual interview with Chris Lebenzon about his work and the film-editing process for festival participants in Frankfurt. Rolf was honoured at the eDIT Filmmaker’s Festival in 2004 and is a former president of ACE, the association of American feature-film editors.
