Global Cinema Beyond Hollywood

Greg Staffa 0:00

You're listening to the Stafford Corner Podcast, a Staffitarian look at entertainment and life with your host, Greg Stafford. My guest today is Gadi Mozes , a film and television editor whose career has taken him from Israel to Montreal and across everything from comedy and fiction to documentaries, from tackling politics, identity, war, and social issues. As an editor, he's one of the people responsible for taking countless hours of footage and finding the story hidden inside. Gaddy, thank you for coming on today.

Gadi Mozes 0:54

My pleasure.

Greg Staffa 0:55

Thanks for having me. One of the reasons I wanted to have you on is I think in America we get so isolated and focused that we are the only country out there, and we're the only country that makes movies and music and television shows. And uh you are a film editor and documentarian and stuff that isn't really Hollywood. And so I kind of wanted to get your perspective from that angle. So I appreciate you coming on.

Gadi Mozes 1:26

Yeah, well, thank you so much uh for having me. Look, uh, I think that uh all creators I think around the world grew up on Hollywood, right? So Hollywood basically invented most of the language the way I see it, uh, of cinema. And therefore, and because Hollywood has always been a relatively rich industry, it was like it's always kind of a double-edged sword. Like on one hand, you always want to be a part of it, but on the other hand, because you're never a part of it, or it's hard to get there, you're saying, okay, I'm gonna invest all my efforts in something else, you know. I'm gonna invest all my efforts in like making my own thing and being independent. And and I think that's how the independent uh globally, also in the US, because the US have a lot of like independent uh filmmakers, that's where it came to be, you know.

Dyslexia And Choosing Editing

Greg Staffa 2:29

You started at a very young age. What got you interested in in cinema?

Gadi Mozes 2:34

I had dyslexia, I think that was the thing. I wanted to communicate I needed to find a better way to communicate with people, and uh and and and cinema was a part of it. At the beginning, I wanted to be a writer, but uh editing was a lot smoother sale for me. So I just picked editing, and and that's how I end up where I am uh today.

Greg Staffa 2:58

Then you got your BFA in film studies. So this is something that early on you knew was gonna be a career for you. What was it like going to film

Film School Near Gaza

Greg Staffa 3:08

school? Are there still tools that you use today, or is it yeah, absolutely?

Gadi Mozes 3:14

So uh in Israel, actually, like you know, you you do the mandatory army service, and then uh you reach the age of 21, and you're like, unless you're like one of those people that actually like to be in the army and you like see your career there, most people need like just uh a couple years just to figure out who they are again because you completely forgot what happened in high school. You're in a completely you were in a completely different space, you know. And and then uh at the beginning I wanted to be a copywriter, so I studied that. And then someone uh someone said to and and I always wanted to make like uh like big fancy uh commercials for television. Then somebody told me, why don't you go study film if that's what you want to do instead of uh just working in advertisement? And that's uh and that kind of clicked. So I went uh so I went to film school. I I went in a later age, like I I started my BA in uh 23, 24, something like that. So I was already quite even 25, think about it. So I was quite already old relatively to other people in the world. But on the other hand, I already knew what I'm good at and what I want. I already knew what that I have something to say or that I want to express myself or be be a part of that of that thing, you know. I studied in a college in uh it's called Sapir Academic College, it's Bais Delot. So I don't know if it's the Ros de Lot is one of the one of the uh towns that are really, really close to Gaza. And and you know, you went to film school and you had to run to bomb shelters on a daily basis, you know. Uh it's like literally uh like studying in war zone. And I went there because it was cheap, and it was cheap, but you know, it was kind of a unique experience back then. But I gotta say that the school quality was very high, and even today when I see other people, I'm so happy I went there. I think I went to really the best film school I've uh that that I could have.

Greg Staffa 5:33

Hearing you say that, and you say it so casually that you had to go to school in between running to the bomb shelters. I mean, that's something here in America we just simply can't grasp. Is was film an escape for you? I mean, you're you're dealing with all this other stuff that most of us would say, you know, I'd be focused on that. Was film a way for you to escape from the realities of having to go to the bomb shelters and being involved? Film was a device to deal with the reality.

Gadi Mozes 6:05

So some people would escape, and some people would use it as a lens to look at the reality to try to understand reality. So you can imagine that a lot of the stuff that was made was uh, you know, war was made about the conflict and about the war and about those things. And even when you don't, it kind of chases you, you know. I have a friend, I have a friend, he had a rule that he never goes to bomb shelter if there is an alarm and he's in the middle of the shower. Like that's it. Showering, if if if a bomb falls on my shower, that's it. Like, I'm not, I'm not, I'm gonna leave it a chance. You know, it's the one thing I'm not gonna let interrupt. And one and one day, right before he had the big uh like some big shots from television came to our school to hear to to listen to like we were pitching uh ideas, and he prepared this whole pink pitch and he went to the shower, and then there was an alarm. And you know, I don't know what happened, it was the first time he ever stopped the shower. He just for some reason he just put a towel on, went into a bomb shelter, and when he came out of the bomb shelter, there was no shower, and there was no room anymore. So it kind of and and then with this, uh, I remember how, like he said, I have to go to my pitch. So he got dressed quickly, and he just left the house and he went to the college and he pitched his idea and he said, I'm sorry, I'm a little upset because a bomb just fell in my room and everybody was laughing. They thought it was a joke. Uh, it took him a while to convince the judges that it was a little late because of that.

Greg Staffa 7:51

It's amazing that you're able to tell a story with a smile on your face. There's uh there's humor in it, but at the same time, I one of the reasons I wanted you on is your perspective is so different than what we're used to hearing in America, and yet you do something that's very recognizable in America, and it just it brings, I think, us closer together hearing these kind of stories.

Where An Edit Actually Starts

Greg Staffa 8:17

One of the things that I think really changed as far as perspective of editing is you know, a lot of people don't really fully understand what editors do. And I think one of the things that really helped that was I don't know if you saw the the movie Justice League, where they came out with that one version and then they re-edited it and came out with a completely different version using the same footage. Do you know yes?

Gadi Mozes 8:43

It's hard for me to talk about that because I haven't seen that specific. I haven't seen that. I think I've seen one of the versions of Justice Lee, but I'm not sure. I I I don't know. I I haven't seen both, so it's hard for me to compare.

Greg Staffa 9:00

It's a very interesting case study as far as how much you can change a movie using the same. I mean, they edit a few clips, but it's interesting how much you can change a movie just in the way you edited it. And for you as an editor, when you're given hours and hours of footage, you know, what is your beginning process? Because that can seem overwhelming at the beginning.

Gadi Mozes 9:24

Are we talking about uh are we talking about uh documentaries or fiction? Whatever you get a little bit, it's a little bit different. Um with fiction with fiction uh the job is a little bit different in my perspective in in documentaries and in fiction, where fiction is more big uh fiction because you have the you already have the main story. So the process would be usually getting the getting the script, assembling the assembling the scene usually for a with a very basic language. So making an assembly of the best shots or the best cuts. Sometimes you would put a couple of takes uh one after the other just to keep yourself an eye, and basically reducing the timeline into the best and and and from there start to build a language. Uh, sometimes I would take a specific scene and I and I would work on it in a certain way just to test the language, you know, would work with the director if that's a language that's suitable for the film or not. You would do that too in a documentary, but till you get there, in a documentary, you have a long way to go. It's a much longer uh process. In documentaries, you would want to reduce the footage. So, my first my my method is that I take all the footage, I put it on a timeline, and I try to reduce for the first time just 10 to 30 percent of that timeline because I don't know what I want to use or not. So I'm just taking out all the real relay outs, and then I duplicate that sequence and I would reduce another 30-40 percent, and then till I get to a point where I have a scene that is much longer than what it would be in the real cut, but at least I know what's the strong part of that situation. If it's an interview, I would I would cut it by themes. So I would write down the themes that uh interviewee talked about, and I would cut him by by themes. So, like here he talked about this subject, here he talked about the other subject. If I have if it fits to if if the what he said fits two uh two different themes, I would put it in two different places. Now you can do it with uh with in just in text, theoretically. I'm not a big fan of that process because you don't really learn the footage, you need to study the footage. Uh especially in a documentary, you study the footage a lot more than your director. So you need to be really on top of you, you really need you need to, it needs to be implemented in you. And I I never liked those kind of editings where people just, oh, this guy said that, put put it like do the paper cut, you know, without watching the interview, and then uh and then I'm supposed to just build it according to to us to a paper cut, what they call. I I don't like paper cuts. I like to see to understand the intonation. Was he happy when he said it what he said? Maybe I can build some all my creative ideas come from just being in that footage.

Learning Footage And Avoiding Paper Cuts

Greg Staffa 12:58

How does your process work? Is it more creativity? Is it more analytical? When you're when you're doing something like when I write, if I'm writing a review for a show, I won't start from the beginning. I'll I'll lay out a couple paragraphs or a sentence or two, and then I'll write around that and find where that sentence actually fits. If there's something I'm passionate about, I'll be like, all right, here's a sentence that I love, or here's a scene that I love. I don't know where it's gonna go in my review, but I'm gonna set this aside. When you're is it almost like puzzle pieces for you where you're trying to find the right connecting puzzle piece that you're you're moving things around, and I mean how much of that process goes, or once you see it in your mind, you're able to kind of put things together, and then it's just a matter of splicing it together, then it's it's totally a puzzle.

Gadi Mozes 13:52

It's totally a puzzle. Um, it's a puzzle piece, like in documentary, right? In in in in fiction, it's different because you have them you know off the bat uh what's supposed to what what you're supposed to do, and then you just may uh and and and then you know you you might mix the scenes around, change the plot, but but that is the next step, you know, just to get to the first cut. It's totally a puzzle, because uh usually director that films a documentary's been doing it for a few months, usually a few years, and he doesn't know exactly what he wants to say. Um he doesn't know exactly how to, it's like you're kind of helping him say what he wants to say, so it's a lot more more uh interesting and a lot more it's a lot more it's like when you're working on a documentary, you're like a lawyer, you know, like a person comes, you're like representing uh a director, you know. He has all this stuff, he comes to you and he says, uh represent me, right? Like make me, you know, make my claim, and and then you have to start uh going through what he brought you and see how you're building his case, you know.

Greg Staffa 15:15

Has there ever been a time where you get the documentary and the director says, you know, here's my vision and gives you an idea, and you're sitting down with these hours of footage, and you put together something. Has the director ever come back and says, This is totally not my vision, but it's better?

Gadi Mozes 15:36

It's totally not my vision, but it's better?

Greg Staffa 15:39

Yeah, where it's like he was picturing one story and you found another kind of sub-story or a theme that you know, through hours of footage, you were able to put together and almost tell a different story within that same story, but yet it wasn't what he was seeing, and they thought it was better, or they thought maybe it was worse.

Gadi Mozes 16:01

Well, I can't say that that happened like that. I definitely I definitely had a lot of influence over people's creation, and I'm grateful that I got to do too influence that way. Usually directors in documentaries have no, uh they get uh extend to the editing room exhausted and depressed and scared because they don't know if they have enough, they don't know how good it will be. It's been years, they don't even remember everything they shot, you know. And and and many times you would make something, oh I don't remember that scene. Oh, where did you get that? Or where did you find that? Oh, I didn't know this uh worked out that way. When I was filming, I didn't see that. And it's hours and hours and hours of footage, and you can't really watch the rushes, you know. When you film a fiction film, you can watch the rushes and say, okay, I like take three, six, and uh and seven. But when you film a documentary, you're not gonna sit and watch now the whole day of should in the middle of the night, you know, to see uh what are the good parts. So so many times they will forget what what they filmed and and and uh for good or bad. Sometimes they'll be surprised for good, sometimes I would tell them, listen, I know you thought you shot that, but it didn't come out the way you think it came out, you know.

Greg Staffa 17:37

And on that line, when you're putting together something, how far into the process is it where you can say, Wow, there's something, there's a story here, or is there times where you've spent hours and hours going through stuff and saying, I can't find a beginning, a middle, and end. I can't find the story in what you've given me, I need more. Yeah, yeah.

Gentrification And Finding The Claim

Gadi Mozes 18:00

Well, I remember that in uh there is the term gentrification, and I did a show about gentrification. I think it's probably the best thing I've did in 20 2020. And I and it was a year process working on that show, and I remember uh that it took me a couple of months, two or three months, just to understand what is the problem with gentrification. Because I for me, you know, I was like, I was they're telling me, yeah, but but uh the the the the poor people leave the mill live the middle of the city, and I'm like, uh what do you want? Okay, so it's like uh it's it's just urban renovation and whatever, okay. So they'll find another place to live. No, not everybody has to live right in uh in downtown of the city. If they're too don't have the money, go find a cheaper way to live. Like I didn't understand that that it's a whole it's a whole process that starts in that starts, it's it's decades of disinvestment in those neighborhoods, that it's that people are trying to push them out actively. It's not just something natural that happens. It took me a while to understand that. And I needed to understand that in order to get on board with the claims of the creators, because they come with a militant way. We're gonna, I need people to know about this, and and in order to get there, I need to morally figure it out. Like for myself, I need to understand how do I explain it to people who are coming uh neutral. How do I convince them that there is such a thing called gentrification and it's a bad process, and it happens, it's an invisible process, like you don't see it unless you're really trying really hard. So that took me like three months to understand that.

Greg Staffa 20:09

Did doing that help you become a better editor? Because you were trying to convince the people that you basically were months earlier, and you finally got it. So now you have to find a way in that story to show what you learned to the audience. Did that make it more creative for you? Because you were the the people that you're the audience in some regards, because you didn't and your job was to convince them or show them. Did that help kind of get the creative juices flowing, knowing that you went through that same process that you're trying to get the audience to discover?

Gadi Mozes 20:45

Absolutely, absolutely got the thing that I'm doing now with every project I'm in I'm working with. So there's something I learned, like you have to stand behind what you're saying, you know. And I think that that's probably when someone comes to me with a documentary, and it doesn't matter, it could be like I'm from Israel, but it doesn't matter if it's a pro-Israeli or a pro-Palestinian or or whatever, as long as the claim makes sense, as long as I'm not uh, as long as I'm I'm telling the truth and I'm telling a true story and I'm telling somebody's real narrative. As long as I can express someone's issues, I'm not scared of uh I'm not scared of going all the way in with it, you know. I'm not scared standing behind it. As long as I can stand behind the claim, that I'm like, okay, now I understand your claim. I'm gonna stand behind you and I'm gonna I'm gonna help you get it get this message message through in the most creative way possible.

Documentary Power Versus Fiction Craft

Greg Staffa 21:54

Now you've done both documentaries and you know um scripted projects. Is there one that you find more creative freedom?

Gadi Mozes 22:03

Documentary, you're much you're like you're much more uh relied on as an editor in a documentary. Um it's a completely different uh I know like I when you study and you want to be a director, most people want to be fiction directors, especially for my generation that grew up on the Blockbusters. Uh they want to they have that dream, you know, and if they're more sophisticated, they usually would have a dream, like a more let's say European artistic director or whatever. So but but there as an editor, documentaries are a lot more interesting, it's also a much bigger engagement from you. But having said that, uh fiction does have uh its beauty because you get to work with uh first of all, the footage is really good, right? Because it's been planned well, every shot has been planned properly, and and there and and you have to build the language which is absolutely amazing, you know. You get right to that, to the core of building. Uh, do I want long shots here in in in in as a language for this film? Maybe it will work better in more long shots, maybe in close-ups, or the whole film in close-ups. Is it fast cuts, slow cuts? Uh, how do I incorporate music? Uh sound effect, like the ambience, like how the whole the whole language and all the component of cinema, um, you get to it right away, uh, relatively in a short period of time. And that's incredible. Uh but when when you're working on a documentary, but when you're working like when you're working on fiction, you're like, I see myself, I'm I'm like a type of uh of a film doula, you know? I have a director, and I'm helping the director give birth to his film. Uh with the documentary, you you have you you have um with the documentary, I'm more like uh representing someone. Uh and I'm consolidating a journey, consolidating a process.

Greg Staffa 24:37

When you lock in a film, you figure you know you're you're done with it, you got it locked, this is how it is. How often are you happy with it? Is there because I I would assume there's always kind of this this emotional need to go, oh I just uh I should have tweaked uh I should go back and tweak no it's it's good, but uh, I want to tweak this or that. Is when you're this is the director thing, this is a director disease.

Gadi Mozes 25:05

The uh it's is and it's a good disease, by the way. It's important, it makes the film better, but in the end of the day, uh most of the time, you know, sometimes it doesn't. But let's say uh and yeah, and and and and whenever you get to a professional workflow, once you lock the film and then you want to make changes, it's always a big deal, you know. Unless you're like unless you're in Hollywood. There's one difference between Hollywood and the independent. Um, so but for me personally, uh whatever I want to do to the film, I did already in the fine cut level. Like, and and and uh once it's done, as far as I'm concerned, it's good enough. Like, like it's like I can't think of anything else I want to improve here, unless you're giving me uh unless there and but we sit and we watch and we still iterate and and we make those and we make a few more changes. But there is also a level of professionality that is being expected from the director not to do all these. Oh, oh, I have this just one. It's not profession, it's not the most professional thing to you can do, you know, as a director. Um, it it's uh unless it's really important, try to avoid that, you know. Before you release, before you declare that your cut is locked, uh lock it properly. Just because it costs money, right? It costs money to go back and forth from sound to go back to the editing room um to reiterate in that way.

Greg Staffa 26:54

There's an amount of professionalism in having the confidence to say this is the product, here you go.

Gadi Mozes 27:00

Yeah, there is something professional about it. And and and if you want to be able to work, and also between you and me, most of those changes are things that no one will notice except the director himself. And if you're not, and and the director needs to know when he you know when he says, Okay, that's enough, and move forward. Um, it needs to release

Picture Lock Discipline And Premiere Anxiety

Gadi Mozes 27:22

it.

Greg Staffa 27:22

No, you've sent the picture over, it's done. Let's say they invite you to the premiere. You have seen this footage from every angle numerous times. You've seen it. I mean, you've seen it in your sleep. Are you able to separate yourself and actually enjoy your creation?

Gadi Mozes 27:42

Rarely I get to do it. Um, rarely I get to and mostly I have anxiety in premieres that I'm gonna that I made some kind of mistake that nobody noticed, and now I would now everyone's gonna see it. That's what I'm scared of. Even though it went through quality check and approvals and the color, and it went through everything, and everyone watched it a million times. And they created like even then, when I sit in the theater in the premiere, I'm scared that uh I'm scared that there's gonna be some kind of a screw up, you know, that we haven't noticed, and everyone's gonna see it.

Greg Staffa 28:24

Now you worked on a thing called Yid Life Crisis, which is very important from what you do with your documentaries. Is editing comedy harder because you know a fraction of a second can determine whether the joke works or not? Or is your approach any different between a comedy and a feature that's more serious? Absolutely.

Gadi Mozes 28:47

I think that rhythm is uh everywhere, it's in drama and it's in uh comedy, and and yeah, for sure, for sure. But uh, but um for me, if I I I I like I have a sense of com of uh comical uh timing, comic timing. So I'm not uh so it comes naturally to me, and I enjoy it. And you know when you do it, you there is some when the joke is good, you sit back and you press play and it works. You can feel that it's makes you laugh, so you can feel that it's funny, you know.

Cutting Comedy With Rhythm

Greg Staffa 29:25

You grew up in Israel and you had a lot of education in Israel as far as filmmaking, and then you made the move to Montreal. Did the two different cultures uh did that affect your editing?

Gadi Mozes 29:36

Whether two different styles because of the cultures the main change, the main shift in my work was that in Israel I did more television because I was connected more with television creators, and here I was doing more cinematic stuff because there's not a lot of television in English in Montreal, and and the people I met here were doing uh film. So all of a sudden I was working more in film, but the work is still the work. I can say that it's much like it's the same work, you know, it's just that the product itself is a bit different. Obviously, if you're making a film, you have more room to be more poetic, more breathing room between shots, between scenes, more because you have the you know, once you have the the audience locked in the in the theater in the dark and their phone is off, then you can do a lot more than uh when person comes in the evening and turn on his TV, you know, and he has a million other things around. So you you have more leverage. Uh it's more creative in that way. But TV is also in TV you you also have that kind of creativity where you're trying to sneak in sneak in artistic stuff into the prime time, you know, because that's where you win for yourself, you know. It's like, oh, I got this cinematic shot. No one would notice it, but at least I feel good that uh I was able to do something artistic in television, you know.

Israel To Montreal Film Versus TV

Greg Staffa 31:18

Now, let's say Steven Spielberg uh came to you, says, I love your work and I need an editor, but I'm kind of out of stories ideas. Is there a particular story that I could tell that you would just love to edit, you would love to work on, and put your creative voice in telling? Is there something out there that if given the chance, you would just feel honored to be a part of telling that story?

Gadi Mozes 31:44

Well, I'm not very picky, I must say. I love stories that I love stor like I love stories that are small relatively. I have a I have a I have a think for small stories. I think that uh there are beautiful small stories that contain the whole world in them, you know. You know, one person, uh one family that is that is uh one family that is struggling uh can tell you a lot about the economy than all the great experts and professors and uh and people uh you know expressing everything. It's just one family that is struggling, or one family that like give me the like I would be happy to go into the small, simple stories, and for me that these are the best. So I'm not sure that Spielberg would want to hire me, Spielberg itself, because I I think that he would want people who want to do bigger things, you know. But I love the small stuff, I love the small stories, I love the small uh both fiction and uh and documentaries. I love this, I love the character-based ones. So for me, it's all about the character and the story. And for example, I participated, I wasn't the main editor, but uh but I was an editor in that show called The Last League. It's about the last league in soccer in uh in Israel. So the last league. So these are people who all have day jobs, and then in the afternoon they go practice a little bit of soccer and they have their own games. It's like totally amateur, and and but it's still the dream for those characters. It's like people from really all over like marginalized communities all over all over Israel, and and they're like still have the those players still have the dream of making it big, and and those and and it's all about like small story, everything is small, you know, the budget is small, the the the audience is small, the winnings are everything is small, but it contains all the components you can want from a good story, you know. Nice.

Small Stories Big Meaning

Greg Staffa 34:11

Which is harder for you as an editor, figuring out what you need to add to the scene, or having the courage to remove something that was really good but just didn't fit the story, add something to a scene or to remove.

Gadi Mozes 34:27

Oh, it's much harder to remove, I think. But sometimes you have to. It's painful, but you have to. So I would eventually take the best parts and put them together and see how much time do I still need to fill after I put all the best parts that I like, you know? And and uh so so yeah, it's easier to add stuff for me. It's to remove things is difficult.

Greg Staffa 35:07

Interesting. Well, Getty Moses, I just want to personally thank you for coming on. Uh, you're a little bit of a different guest, but I think it's important to hear somebody's different stories that are so familiar yet so different. And to hear your stories about you know editing and then having to go to bomb shelters, it's just things that we just can't comprehend in here, and I think they're important to hear. So I sincerely appreciate you coming on, taking time out of here.

Gadi Mozes 35:34

Thank you so much. Thank thanks for having me. It was a pleasure talking to you. All right. Wish you luck, sir. Thank you. Good luck, bye bye.