ABSTRACT
Pace is most obvious in action sequences, but all sequences are shaped for dramatic effect. Variation in pace guides viewers in their emotional response to the film. More rapid pacing sug-
gests intensity; slower pacing, the reverse. Karel Reisz explores the opposite of editing for pace in
his discussion of Hitchcock’s Rope (1948), a film that was directed to avoid editing.1 The entire film looks like a single long take. Reisz argues that too much screen time, which could have
been used more productively, is wasted moving the camera from one spot to another.
