Francis Ford Coppola is widely recognized as an important film director. Acknowledged as a film maker that used the technical aspects of the cinematic process to great advantage, Coppola once said, “The essence of cinema is editing.” He is known for expressing tension using editing and sound techniques. Francis Ford Coppola used a signature sequence of cross cutting with poignant sound and music to create cinematic tension in three of his films from the 1970’s, The Godfather, The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now. In 1972, Coppola produced a sequence in The Godfather that combined cross cutting and ambient sound with an organ work by Bach to make cinematic tension. The scene shows Michael Corleone…show more content… The scene portrays the charge of American helicopters and soldiers on a Vietnamese village and the bombing of the citizens and children during the war in Vietnam. Coppola makes about fifty cuts in the approximately three minute sequence, which begin slowly then escalate in speed, moving between the menacing helicopters and the alarmed village. He selected the imposing Ride of the Valkyries by Richard Wagner as music the helicopter crew blasts from their tape player, which once again crosses into the initially quiet village, where chickens and children’s singing are heard and accelerates into the eruption of gunfire and explosions. With cross cuts from advancing helicopters to the unsuspecting village that progressively build, the powerful music that forces its way into the peaceful morning of the village, and engulfing sounds of war, Coppola conveys the tension of the time.
During the 1970’s, Francis Ford Coppola designed sequences in three films The Godfather, The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now, that employed cross cut editing and the strategic use of sound and music to create cinematic
