Bernini ‘Last Ones To Leave’ (Director’s Cut)

The interesting thing about the Bernini project is that the edit itself became the writing. The first half was only loosely guided by a few questions from director Alexa Wilson. The girls were cast, but once they got talking, the camera seemed to disappear. They moved naturally between subjects, interrupted each other, spoke over one another and just became old friends having a conversation. That made the whole thing feel incredibly real.

The edit became very fly-on-the-wall. We were listening for little thoughts, reactions and connections buried across a huge amount of material, then stitching those fragments together until a story emerged. With roughly 10 channels of audio and constant conversational overlap, a lot of the craft was deciding what to hear, what to lose and where to move between conversations without killing that natural rhythm.
We weren’t cutting a script. We were finding one inside the conversations. I love that the final film doesn’t really feel like a traditional commercial.