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WAEA 25th Annual Conference & Exhibition
21-24 September 2004
Washington State Convention & Trade Center

CUT IT OUT!

Debbie Chariton (Sony Pictures Releasing) and Frank Hall (DreamWorks SKG) explained that content providers edit films so the content is appropriate to air on aircraft mainscreen systems and has a running time of less than 120 minutes.

Profanity and scenes containing sex or nudity, excessive violence, or religious/racial or cultural slurs are edited from films. References to plane crashes, airplane turbulence, terrorism, or bombs also are removed. Hall illustrated how a scene was edited to reduce the emotional tension it generated, while maintaining the information and intention of the scene.

"We try to make one airline version that we hope will be acceptable to everyone," Chariton said. "We don't want to take out more than necessary."

Chariton explained that the film's director and producer must approve the edited version of the film. Often elements such as a new audio track (that may also include language tracks and subtitling) must be conformed to the edited master, which adds time to the delivery schedule. Editing an R-rated film that requires heavy editing, such as a love scene, costs US$75,000-$100,000 dollars. A PG-13 rated film that requires moderate editing could cost US$40,000-$75,000 to edit for airline distribution.

Providing content in a 16x9 aspect ratio in addition to a 4x3 ratio could add 20-50% to the cost because the duplication labs must reproduce the film in both versions. This also affects the turnaround time and creates less flexibility for repositioning shots during the editing process, Chariton said.

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