Assignment 17 - Erin

If you were to ask me who I think one of the best directors working today is, without hesitation I would answer Edgar Wright. Quickly after that answer I would also add Wes Anderson, but I’d like to focus on Edgar Wright because chances are you’ve never heard of him. He made his entrance to American audiences this past summer (2017) with his original film Baby Driver, which you may or may not have heard about. Prior to the release of Baby Driver, Wright was mainly known as a cult classic director with the majority of his fan base in the U.K. Other notable Wright films include Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, and –my personal favorite– Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. To discuss Edgar Wright’s unique style of filmmaking, I’ll be comparing Scott Pilgrim and Baby Driver.

Though on the surface both of these films seem fairly different, they share more similarities than meets the eye. Both follow the story of a loser protagonist who just wants a better life, as well as love. Both feature an ensemble of stars who bring the story together. And both contain Edgar Wright’s idiosyncratic ability to tell a story to a beat.

Now, how that beat flows depends on the film. 

In Scott Pilgrim, quick-fire dialogue and visual cues keep the pace; while in Baby Driver, the entire film is underscored by and coordinated to a playlist, playing out like one long music video. If we trace these methods of pacing back to the roots of the two films, we can find why they work so well. For instance, Scott Pilgrim was adapted from a series of graphic novels all centered around video game style battles. So the use of blunt ping-pong dialogue between characters mimics the way most people quickly read through the dialogue on a page of a comic, or a screen of a game. On the other hand, Baby Driver centers on the character of Baby, to whom music is an integral part of his life. His major quirk is that he's always listening to music. By making the audience always hear what Baby is hearing, we better connect to him. Either way, the purpose of crafting the films to a rhythm is to fully immerse the audience. Often times poor pacing leads a viewer to become bored with a film, either they can’t keep up or feel as if everything is way too slow. Wright uses the pacing of his films to keep his audience invested, and feel like part of the story. From the opening scene of Baby Driver (a car chase perfectly choreographed to Jon Spencer Blues Explosion’s “Bellbottoms”) to the final scene of Scott Pilgrim (three characters emotionally bouncing lines off of each other), Edgar Wright’s films move to the beat.