Editing Whalefall | Oscar Winning Editor Pietro Scalia

0:00Jawad MirWhalefall, which is a remarkable film. The thing that stood out for me the most was editing

0:06Pietro ScaliaOne transition is when he jumps in the water after his father's argument. The breathing, the angle of the shots, seeing that it's the same angle as when he lies inside in the belly. And this is talking also to the sound designers. How do you make these transition work? So you kind of pre-lap the breathing.

0:25Jawad MirSo I had completely forgotten, Pietro, that you had edited Gladiator when I was watching that. In the scene towards the end when the breakthrough between father and son happens, I was taken back to the scene of Gladiator when Maximus goes up to his, family being hung by a tree

0:41Pietro ScaliaI think, exactly that. When the breakthrough happens, was, it was the transition of him waking up

0:48Jawad MirJFK was a very complicated film, right? I mean, you're going back to a historical event and investigation

0:54Pietro ScaliaWhen I was offered the film by Oliver, I was scared because it was a lot to take on

1:01Jawad MirIf any movie comes close to Saving Private Ryan in terms of war, it's Black Hawk Down. And the way that film ended, I'm, I'm from Pakistan originally. Presenting them with water, and I thought that was such a beautiful imagery

1:11Pietro ScaliaGlad you mentioned that because those shots of the Pakistani soldiers in the s… bringing the water was very important for me. Cut to each of those characters a… and drinking that water. I gave everyone the same amount of time. This is Jerry Bruckheimer says, "Man, it's just too long." Well, we kinda like it, so we left it. Then the second time around when he saw another screen, he says, "Why didn't you cut it?" No, I mean, I don't know. Ridley and I kinda like it. A third time, "Wait a minute, you just have to cut it, you know?" And I spoke to Ridley and he agrees. And I go, "Well, I don't have to agree with Ridley."

1:53Jawad MirI just wanna extend my gratitude for all the work that you've done over the years that…

1:58Pietro ScaliaOh

1:58Jawad Mir... A lot of us have grown up with. I mean, JFK, Good Will Hunting, Black Hawk Down, Gladiator. You know, the list…

2:07Pietro ScaliaYeah

2:07Jawad Mir... Goes on, but, today we're here for…

2:10Pietro ScaliaIt's, it's been many years

2:12Jawad MirBut great films. I was looking at your filmography. I mean, I've probably seen, like, 90% of the films that you worked on, which is…

2:19Pietro ScaliaWow

2:19Jawad Mir... Which is amazing. Yeah. Yeah.

2:21Pietro ScaliaYeah, so I've s…

2:21Jawad MirAnd not knowing it, yeah. Go on, please.

2:24Pietro ScaliaNo, I've seen, I've seen, saw some of the, shows, podcasts you did before, and then you had people I've worked with in the past. I mean, you had, Sonja Klaus from American Gangster on it. I saw that, so it's nice to see her. So yeah, there's a, I had a, yeah

2:41Jawad MirYeah, she's, she's become an amazing friend.

2:44Pietro ScaliaOh, nice.

2:44Jawad MirWe chat quite regularly. She's going to be involved in one of my projects, hopefully, pending a lot of things. But, I'm seeing her next week. I'm going to UK, so she's, she's awesome. She's lovely to talk to.

2:56Pietro ScaliaYeah, great. Well, say hi to her, dear.

2:59Jawad MirI will. I will. And, obviously we're here for Whalefall, which…

3:04Pietro ScaliaRight

3:04Jawad Mir... Is a remarkable…

3:06Pietro ScaliaUnderstood

3:06Jawad Mir... Film. And, I…

3:08Pietro ScaliaOh, thank you

3:08Jawad Mir... I briefly reviewed it under, like a minute on Instagram and, you know, ev… I talked about everything, but the thing that stood out for me the most was editing.

3:19Pietro ScaliaReally?

3:20Jawad MirAnd that film is what it is because of editing, and the relationship…

3:24Pietro ScaliaOh

3:24Jawad Mir... That is established between father and son, how it intertwines back and forth is…

3:30Pietro ScaliaOh, okay

3:30Jawad Mir... All post-production magic. Nothing to take away from anybody else…

3:33Pietro ScaliaWell

3:33Jawad Mir... Right? But just saying.

3:33Pietro ScaliaNo. Well, I appreciate, what you're saying. It, I had a lot of fun, working on the film. But, I mean, the effort is really,.. And the basic conceit is already in the script, and that's what, you know, appealed to me, the story, the original… originality of the story. But, there are, a lot of things that I'm really proud of, that, you know, is where you find these transitions between, you know, the so-called real world or the imagined, you know, between the real and the surreal. So that was all a lot of fun, how to work, those transitions, you know, to make it, I guess, emotionally resonate somehow.

4:23Jawad MirYeah, no, it certainly did, and there was a lot of poetic moments, which is hard in a film like this, right? It's, you can call it of a kind like a survival story/, for the lack of better word, I don't wanna use it, like a disaster movie. It's not, but it's really, you know, like about one boy's, young man's struggle, and how…

4:41Jawad Mir... That connects with his father's relationship. And it's just, you know, which leads me to my question, is that the film was marketed, obviously for right reasons, as the concept that it is, which is, you know, mind-boggling itself. But it touched upon a little bit about father and son relationship, but not too heavily, which was fantastic. I truly admired that because it didn't give away the film too much.

5:05Jawad MirIt's a suspense film, but it's a relationship film. How, you know, yes, it was in the script, yes, it was in the performances, but when you edit, the film is more or less rewritten or, you know…

5:18Pietro ScaliaYes

5:18Jawad Mir... Kind of a lot of, a lot gets changed. How did you…

5:21Pietro ScaliaYeah

5:21Jawad Mir... Balance those two things?

5:23Pietro ScaliaWell, to me, I mean, we talked to Brian Duffield, the director, very early on when I read the script. And, there's a couple of things that really hit me off, I mean, touched me personally. First of all, the placement of the story, underwater, survival. Th… things appeal to me in these stories. I dive. I know the world down there. I like s… you know, Steinbeck. I could see the character of Josh Brolin. That world of Monterey, I like to go fishing. I like the sea. There were a lot of, you know, elements that a… appealed to me in the script. But it, going back on how to balance those two worlds, well, you know, when you read the book, you are in, In, you know, in the, in Jay's mind, you know, you can understand his thought process. But what I, what I liked about the script and, or the challenge more was, you know, how to be able to express certain thoughts, you know, of, what the character's going through, how is he gonna solve certain problems?

6:28Pietro ScaliaBut in order to do that, I relied a lot of things of the aspect of ha… has to be really realistic, and that's what the production team was also going for, very realism in terms of, the conditions, the tensions, the pain, the suffering. It has to feel real, as real as possible. And, you know, amazing, visual effects, the production design to create this environment where, the character has to live. It has to be an experiential experience, you know? I mean, nobody knows what it's really like to be in… inside a whale, right? Nobody's ever been in there. Maybe one guy probably survived, but just in his mouth, you know, couldn't go any further, I just read. But, so you imagine, the world and, you know, and you want to put the audience in that position to experience that, you know, the claustrophobia, the tension, the understand the geography.

7:30Pietro ScaliaEverything has to feel real. I mean, when you get swallowed, that was part of the fun, the experience, the action of it. But then how do you balance that with the more emotional stuff? Well, what appealed to me is that, like I said, there was not much dialogue, that the expressions and the thought process had to, you know, happen on the character's face. But how do you transition into the other world in the flashback, really the subtext of the story, that it's a story of survival but also dealing with, you know, with death, with grief, with resentment, with a lot of stuff? How do you overcome those obstacles, and how do you transition into an internal state? And I think there is, a lot of, opportunities to do that. The building blocks were already in the script, you know, following in some form what also the novel expressed. But, I had a lot of fun physically, and, through my craft figuring out those transitions, that they feel right, if it has to do with sound.

8:34Pietro ScaliaI mean, one particular transition that, you know, we wanted to bridge the two worlds between the imagined and the real, so one transition, is when he jumps in the water after his father's argument, and he swims. The water is very cold. The breathing, the angle of the shots, why, you know, ending with that shot, because it looked very much, maybe by design, but it, seeing that it's the same angle as when he lies inside in the belly as it transitions. It's the same position, same angle. But it helps as he breathes and struggles in swimming to start, and this is talking also to the sound designers, t… how do you make these transition work? So you kind of prelap the breathing apparatus that they merge. So th… th… the cut scenes…

9:28Pietro Scalia... You know, both you know, I mean, that's one, like, examples of many where you go in and out of that, you know, physical experience, I mean, of the imagined world and, you know, your breathing that becomes a very strong thematic element. Anyway, those are the…

9:44Jawad MirNo. This is, this is awesome

9:46Pietro Scalia... Things, think, th… think about. But there's a lot of, you mentioned poetic, moments. I'm happy that it is, that there are moments of poetry because you need to create these balances, th… these shapes, these ups and downs of valleys, of, you know, for example, the ordeal of fighting the squid, right? And being chewed at, and then being spit out. And, you know, after all this of, like, you know, 10 minutes or whatever length it is of stressful situation, you want, physically you want to relax, you know? And I saw it, and I saw it in the material where, you know, they shot this beautiful take of just on him that starts on the close-up right after the squid gets swallowed into the stomach, and holds on it for a very long time, and pulls back. Loved it. I mean, they did other coverage with the close-up, which I go in later, but that shot it seems like called for that you just rest. Let him breathe. Let him slow down in breathing, just the way you feel, you know?

10:49Pietro ScaliaThat's where you kind of find the mutual experience of the viewer who just experienced this…

10:54Jawad MirYeah

10:54Pietro Scalia... Stressful situation. We're slowing down. Let him breathe. And it's beautiful. It's, it's, it's a poetic shot s… m… because it slows down maybe, but because it slows down to the breathing, the breathing of the viewer, and visually it looks like, you know, he's li… he's, like an embryo, you know, inside the womb. I mean, you know, if you literally look at the image, which is an image…

11:19Jawad MirYeah

11:19Pietro Scalia... Or thematic symbols that happen later in terms of, like, you know, he's, yeah, he's literally, he still has to be born. He has to still go through the journey. He's in the womb, but the thing that calms him down is the heartbeat, you know? The heartbeat. He hears it, you know? So sound becomes important in experiencing, that world, to highlight as it was s… written and intentionally directed and shot, by the filmmakers to make that point, to remind, say, "Yeah, we have to make a point of the heart." Like I was saying about, like, an embryo, you know, listening to the heartbeat inside the womb. It calms him down until the next event happens. But, it was always about putting the viewer in that, in that environment, in that experience.

12:06Jawad MirAnd you guys most certainly did because just like in any situation in life, right, like when if somebody is... Gets sick…

12:13Pietro ScaliaYeah

12:13Jawad Mir... With some illness or if somebody gets into an accident, there's always that first initial moment where you are sort of reacting in a very, you know, shock way, and you're not reacting properly. Th… th… your just mind is not set, and then slowly you kinda come back, and that's exactly how it happened in this film for, you know, when he's swallowed, for the first, I would say, 15, 20 minutes, the fight with the squid and the rest of it's just like you feel like you're there. You're, you're claustrophobic.

12:44Pietro ScaliaYeah.

12:44Jawad MirAnd, yeah, it's, it's awesome. It's awesome, yeah.

12:46Pietro ScaliaI mean, I like, the thing is, I like the whole action sequence which they obviously use the, you know, in the early forms of marketing the film, the concept, the kid gets swallowed by a whale. But, you know, the actual sequence, the buildup, which starts really slow, and he's, you know, obviously, you know, looking for him, but just getting caught up. The slow buildup of… and then being thrashed around when he gets caught, you know, the leg being pulled out. I mean, it's exciting stuff, but literally, you… did... I've seen it at with, you know, audience reaction, they feel like they're being swallowed. I mean, literally, you know, just like... Anyway, it's a, it's, it's fun to see that, obviously because of the thrill of it. But at the same time, you hope that, you know, whatever was in the novel and the connection, the, somewhat surreal connection to connect to his, father in the afterlife, you know, that conceit can work.

13:49Pietro ScaliaAnd, you know, that was the hard part, you know, did will people go with it? But, I think we... I think it works because we use, you know, the element of, when he dives into the deep with, you know, nitrous, poisoning in his brain, and he starts, you know, imagining things, that, you can make that jump. But I also like it because after his ears pop, it's one of my favorite moments, actually, when he goes to complete silence and dark…

14:28Jawad MirYeah

14:28Pietro Scalia... And he transitions into the deep where there's nothing. I mean, that's like, that's the end. That's like as low as he can get. He's been, you know... Anyway, that's the, that's the threshold. He dies there and then goes, you know, somewhere you know, when he comes back, you know, and his fa… and he hears his father. Anyway, those are the things that we played around with.

14:49Jawad MirNo, that's incredible. You know, one of the things that, and it probably wasn't in any way intentional, it's just as an audience member, I kind of found something similar. So if you remember Finding Nemo…

15:00Pietro ScaliaYeah, huh

15:01Jawad Mir... Where Nemo goes over the canyon, and his father says…

15:05Pietro ScaliaRight

15:05Jawad Mir... "Don't go," you know? And that…

15:06Pietro ScaliaThat's right

15:07Jawad Mir... That part, that part when he's just sort of sitting there kind of reminded…

15:10Pietro ScaliaYeah

15:10Jawad Mir... Me of that, and there was a dad and son relationship in that, too.

15:13Pietro ScaliaYeah.

15:13Jawad MirAnd I thought that was really cool. Just something I, you know, felt my personal, for myself. You know, this is a little bit more of a personal thing. It's a father-son relationship. As an editor, how much of something that you and your father or you and your son have sort of gone through in your own relationship settled into this intentionally or unintentionally that you can think of? If not, that's all cool, too. I was just kinda curious.

15:44Pietro ScaliaYeah, I mean, you do, relate and, share experiences that you, everybody goes through with their fathers and myself being a father and, that you want to, you know, give your kids, all the tools necessary to survive and that in many forms, you know, in supporting them, in encouraging them, and in, you know, leading by example, you know? I can, I can definitely see that, in many fathers and in also in, Josh Brolin's character, you know, Mitt, with a very forceful thing. At the same time, you know, having really hard time communicating clearly. It was al… it was always about communications, you know, at the end, that somehow they had the same thing, but they never really s… said the same things, and that ha… that's very relatable, I think, you know, specifically with fathers and sons, you know?

16:46Pietro ScaliaSo what re… relationship is that, what relationship you have with your son. I like that aspect of it. Eh, just to explore that, you know, with the whales, that they have a form of communication, that's, that's more wholesome. But, yeah, I'm not taking examples from my personal life necessarily. We have a great relationship with my son. I mean, it's open. That's what I really value, about my relationship that, we're ve… very close, and we like each other's company, you know?

17:28Jawad MirThat's good.

17:28Pietro ScaliaI like spending time. But it's, it's great to see. I think the pride of any father is when you see that they're so similar to you know? And y… and you see that they follow because you actually have given them something that they, you know, can take with them, so…

17:48Jawad MirYeah

17:48Pietro Scalia... Sometimes you, a lot of times you don't maybe appreciate enough, but, anyway.

17:53Jawad MirNo, it's all good. I mean, one of the things that this film made me realize, not that it's, it's not breaking news or anything, seeing Josh Brol… Brolin and Elisabeth Shue, Goonies and Adventures in Babysitting, that how far time has come, right?

18:08Pietro ScaliaRight.

18:08Jawad MirGrowing up with those films, I mean, those are like childhood classics, right? And that... I was watching it, I'm like, damn, you know? It's been so long now since those movies came out. We talked about, you know… The isolation in Whalefall, another film that you worked on with Ridley, Martian, right? That was a lot about isolation as well. And was there any... How was, how was your a… approach different, if not the same, if at all? I know they're two different movies, but the thematics of it is isolation and survival.

18:42Pietro ScaliaWell, yeah, so, well, the thing is the, Martian had the benefit of having the commentary and the, device of, the video, commentary of, Matt actually talking and, a… and, you know, expressing his thought process and journey through. That was his way to help out to use that device continuously, you know, as he's, telling about the progress. And having the cameras in the, in the Rover or in the, in the pods or inside the lab, that he could always talk to the camera. I loved it. I love that, you know, point of view, the talking to the audience. A lot of times there's a lot of humorous beats that Matt did, and just in terms of time that I loved, you know? I mean, even if he comments about, you know, forgot the character's name, Jessica Chastain's character, listening to, you know, Donna Summer, you know, while driving. Any… anyway, there's a lot of humor, but using that a… as a commentary helps the audience understand his thought process, his scientific step of how to find solutions.

19:49Pietro ScaliaThe challenge on, Whalefall is that there isn't very much, you know, very, for a long period of time, you know, understanding where things are and, you know, expressing those literally, visually without an… any dialogue. So it was all b… based on, understanding geography, but also on performance, his eyes, his expressions to understand how the wheels are turning, understanding how, put two and two together. And I think, you know, a g… a good sign would be is that if you watch the film, and people do this all the time, is that, you know, does it work visually? Can you follow the story without having said anything? That's the fundamentally. You have to be able to follow it. Yeah, you get it. Maybe they'll get every… but you get enough, so you don't just rely on the story. The visual storytelling takes precedent in terms of how you think. And then, you know, we had to obviously express, which was a, also a technical challenge, you know, the mouthpiece and the voice, the dialogue to hear everything clearly.

20:58Pietro ScaliaYou can't take things out because of the methane. But, the, there is a full section when he actually, I think, you know, has a chance to talk to this, animal, the jellyfish, you know, becomes a bit human. He has somebody to talk to. It's a very human thing. So, it c… it can express, the, train of thought. But it also helps about, again, about, you know, being able to communicate, I guess, you know, with his father later on. So, i… we relied a lot on, more on, visuals, and, other sounds than just simply dialogue to explain, you know, plot…

21:46Jawad MirYeah

21:46Pietro Scalia... Or give you maybe more. I mean, it could have used maybe more of a, or the device could have been narration, right? I mean, somebody tells you narration, which obviously, th… thank God they didn't, didn't do it. But, you know, the book might give you that feeling. Like, it feels like a narration if you, if the, if the narrator talks about his relationship with his dad. So how do you express that, visually? That's a…

22:13Jawad MirYeah

22:14Pietro Scalia... You know, big, the challenge.

22:17Jawad MirBut, you know, you said, you said a very interesting thing visually, right? So I remember when I was, I had my second film that I directed, and I was kinda co-editing it, and, one thing I read out of it, I'm not sure if it was a Walter Murch book or somewhere, that if you can play a scene or a movie with no volume and…

22:37Pietro ScaliaYeah

22:38Jawad Mir... If it's…

22:38Pietro ScaliaSilent

22:38Jawad Mir... If it's telling you something, that means you got the editing more or less at the right beats.

22:44Pietro ScaliaYeah.

22:44Jawad MirLike, at least the beats are there.

22:45Pietro ScaliaThat's right.

22:45Jawad MirAnd that's exactly where Whalefall falls into place, is that it's, you could, you know, it had very minimal dialogue, especially…

22:52Pietro ScaliaRight

22:53Jawad Mir... Without the flashbacks, but you could figure out because he was in the space, and the emotions that were driving through him were really out there and very believable.

23:02Pietro ScaliaYeah. Yeah, I was seeing even if you go into a flashback with, the scene with, you know, with Matt and, Jay in the driveway when his friends are going to pick him up, you know, to go to Ocean World, and he goes, "Fake ocean," you know? I mean, just look at the posture of how Josh Brolin is standing, his muscles like this, you know?

23:25Jawad MirYeah.

23:25Pietro ScaliaAnd even the size of the over-the-shoulder shot, not a close-up on Jay, but an over-the-shoulder shot wide that makes him look, like, small, right? It's just like, it's, it's a, you don't see... I mean, yes, you're a filmmaker, you no… you notice those things, but, you know, when you watch the movie, you don't think about it, but y… it is a visual storytelling, you know? The

23:49Jawad MirIt is. But people do, it does affect people at a subconscious level.

23:52Pietro ScaliaYes, it does.

23:52Jawad MirThey don't pick it up, right? But it's there.

23:54Pietro ScaliaThat's right. That's right.

23:55Jawad MirIt's, it's there. I wanna talk about the most, emotional scene for you to edit. I mean, there was quite a bit in there, so it's so interesting. So I had completely forgotten, Pietro, that you had edited Gladiator when I was watching this, okay?

24:10Pietro ScaliaOkay.

24:10Jawad MirAnd when the, in the scene towards the end, when the breakthrough between father and son happens, for some reason, I don't know why, I was taken back to the scene of Gladiator when Maximus, Russell Crowe… Russell Crowe's character, goes up to his, family being hung by a tree and, you know, the music plays in…

24:29Pietro ScaliaYeah

24:30Jawad MirI just felt something very similar there. I mean, I know they're completely different, but there was just something there that I was reminded of that scene.

24:37Pietro ScaliaYeah.

24:38Jawad MirWhat was the most emotional scene for you to edit?

24:42Pietro ScaliaWell, I think, exactly that. When the breakthrough happens, when he starts talking and, to, you know, I mean, it was… we cut a lot out of it. It was much longer. You know, it can go on. But, it was, it was the transition of him waking up, and I love, I love the early breakthrough where he hears somewhat, hears the voice, and you're very close on him, and him calling out for his dad. And m… the most moving thing is at, is at the end, for me. I really felt the loss, and that is when, he… his father dies or the whale dies or, you know, he has experienced his father's death, somehow by even not being present at the, you know, his deathbed. But that death is felt, when the, when y… you, the heartbeat, the sound completely stops and it's empty, and you really notice the emptiness of it.

25:49Pietro ScaliaI thought that always hits me and, I like it. I like that all of that just comes, come, comes to an end. You know, I mean, if you, if you experience death and how people grieve, you know, when I thought about, you know, when my father passed away, you know, also a illness. And, when, you know, when the spirit is gone and y… you see it's just like that emptiness. It's, it's remarkable. So I felt that.

26:30Jawad MirThank you for sharing that. You talked about that you... One of the reasons it was attracted to this film, aside from the story, was the underwater aspect of it. Tell me about your underwater journey. This is kind of like segueing from the film itself. Like, do you scuba dive, and where do you go, and…

26:48Pietro ScaliaYeah, I... Yeah, so I scuba dive. I, you know, as a child and as a teenager and even to this day, I spend a lot of summers in southern Italy, by the sea, in a town called Gallipoli. It's in Puglia in the Salento region. Beautiful sea. I mean, literally, my parents had a house there, and we used to spend the summers on the beach. But I liked going out with my dad, fishing. It was one of the things we enjoyed doing. But I also liked, snorkeling and, spearfishing.

27:21Pietro ScaliaSo I would actually go out and on the rocks and, you know, spear fishing or collect, you know, an octopus or…

27:29Jawad MirOh, wow

27:30Pietro Scalia... Sea ear… sea urchins or a flounder. I mean, just like, you know, they would end up then, you know, as a, as lunch. I mean, we would just like, you know, until my children told me that, you know, I shouldn't be spearfishing octopus because they have the b… the intelligence of a five-year-old. So I stopped doing that. But anyway, I feel very comfortable in the water. I love the sea. I love what it feels like when you scuba dive in a certain depth, when you go, deep into the water. I scuba dived with my daughter in, Mo'orea, and we swam down a canyon with a lot of fish and sharks, and come exactly on a place where th… there's a cliff and, you know, the depth goes down, and you can feel the current pushing up. I did similar experiences in Hawaii diving. So e… the exploration aspect of it and underwater and how it feels to float and how you control your breathing, these are things are very familiar to me.

28:35Pietro ScaliaAnd, so I liked the sequence that was shot in Monterey, in Monastery Beach, when he goes into the water, what it feels like with these really rough, you know, waves, you know, battering you up. But then the contrast of what it feels like once you go under, that kind of just like, floating. And I thought that would be a more gentle, you know, s… segment to maybe reflect back that he enjoys doing that, you know, with his father. Says, like, he likes that. He says, you know, the, his,... John Ortiz ask him, "I thought you didn't like diving," you know? Says, "It's always in diving I li… I didn't, I hate it." He says, "I hate diving." He says, "Not the diving I hated." But anyway, yeah, I w… I felt like, just enough of, the showing the wonderment and, you know, what it feels to be underwater.

29:42Pietro ScaliaBut, y… the movie also when reading the script, you know, reminds me of a lot of classic films underwater, you know, with, what do you call them? With another…

29:55Jawad Mir20,000.

29:55Pietro Scalia20,000 Leagues, yeah, Underwater. Or what is it, the other one? The journey into u…

30:00Jawad MirCenter of the Earth?

30:01Pietro ScaliaYeah. Is that it? Or w… which one is the one they, where they travel inside the human body? Was that…

30:07Jawad MirFantastic Voyage. I was just thinking about that.

30:09Pietro ScaliaFantastic Voyage. That's it.

30:10Jawad MirYes. It reminded me of that, actually. I'm glad you mentioned that. It did remind me of that a lot.

30:15Pietro ScaliaSo there's a lot of... And then even if you look at Pinocchio's, you know, when he gets swallowed by the whale, there's a lot of mythology around whales, so it ties in with that. And I think, you know, trying to create something that, was realistic and you can experience it, you know, whatever the conceit is…

30:31Jawad MirYeah

30:31Pietro Scalia... With the story is, it was, it was fun for me

30:35Jawad MirThat's amazing. You mentioned you were diving with your daughter in Mo… Moorea, is it?

30:40Pietro ScaliaMoorea, yeah.

30:41Jawad MirWhere is that?

30:42Pietro ScaliaMoorea. In Tahiti.

30:44Jawad MirOkay. Okay.

30:46Pietro ScaliaIt's a s…

30:47Jawad MirI was just... I just... Sorry, go on.

30:49Pietro ScaliaYeah. It's a small island off, Tahiti. I mean, just beautiful place, you know.

30:54Jawad MirGot it. Awesome. I'll put that on my list to check out. I would... I just wanna sort of go to another…... M… you know, a couple other things, then I'll come back to Whalefall. You worked with Oli… Oliver Stone on JFK. You worked with Ridley Scott on so many projects. Clearly, I mean, everybody on a film set during post-production, we all learn from each other. But working with someone like them, you know, they have sort of made some of the most incredible films. What have you learned from them working with them on the films? Mostly with Ridley, of course, but JFK being Oliver Stone films.

31:32Pietro ScaliaYeah. I have to say that, you know, starting off with Oliver Stone, I learned a lot, and that was for me, like, the school after the school in a sense. I mean, the real-world experience, and I was fortunate to have had been given a chance to work with, him and his team. So, you know, I'm saying I, finished UCLA, got a master's, did my own films, shorts and documentaries, but, I wanted to work with Oliver Stone because I had seen, you know, Salvador, and I knocked on Claire's door, you know, having, met, David Brenner, who had worked on Salvador, you know, asking for a job. And, the story goes that they said, "Well, we're all crewed up, but, you know, the next one we're, you know,... Give us a call, come by." I mean, and they were off, going to the Philippines to shoot Platoon, and then…

32:29Pietro Scalia... Platoon was a huge success, but besides the recognition and, you know, best film, best directing, best editing, I really wanted to work with, the team, and I was hired on Wall Street. And, you know, had, you know, worked for five, almost six years with Oliver, learning with each film, you know, from Talk Radio to, you know, Born on the Fourth of July, to, The Doors. And, you know, just Oliver was, is an amazing writer. Very kno… knowledgeable, historic. I learned a lot about history, about American history. I, learned a lot from, you know, working with, Bob Richardson, in terms of cinematography. What he was, doing on JFK but also on The Doors and Born on the Fourth of July. Having the luxury to work with, you know, with David and Joe in the cutting room, where basically Oliver had final cut, the decisions were made in there.

33:38Pietro ScaliaAnd the part of that creative process, was a great learning experience. Having the opportunity to learn from John Williams, you know, both on Born on Fourth of July or in JFK with his then, at the time, music editor, Ken Wannberg and who, you know, showed us tricks on how to cut music, you know? He was very knowledgeable. People like that to learn from or from, Paul Rothchild, who was a music producer for The Doors on The Doors abou… about music and the background. So to work with amazing, talented people. Very fortunate at a very, a young age to learn from, you know, these, masters and, you know, take the things with you that, you know, will become useful. I mean, one example, I can make and why it connects and talk about what you learn. For example, on JFK, Bob was experimenting with different, you know, speeds of camera, you know.

34:44Pietro ScaliaShooting some shots with 16 millimeter cameras at…

34:48Jawad MirYeah

34:48Pietro Scalia... You know, four or six frames per second, you know, in order to have the kind of, motion effect within the frame that we would then duplicate to make it to 24, and you get this kind of staccato effect. Which is, you know, with different aperture speeds, I mean, that, you know, create this super realistic almost frozen moments, which is a great, was a great, visual device that, Bob used. But you can see that similar use, years later that, John Mathieson used in Gladiator in the battle at the end of the first battle where he also s… step printed. So I knew about how to step print, how to create that world. And there again, we go from something that is in different films, we go from really real battle, right? I mean, action. You're in it. You're in the mud fighting and it feels physical. I mean, amazing second unit shot. I mean, what the material that you get is fabulous.

35:49Pietro ScaliaBut then how do you take that all the way back, all the way down and eliminate... Well, yeah, in the device, eliminate the sounds but break down the visuals, the memory, whatever it is, that feeling and transition to both musically and visually to something more personal and maybe call it poetic, but the more emotional to me, that, you know, zeroes in on, you know, on Marcus Aurelius. It focuses the story but, you know, with JFK was something about the same way. It's about, a real event and then the fragments of memories and how th… those work. Anyway, it's, it's, it's elements that you learn and you carry them with you for, you know, in next, other films. Things I've learned from The Martian were very useful to doing Whalefall They're all somewhat... You can see similarities, yes, in Gladiator with the Will fall transition as well because there is a moment alike in Gladiator where he's after the death you mentioned in that scene, the death, seeing his, you know, family, burned and killed, the transition into this, world between being dead or alive.

37:10Pietro ScaliaHe has hallucinations of the images because he's being picked up by a caravan. And I remember those images, those very surreal images, you know, of the, of the animal, the cage or a flash of, Djimon Hounsou playing Juba or the floating shot that, really created, you know, him just float. It is this passage of worlds that, you know, you always get an opportunity to play both visually and, conceptually I guess with,... And not conceptually, but thematically I meant.

37:45Jawad MirSure. It's funny you mentioned Gladiator, so that famous scene of him touching the wheat field.

37:50Pietro ScaliaYeah.

37:50Jawad MirI mean, I've seen that imitated in so many films now it's like over the last 25…

37:55Pietro ScaliaYou know, you know the story because I told it so many times, but, it's one of a perfect example. Say, well what does editing really do? Well, editing is thinking about putting that image as the first image in the film. It's not something that is written. It was not something that was shot with intent of where it goes. It was an image like many others that were shot for something completely different, but, by recognizing something in the image and placing it puts it in a completely different context.

38:27Jawad MirYeah.

38:27Pietro ScaliaAnd the meaning changes. And so that's a form... I mean to say, yeah, people say, well, the, well it's a form of ri… writing, but it's a conscious choice and it's not just visually, oh, it's, it's cool. No, it… there's a reason why is that.

38:41Jawad MirYeah.

38:41Pietro ScaliaAnd, so anyway.

38:43Jawad MirNo, I agree. And I, you know, you talked about JFK and obviously you know better, but based on what I've seen of yours, JFK was a very complicated film, right? I mean, you're going back to a historical event and investigation, and I think the editing of that was probably the most complicated editing, at least I have seen, of yours. Was, is, am I right in that as… assumption or am I dead wrong?

39:07Pietro ScaliaNo, it was, it, I would, it was very complicated, it was a very difficult film. When I was offered the film by Oliver, I was scared, really scared because it was a lot to take on. But, working with Joe through it and how we cut up the work, it, the JFK was hard in many aspects b… with the different formats, the complexity, the amount of characters. But, I mean it could be a whole long conversation how we came about to do JFK, and we've talked about it. But in terms of being very difficult, for me, what I liked, and it was part of also the j… tradition or my experience that almost even though I was very young, almost like prepared everything for that movie because I was dealing with documentaries. I like documentaries. I shot them. You find the story in documentaries.

40:07Pietro ScaliaYou create, a storyline through the visuals, through the material you found. So the recreation of events, in JFK, helped me. I mean, I sought out, I mean, like even Salvador, the kind of, you know, social realism or social critique and historic events that are real, to get through the material, and to be able to work on in a format that you can have multiple narratives is very difficult. But, I think visually we managed to do it and that's, I think, part of the editing helped that in the sense that, you were able to follow it even through the complexity because of the help of maybe visuals or sound and sound effects, music. But in terms of being difficult, I thought that was the most difficult thing we have ever done. I mean, we... It was grueling. I mean, just the complexities, the hours we worked on it, and it was in film, not done digitally, which is another whole discussion.

41:15Pietro ScaliaCould spend hours talking how we got it to the finish line. But I have to say that the only comparable thing that was as, just as difficult was Black Hawk Down where I…

41:26Jawad MirAh, yeah

41:27Pietro Scalia... Suffered through Black… suffered, eh, no, that's not the right word, but I did not like it. It was tough. It was a lot of material. It was just like swamp with a lot of material, multiple cameras with multiple characters with, again, a historic event that happened, but it's how do you shape it, you know? It's yes, you have the, you have the book, you have the script, you have some blueprints, you have the material, but then you have the, all these ingredients and you have to still tell it so that people understand it, you know, and experience it. And, again, that one was very early on that even we discovered with, as when building it, that even though you know the event, you experience it. I don't know how it happened, but we all of a sudden noticed that we are experiencing the events like the soldiers in a sense. If they're running and we're running with them, we don't know what's behind that corner, who's gonna shoot at us.

42:32Pietro ScaliaSo a… again, you're putting the viewer in the soldier's position. It's a... You know, we were criticized of saying, oh, you didn't... Maybe in Europe, you know, oh, it's another one of these American t…... Hero stories about…... You know, we didn't show the story of the plight of the people of Somalia, in Mogadishu. We didn't spend too much time there, just like, you know, the end. Well, yeah, it wasn't that s… that wasn't the story we were trying to tell. We were trying to tell a war story. So when we're telling it's, about a specific event, and what does it mean to be a soldier in those conditions? What does it feel like urban warfare, you know? And then you get this material, and then I make choices when I see it, and I say, what does it feel like sitting in a helicopter, you know, going in, and, a… and you have 10 seconds before you reach the destination. And I d… I decided to, again, by the use of sound, to remove the sound and focus on their faces, just the silence of it, and just subdue it.

43:38Pietro ScaliaI mean, it's a, it's a device, but it, I guess it helps, like, eliminate the noise, but to me it's, it centers on the characters and on the viewer and how it feels like. And having then s… shown the film, and when people that, were, you know, technical advisors who were soldiers in Mogadishu and, you know, Special Forces and Rangers come up to you, one soldier came up to me and says, "Man, I just, I don't know how you did it, how you know, but I got goosebumps in that scene. It felt like I was d…" I mean, the soldier tells you, "It felt like I was there again." I mean, it brought him back. I saw, I saw people that at the end of, you know, Black Hawk Down just didn't move, and it was like they were overwhelmed with emotions. And it's like, yeah, what does it mean, you know, these soldiers, the heroic e… events, what does it mean, you know, leave no man behind, you know?

44:35Jawad MirYeah.

44:35Pietro ScaliaGo and save your buddy. I mean, not many people would do that. I think that's, you know, try to get into a soldier's mind. But, yeah, it was, it was a, it was just as hard as JFK, Black Hawk Down.

44:50Jawad MirI'm glad you mentioned that. So J… Black Hawk Down, to me, I think if any movie comes close to Saving Private Ryan in terms of war is Black Hawk Down, the way it involves the immersive, the audience.

45:00Pietro ScaliaYeah.

45:00Jawad MirAnd you talked about, you know, people complaining about Mogadishu, so it's interesting. I remember, so, you know, I think if that film had come out now, I could see way more reaction nowadays, right? But I think back then, I remember coming home and telling somebody that they actually showed the other side, which was, like, unheard of in those times.

45:23Pietro ScaliaInteresting, yeah.

45:23Jawad MirRight? And I app…

45:24Pietro ScaliaYeah

45:24Jawad Mir... I appreciated that. Even though it was for a little, it actually…

45:27Pietro ScaliaVery little, yeah

45:28Jawad Mir... Was in there. It was in there.

45:30Pietro ScaliaYeah.

45:30Jawad MirAnd the way that film ended, again, going back to your chaos versus calmness, it, you know, after all this hell that break loose, you know, you have the scene of, when they come back into the Army base and…

45:44Pietro ScaliaYeah

45:44Jawad Mir... These, people present them…

45:45Pietro ScaliaI know exactly

45:46Jawad Mir... With people from Pakistan, like I'm from Pakistan…

45:49Pietro ScaliaYeah

45:49Jawad Mir... Originally, presenting them with water, and I thought that was such a beautiful imagery, too. And again, it was…

45:54Pietro ScaliaLet me tell you…

45:55Jawad MirPlease. Please

45:55Pietro ScaliaNo, I appreciate it. Sorry to, have cut you off.

45:58Jawad MirNo. No.

45:58Pietro ScaliaBut I'm, I'm glad you mentioned that because it's exactly one of those moments, I mean, it starts earlier when, you know, the surreal children are welcome them back, right? And they've gone through the fog and through this hellish night, you know, come in the morning, and people are waiting around them in the stadium. But to me, those shots of the Pakistani soldiers in the stadium bringing the water was very important for me to cut to each of those characters a… and drinking that water, you know? Just that glass of water, just like, huh, it felt like it. And I remember I gave everyone the same amount of time to each,.. This is Jerry Bruckheimer says, "Man, that's just too long, you know?" I said, "Why?" He's just like, "No, I just think it's just, it's just too long." And I was just like, "Okay, well, we kinda like it," so we left it. Then a second time around when he saw another screen he says, "Why didn't you cut it?" And, you know, it's just like, "No, I mean, I don't know, Ridley and I kinda like it." "No, man, it's too long." So a third time, you know, he goes, "Wait, man, you just have to cut it," you know?

47:03Pietro ScaliaAnd I spoke to Ridley and he agrees, and I go, "Well, I don't have to agree with Ridley."

47:11Jawad MirOf course you don't. That's awesome.

47:13Pietro ScaliaNo, but anyway, I ended up cutting it, but I'm just saying it was…

47:16Jawad MirYeah

47:16Pietro Scalia... It was, I wasn't trying to be a…

47:19Jawad MirI know, I know it

47:19Pietro Scalia... But I'm, I'm just saying that, yes, maybe it was long, but I actually felt, I wanted to feel that. I wanted to feel like what each f… these guys who went through this ordeal feels like. Yes, okay, there's six, seven guys, but I be… spent so much time with them. Other ones, there's 40 characters. These are the last ones to come through. You get to know them when you see them visually. It's important for the viewer, right? Yes, maybe you don't have all six, you know, all seven, you know. Maybe use a wide shot to have four, but I, anyway. It was,..

47:50Jawad MirNo, this is, this is awesome. I love it. I appreciate you sharing that because that scene is something that always stayed with me for many reasons. And, I'm glad you told the story. And I think Jerry Bruckheimer, having worked with, you know, Top Gun, then Michael Bay, and everything needs to be fast and stuff, Crimson Tide, Tony Scott. But

48:11Pietro ScaliaYeah, I mean, I think, I think it's not so much about, you know…

48:15Jawad MirI know it

48:15Pietro Scalia... Sometimes about length of the film.

48:18Jawad MirYeah.

48:18Pietro ScaliaI think it really just comes to, personal judgment…

48:21Jawad MirYeah

48:22Pietro Scalia... Like how you feel something. For example, yeah, how long, why do you decide how long to stay on a reaction shot or something, you know? Or…

48:30Jawad MirYeah

48:30Pietro Scalia... How long you want s… somebody to e… e… experience it. I just go… going back on, Whalefall just for a minute, just like even in the, in the last shots, I love to stay just on Jay because… He does so much on his performance. You know, after he's saved at the end and i… and he says his names and, you know, he's, he's scared and he's crying, but then he starts laughing and just holding on. But it's a, such a beautiful moment. You don't wanna cut that out, you know?

49:04Jawad MirYeah, no.

49:04Pietro ScaliaYou wanna stay on as long as possible. I, you know, because it is, it is human. It's great to see it, and his performance expresses so much. So yeah. But it's always comes down to personal choice…

49:18Jawad MirYeah

49:18Pietro Scalia... Sensibility, I guess.

49:20Jawad MirNo, I mean, Jerry Bruckheimer has given us our childhood. I mean, every single thing…

49:24Pietro ScaliaYeah

49:24Jawad Mir... He's touched, you know, as a producer has turned into gold. I mean, I can go on about him. I wish, I would love to have him one day on this podcast, but that's another story. Going back to Whalefall, you talked about music and JFK and, you know, Born Fourth of July. In this film, the music played a huge part. Right?

49:43Jawad MirAnd also visual effects, which I think they were done so beautifully. Obviously the inside of the whale was, you know, he was actually physically in a pl… in a, in a place. But I couldn't tell for a second any moment that there were visual effects in the film, even though I knew there were, but I just never got distracted.

50:01Pietro ScaliaWow. Well, that's…

50:02Jawad MirWorking with the VF… V… VFX and the music, talk to me about that. But go on, please.

50:06Pietro ScaliaWell, no, that's, I think really amazing work that Guillaume, our visual effects, supervisor, did. And it's, it's a long process, but I think he is trying from very early on, it's like, are these things gonna work? Is this conceit gonna work? He did amazing work in terms of how to translate from the creation of the, these, you know, tubes that, reflected or represented the light source of the bioluminescence, but how to stitch together, make it real. It's very complex stuff to show surfaces that move, that have different depths of, you know, reflections of muscles movements. So they spend a lot of time but… doing that. But you work very early on with the things that I hope it's going to work. I hope you get to that. But you have to wait for a very long time until the effects are done, and then imagine also with the sound. But once the effects get to a stage where these are visual effects, but they're not… I mean, there's all different kinds of visual effects.

51:12Pietro ScaliaI don't wanna, make, you know, comparison, but you can say, okay…

51:15Jawad MirYeah

51:16Pietro Scalia... These are realistic visual effects, or one way of doing visual effects, or there's the avatar form of visual effects that's also very amazing. Or there's, you know, different kinds, but it was always based on realism. It has to feel real. And when you have the sound, married to it to make it as real as possible in the movements of the flesh and stuff and the sound, then, yeah, then you create the illusion that, yeah, you don't see it. It feels, it feels real. But, it just takes a lot of time and meticulous effort to work all through this process until these two things come together, you know? So.

51:56Jawad MirYeah. Yeah. No, I agree.

51:57Pietro ScaliaYeah.

51:57Jawad MirI, sorry, go on, please.

52:00Pietro ScaliaSo you had mentioned music.

52:02Jawad MirYes.

52:02Pietro ScaliaAnd then obviously the music is also very much, part of it. But, you know, Joe Trapanese did a, an amazing work in terms of also finding the balance between the action, you know, the horrific, situation of him being swallowed with the more, transition with the more, thematic, subtext, themes of father-son, but also to, the more kind of otherworldly or angelic, voice of resolution of, you know, of the whale pods, you know, coming at the end. You know, that you also had to do a lar… larger, let's say had a large canvas to cover those, with those, emotions and tones of the film. And so you hope that all elements from the writing, from the production design, from, the performances, the editing, that all those will come together to make, to make sense.

53:03Pietro ScaliaUltimately, you know, the audience, it… it's up to them what they, experience.

53:08Jawad MirRight.

53:08Pietro ScaliaBut you always, you always go with the, with the idea, I mean, from my point of view is, I think about the audience, when I, when I work, and I always think about what does, what does it feel like? What does the character feel like? What does this character go through? That's what I try to get as close as possible.

53:28Jawad MirAnd that's why it works, you know? And I sort of wanted to close on the ending of the film. So before I go to Whalefall, you must have seen Cast Away with Tom Hanks, which came out…

53:38Pietro ScaliaYes. Of course

53:39Jawad Mir... 25 years ago.

53:40Pietro ScaliaYes.

53:40Jawad MirSo there's a scene, the whole scene with the box and the…

53:44Pietro ScaliaYeah

53:44Jawad Mir... Angel wings, and we never find out what's in that box.

53:48Pietro ScaliaRight.

53:49Jawad MirRight? Similarly, in Whalefall, in the ending when he's looking at the paper…

53:54Pietro ScaliaAt the note

53:54Jawad Mir... And, at the note, yeah. And I'm thinking, I hope they don't show it, and I'm like, I hope they show it. I hope they don't show it. I hope they show it. But I was so glad that, what kinda came out of it and…

54:04Pietro ScaliaYeah

54:05Jawad Mir... It was, it was very pleasing. Yeah, I really like the way that unfolded.

54:08Pietro ScaliaOh.

54:08Jawad MirI don't wanna give it away, but it was really pleasing.

54:10Pietro ScaliaYeah. I'm glad, I'm glad you reacted the way we were hoping everybody would react, because, like, again, it's like, you know, what would it be? I mean, you already said everything needs to be said. It's gonna be maybe a hat on a hat, and maybe some people needed it, you know, some finding some closure. Maybe that's important, but I don't think that as much as important as the experience of it, going through it, you know? And I'm more important… I'm, I'm more interested, and what's more important to me is his reaction, the actor's, and what he, what h… his face. I wanna read his face, you know? I mean, as a viewer, it's not so much about, you know… what it tells me that, 'cause maybe, I don't know, but I, both, you know, the director, Brian, and I felt now we stay, we stay on him, and we were blessed, with that last shot with the letter.

55:12Pietro ScaliaActually, by the way, I don't know if you know this, but this was something that was a, was a pickup shoot because we e… ended it, you know, with, originally the film and the script ended with the rescue with, you know, the pullback…

55:24Pietro Scalia... And him being rescued. But always, Bay felt in viewings, and the studio felt the same way that it needed to have some kind of... It was too abrupt. You needed to have some kind of catharsis, something to, a little bit more of a beat bec… to digest this whole event. But going back to the last shot of him reading the letter, his expression on, Jay and Austin's face, you can see it, and this is miraculous, and we noticed it. The director noticed immediately that, and it was, I guess chosen for that, but it was, it was perfect is that when he smiles at the reaction of the letter, the sunlight hits him. Take a look at it. It's, it's just a perfect moment. It's not, it, no DP can plan the, what God has, you know, given to, with the, with the sunlight. It really, it's a beautiful moment, but it's just like, again, why ruin that? You know? It's, it's perfect on his face. The sunlight hits him and, you know, that's, that's all you need visually.

56:24Jawad MirThat's awesome.

56:25Pietro ScaliaYeah.

56:25Jawad MirI gotta, I gotta check that out again. I…

56:27Pietro ScaliaYeah

56:27Jawad Mir... And I did feel, I did feel that as soon as he opened it, right, his reaction was very quick. So in my head was it's like one or two or maximum three words. Like, it's not…

56:38Pietro ScaliaThat's right

56:38Jawad Mir... Like a, right?

56:40Pietro ScaliaThat's right.

56:40Jawad MirAnd I don't wanna know even if you knew what it was 'cause I don't want it to…

56:42Pietro ScaliaYeah, of course. Yeah

56:43Jawad Mir... Be ruined right, 'cause that's, that's the experience that I wanna s… want it to stay with me. But yeah, no, a marvelous film, and, you know…

56:51Pietro ScaliaOh, thank you

56:51Jawad Mir... Again, as I said in the beginning of the conversation, always been a fan of your work, and to be able to see it in Whalefall and now talk to you is incredible, and, you know, I truly appreciate all the work that you've done.

57:03Pietro ScaliaWell, I…

57:03Jawad MirI'm looking forward to more of your work, of course.

57:05Pietro ScaliaOh, thank you very much. You've been very kind, and I'm glad you enjoyed Whalefall, and, good luck to you, and hopefully we'll do a… another one on some other movie.