Walter Murch is a pioneering film editor known for his work on films like Apocalypse Now and The English Patient. Some of his key contributions to film editing include developing a set of six criteria for evaluating cuts, with emotion being the most important. He was also an early adopter of computer editing and used Apple's Final Cut Pro to edit the film Cold Mountain. Murch believes editing is an intuitive process involving decisions about what shot to use, where to begin it, and where to end it with each film containing thousands of such decisions.

1. Pioneers Of Editing
Walter Murch
Walter Murch is famous for wining an Oscar for mixing
sound on Francis Ford Coppola's 1979 film 'Apocalypse Now',
then winning twin Oscars for sound mixing and film editing
on the 1996 drama, The English Patient. He is extensively
referred to as a visionary and deep thinker on issues of
sound design in motion pictures. Walter switched to
computer editing in the mid 90’s. he makes up a principle not
to go out on set and see the actors out of custom.
According to Walter Murch, when it comes to film editing,
there are six main criteria for evaluating a cut or deciding
where to cut. They are
Emotion (51%)
Story (23%)
Rhythm (10%)
Eye-trace (7%)
Two-dimensional plane of the screen (5%)
Three-dimensional space of action (4%)
Murch assigned the notional percentage values to each of
the criteria.

2. Murch cares about soundtracks. Listen to THX-1138 (1971),
The Godfather (1972), American Graffiti (1973), The
Godfather, Part II (1974), The Conversation (1974),
Apocalypse Now (1979), Crumb (1994), The English Patient
(1996), or The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999). Murch mixed them
all, and they each possess an audio allure. They sound as
good as they look.
He believes in editing while standing up. Murch technique
was to capture emotion.
"Emotion, at the top of the list, is the thing that you should
try to preserve at all costs. If you find you have to sacrifice
certain of those six things to make a cut, sacrifice your way
up, item by item, from the bottom."-Murch
Some of the films Walter has edited on; Ghost, Apocalypse
Now, Frankenstein, The English Patient.
A key film that he worked on was The Godfather2
This is a very old movie and was published in 1974. In a clip
of the god father, as they was talking around the diner table
Walter Murch used a shot reverse technique and reaction
shots and long shots to get everyone in the scene.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=435mkg6_eGQ
Cold Mountain- released December 25, 2003
The film also marked a technological and industry
turnaround in editing. Walter Murch edited Cold Mountain
on Apple's sub-$1000 Final Cut Pro software using off the
shelf G4s. This was a leap for such a big budgeted film,
where expensive Avid systems are usually the standard
editing system. His efforts on the film were documented in
the 2005 book Behind the Seen: How Walter Murch Edited
Cold Mountain Using Apple's Final Cut Pro and What This

3. Means for Cinema. Final Cut Pro was used to edit this film.
Walter said "Technically cutting Cold Mountain was one of
the best experiences he has had editing a film" adding "he
would use Final Cut Pro on his next film project." "Using a
un-proprietary hardware system that is software based
eliminated a lot of bottlenecks". "FCP did away with a lot of
the financial and physical commitments in contrast to
editing on an Avid where only one system could have been
acquired instead of the four primary G4 workstations that
were used to edit "Cold Mountain". One station was used
for editing, the second for file management, the third for
digitizing, and the fourth for output to DVD etc. clip
analyzed http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHTWme5Ks9g
The shot is a medium shot involving two characters with
multiple shot reverse shots used, there is then a cutaway
scene to show the event taking place then close ups of
pictures and the two main characters of the scene kissing.
Walter say "The three things that you are deciding over and
over again are: What shot shall I use? Where shall I begin it?
Where shall I end it? An average film may have a thousand
edits in it, so: three thousand decisions."
One of the most important things he thinks every editor
should do when choosing an out point for a shot, whatever
their approach, is what he calls a "flinch". He rolls the shot
and then hits the editing button when it feels instinctively
right to turn away from that shot.
The English Patient- my thoughts on the editing on this
movie
film made 1996.
At the close of WWII, a young nurse tends to a badly-burned
plane crash victim. His past is shown in flashbacks, revealing
an involvement in a fateful love affair.
LINK TO CLIP
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMUKZ8nDiJo

4. From the first clip you can see the camera’s are on all on
tripods and have some tracking in this scene. This movie has
a lot of seamless editing; everything seems to go so smoothly
you wouldn’t really notice the editing. There are multiple
shots of people dancing close ups medium shots and long
shots. Then the camera tracks to follow one main character
as she walks. There is also a few reactions close up shots so
you feel the tension in the movie.