Cut to Impact
Clark Connors vs Jack Cartwright, 15 September 2020 (Championship Wrestling from Hollywood)
Clark Connors breaks in 19-year-old newcomer Jack Cartwright in this TV wrestling show from last month. Jack looks a little heavier than Clark, but on the whole the two are well matched against each other. I take it that Clark is the heel here on the grounds that Jack is a quintessential babyface. It's harder to tell without a live audience to cue home viewers on whom to cheer and whom to hiss. Good or evil, Clark is the man for me if for no better reason than his chiseled torso and hawk-like facial features. His mad-dog energy grabs my crotch.
But this post is more about technique. There are two main ways to shoot a wrestling match - a single-POV by means of a handheld camera and multiple-POVs, edited together. I prefer single-POV because it makes me feel more in touch with the wrestlers and the match. The editing of this match reflects a "cut-to-impact" approach that I kinda like and I kinda am tired of. It's a style that WWE and other big brands rely on extensively. What I mean by "cut-to-impact" is the practice of switching points of view at the moment that a wrestler hits the mat, or a wrestler slugs his opponent, and so forth. The technique is illustrated in the third, fourth, and fifth GIFs above.
On the one hand, multiple cameras are more likely to show key segments of the match from the best angle and add drama to an otherwise standard shot by means of Eisenstein-style edits. I'm not opposed to edits on principle because sometimes they're the better option; few camera operators are instinctive or well briefed enough to catch important shots at the right angle and proximity. On the other hand, having seen quite a few live shows, I prefer the single-camera approach even though I may not see everything that's happening. What I like is I can imagine a single camera as a stand-in for me. Not only do I feel like I am there. but, to borrow a phrase from Gertrude Stein, it makes me feel like there is more there there.
Visit Championship Wrestling from Hollywood here.
I must confess that I discovered ‘Championship Wrestling from Hollywood’ lurking in the nether regions of my Dish network subscription in late 2018. I found that I really enjoy their programming.
ReplyDeleteIt seems like they have that old-school in-studio NWA feeling to their shows and its enjoyable even without the audience … maybe more so for me since I have a preference for “empty arena”matches in a ring.
CWA has some great up and coming talent on hand. Last year “Eye Candy Elliot” that I knew from Wrestlers For Hire showed up for a few matches on CWA. The CWA champion Dan Joseph is every last bit of handsome and some of their other guys that have caught my eye and attention like Jordan Clearwater and Ray Rosas. It’s cool to CWA get a shout out on Skull Island.
(...and Clark kinda needs a haircut.)