Slow cutting

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Slow cutting is a film editing technique which uses shots of long duration. Though it depends on context, it is estimated that any shot longer than about fifteen seconds will seem rather slow to viewers from Western cultures.

A famous example of slow cutting can be found in Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange (1971). In a segment that lasts three minutes and fifteen seconds and contains only three shots, the main character (Alex de Large) is followed as he walks the length of a futuristic record store, meets two young ladies, and brings them back to his (parents') house.

Another example is Alfred Hitchcock's film Rope (1948) consisting of only eight cuts. Each cut lasts about as long as a full 1000 foot roll of 35 mm film (about 10 minutes).

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