Thelma Schoonmaker is one of the best film editors of our time. For over forty years, she has worked closely with director Martin Scorsese and has earned seven Academy Award nominations, winning three Oscars for Best Film Editing for Raging Bull (1980), The Aviator (2004), and The Departed (2006).
Schoonmaker is from an American family but was born in Algiers, French Algeria and lived there until she was a teenager. In 1955, she immigrated to the United States and attended Cornell University in 1957. After college, Schoonmaker continued graduate school education at Columbia University and while studying at Columbia she enrolled in a six-week filmmaking class at New York University. At NYU a professor suggested that she help a young Martin Scorsese with editing his short film, What's a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Place Like This (1963). Shortly after Schoonmaker went on to edit Scorsese’s first feature film, Who’s That Knocking at My Door, (1967).
Even though she clearly possessed a great amount of talent, Schoonmaker like many other aspiring filmmakers, especially those who were female, experienced significant resistance for twelve years while trying to gain membership to the Motion Picture Editors Guild. She had to serve five years as an apprentice and three additional years as an assistant as well as overcome the implicit barriers due to gender bias in the film industry. When Scorsese started working on Raging Bull he wanted no one but Schoonmaker to edit the film. In turn, the director had his lawyers accelerate her membership into the union. Thus Schoonmaker was finally accepted into the guild and showcased her genius after Raging Bull won the Oscar for Best Film Editing. Schoonmaker's style and creative approach is especially evident in the way she constructs the final fight scene montage between Jake Lamotta and Sugar Ray Robinson, a scene in film history we now deem masterful and iconic. From that point moving forward, Schoonmaker worked on every single one of Scorsese’s films.
Editing is one of the most difficult tasks of filmmaking, as you must not only exhibit a strong creative intuition but also a deep confidence to make firm decisions and “cuts” for the better good of the story. In addition to breaking through the celluloid glass ceiling, Schoonmaker is one of cinema’s best talents and continues to contribute her expertise and vision to the ever evolving art form. Schoonmaker recently finished editing Scorcese's passion project, Silence (2016), a story based on a book about two Jesuit priests who are subjected to persecution when trying to bring Christianity to Japan. Look out for Schoonmaker's work as Silence comes to theaters in November.
“I’m not a person who believes in the great difference between women and men as editors. But I do think that quality is key. We’re very good at organizing and discipline and patience, and patience is 50 per cent of editing. You have to keep banging away at something until you get it to work. I think women are maybe better at that.”