How Editing Displays the Theme in Whiplash

A huge part of film and how a film is made is how directors control physical elements of filming to display themes in their movies. This results in a powerful way of expression oneself through a film. This can be done in many ways, including editing. Editing is taking footage and crafting that footage together to make the film and directors can use various techniques to make the best version of a film possible. 

In 2014, Damien Chazelle released his Drama film that was nominated for 5 Oscars and won 3, including Best Film Editing, Whiplash. Whiplash is about a young musician who is willing to work as hard as he possibly can to be the very best. Whiplash revolves around a young man named Andrew, who is going to school and wants to be a famous drummer. In his journey to be the best, Andrew must overcome many obstacles and give up many things in order to achieve his goals. The theme of Whiplash is that being the best at what you do comes with a price. To best display that theme, Chazelle uses editing to his advantage all throughout the film. 

A major scene that not only set the tone and theme of the film but also establishes the editing, is when Andrew attends his first practice with his new director, Fletcher. Andrew is a little nervous at first, but Fletcher comes and talks to him about his musical background. The more Andrew and Fletcher talk, the more the editing slows down. The scene started off with slow editing, but as soon as Fletcher started talking to Andrew, it speeds up. During their conversation, the shot would change every time a character spoke. As Andrew got more relaxed, the editing slowed down to every other line the character spoke. Then Fletcher told Andrew several times he just needed to relax and from that point on, the over the shoulder shot stay on only Andrew and is without editing, even when Fletcher walks away. Andrew then walks back into the practice room and begins to get ready for rehearsal. The editing shows he is very relaxed because there are very few cuts and he is moving in almost slow motion. When Fletcher walks in the slow motion stops, but the slow editing remains the same. This all changes when Fletcher points out Andrew screwed up. As Andrew continually screws up, the editing begins to get faster and faster, and each time Fletcher is getting more and more irritated. Fletcher then throws a chair at Andrew and gets in his face, even slapping him at one point. During this scene, the editing is the fastest it has ever been. The camera shots are constantly and rapidly switching between Andrew, Fletcher, the music and equipment, and other students. This shows how stressed Andrew is and how he is no longer relaxed. Then the rehearsal ends and Andrew is free to go, but the editing still remains at a rapid pace. This shows Fletcher’s effect on Andrew and how Andrew can no longer relax because he constantly needs to work on his music and improving himself so that Fletcher won’t humiliate him. This is important because it ties back to the theme and shows Andrew has lost his ability to relax. He decided to give up relaxing so he could be a better musician and it shows with the editing because what started off as slow and relaxing is now rapid and stressful, even when Andrew is not around Fletcher. 

Overall, editing plays a very important role in Whiplash and director Damien Chazelle using editing to his advantage. Throughout the film, editing showsAndrew is giving up his peacefulness and relaxation so he can be a better musician. This ties into the by showing that being great comes with a cost, and in Andrew’s case, he will constantly be mentally and emotionally stressed.