Inside Amir Etminan’s Covert Editing of "It Was Just An Accident" As It Heads into Awards Season
I am often captivated by films that rely on long takes and engaging dialogue. These are defining qualities of Jafar Panahi’s latest film, It Was Just An Accident, making the film a standout narrative experience and a highlight of my time at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Shot in secret in Tehran, It Was Just An Accident follows a collection of characters who were former prisoners that now have to relive the terror of their experience after encountering the man they believe tortured them. Panahi pieces together a taut dramatic mystery where every character who enters the story adds unpredictability to the scenario and sharpens the narrative’s stakes.
Long takes and engaging dialogue take a meticulously coordinated effort across nearly every stage of production. This meant that the film’s editor, Amir Etminan, had to be intimately involved with this covert project, working closely with Panahi to ensure the vision was coming together clearly while working with tools and software in a way that wouldn’t compromise the project.
Speaking through a translator, Etminan describes how his role required daily involvement with filming.
“The way we worked on this project, I was present on a set and I would edit at the end of the day what we shot and I would try to have a sample - you know, kind of a rough cut of the project from every single shooting day,” Etminan explains.
It was important for Panahi to see the story taking shape in real time. To achieve this, Etminan says the daily drafts included the footage shot that day, some preliminary color correction, and rough approximations of the visual effects - enough to give a sense of how the film was coming together.
Etminan explained that typically, he employs the use of the full Adobe creative suite in his work. As a multi-skilled creative professional, he says “I'm not just using the [video] editing software of Adobe, I'm using the Adobe ecosystem because I work also as a photographer. So I use Adobe products for editing my photos. But in this specific project I used Adobe Premiere and Adobe Encoder.”
Because of the discretion needed for It Was Just An Accident, Etminan had to work offline and with limited resources to complete his editing work. He even notes that the laptop he used was only serviceable for basic needs. “In other projects, Panahi and I used After Effects, but in this specific project, I couldn't use that because the computer I was using wasn't strong enough to be able to handle After Effects or any visual effects,” he says.
Once shooting was complete, the project was then sent to a post-production team, and the final product is a film that has dominated conversations at film festivals and in award season considerations. It Was Just An Accident has earned many prestigious accolades, including the coveted Palme d’Or following its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival and continues to be a frontrunner in the upcoming race to the Oscars.
But bringing awareness to social issues and injustices remains at the heart of Etminan’s priorities in being involved with the creation of It Was Just An Accident. “We are bombarded by information, so people know about the situation of other people in different regions of the world - it's not a secret anymore,” he states. “This film is a continuation of what they know about Iran.”
And while Etminan is proud of the film’s accomplishments so far, he says what he’s most heartened by is how the film is driving awareness for social issues. “Of course I'm very happy about what's happening to the film, but I'm more happy because this film did what it was intended to do, which is being an instrument for the social and political activism against the totalitarian authority.
“And it seems like it's doing its job very well so far.”