Renaissance: A Film By Beyoncé Has A Major, Oscar-Worthy Element

For the moment, let's put aside the fact that Beyoncé is a once-in-a-generation talent and one of the best entertainers alive. Let's also put aside the incredible production design, lights, pyrotechnics, choreography, live music, hair and makeup, and sound work that goes into producing her wildly impressive tour and subsequent movie, "Renaissance: A Film By Beyoncé." I was stunned by all of those aspects of this movie, perhaps none more than the film's editing. That's not always the sexiest thing to talk about when it comes to movies, but the editing in "Renaissance" deserves a shout out. 

The film is relentlessly paced: Aside from the copious amount of concert footage spanning dozens of different shows over the course of the tour, there are so many shots of the crowd, behind the scenes conversations between Beyoncé and her family, interviews with different department heads, and B-roll of the production coming together. I have no clue how much raw footage was captured for this project, but it has to be an astronomical amount. It was so much, in fact, that I counted a staggering 18 editors listed in the film's credits — that's by far the most on any project I've ever heard of, and after you see the overwhelming final product, it's easy to understand why so many were needed.

Movies like "Summer of Soul," "20 Feet From Stardom," and "Amy" have previously won Best Documentary Feature Film at the Academy Awards, so I suppose there's a chance Beyoncé could walk away with a win in that category. As for more specialized categories, it's unclear to me whether the movie is eligible to win an Oscar for Editing, but if it is, it should absolutely be considered a serious contender. 

I also think the film's stunning costume design is worthy of a trophy — although the Oscar rules dictate that the award must "recognize the designing of costumes for their special use in narrative motion pictures," and I'm not fully sure if the Academy recognizes a documentary as a "narrative motion picture." Still, the sheer amount of jaw-dropping costumes on display here is unreal, and the editing helps highlight those outfits by cross-cutting between multiple nights of the tour, often within the same song. The resulting effect is an astonishing procession of spectacular outfits more varied and vibrant than what you'll see in 99% of feature films today.

I spoke about this with /Film editor Ethan Anderton on today's episode of the /Film Daily podcast, which you can listen to below:

We also talked about "Napoleon," "Past Lives," the Emma Stone-hosted episode of "Saturday Night Live," and much more.

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