Cutting Maestra: Elisa Bonora and Fin Couling
Editors
Newly released documentary feature, ‘Maestra’, follows five international women who participate in ‘La Maestra’, the only competition in the world for female orchestra conductors. Released at Picturehouse on International Women’s Day and directed by Maggie Contreras, it was worked on by an 80% female crew, including part of the editing team at Red Wolf Films.
To find out more about Maestra’s cutting process, and to dive deeper into this incredible film, we speak to Elisa Bonora and Fin Couling. We discuss their highlights, challenges, and inspirations behind their editorial choices.
After working together on Deep Rising (2023), Elisa and Fin continue to collaborate today at Red Wolf Films, where Elisa is cofounder and editor.
Before Red Wolf, Elisa’s career began working with Joe Pytka, a multigenre director, editing high-profile commercials. Fin’s editing, however, spans back to age 12, when she would recut film trailers on YouTube.
“‘Throughout my teenage years I cut anything and everything I could get my hands on. When I left school, I studied Broadcast Production at Queen’s University Belfast to broaden my skillset, whilst editing remained my true passion. This is where I found my love for documentary editing.’ ”
What was the edit process like on Maestra?
Fin: I was one of three editors on Maestra - it was a highly collaborative process. Firstly, I watched all of the footage, taking notes about what moved me, interested me and was important to include. Then we had a long discussion about structure and pitched our proposal to the director. Given the number of characters, we cut each characters arc independently of the others and then wove the stories together.
All three editors worked independently on sections, then came together to screen work and discuss changes. Maggie, the director, would hop between edit suites and work with us if she was in the office. If we were working remotely, we would upload our work to Frame.io at the end of the day and wake up with notes in the morning - a benefit of working with a time difference in America!
Elisa: For this project as three editors, we would carefully watch all the footage and take notes. We would discuss at length in edit sessions, as we aimed to achieve a balance between the five different stories of each character. At Red Wolf we work in a team, so the editing always reflects conversations and ideas previously discussed amongst ourselves. We continuously showed each other our edits, trying out suggested changes together. Despite time differences with our director Maggie, we always found a way to be in the same room to collaborate, especially when it came to making final decisions.
“It is not a typical ‘competition film’ so making sure people could connect with each of the characters and feel satisfied by their journey and arcs was imperative. ”
Where did you draw inspiration from when cutting Maestra?
Fin: Whilst I watch a lot of music documentaries, honestly what was most impactful on this particular project was a childhood favourite - Fantasia. Whilst an animated children's film, it remains a masterclass in marrying picture, emotion and story to classical music.
Elisa: My family is primarily made up of musicians., My Grandfather played the Lute, my father was a jazz player, and my sister is an incredible flautist. She played as the first flute for the London Philharmonic Orchestra, amongst other major orchestras worldwide. Since my teen years, I have witnessed firsthand how challenging it was for a woman with her talent to exist in that world, and how rare it was to see women conductors - essentially non-existent! Whilst editing Maestra, I was able to share my process with my sister Paola, and the possibility to shine a light on such an important issue that has permeated her professional life. But I was also able to shine a light on it partially through my love for her - that in itself was pure joy.
“Growing up listening and seeing her play was my inspiration…in a way, it’s a love letter to my sister.”
What’s your highlight from the edit?
Fin: A highlight from cutting Maestra would be cutting the final round of the competition, where two characters' stories simultaneously come to a close. The orchestral piece performed was beautiful and such a joy to weave with the climax of two characters’ emotional journeys. It's the longest we stay with a musical performance in the entirety of the film and it was brilliant to be able to draw those strings together in a way that I could really play with each cut.
Elisa: When you have so many storylines and bits and pieces, like a puzzle, you never know until the end how it will live organically in one storyline. When things suddenly click together, it's the biggest joy. To finally see the end make sense… it was the perfect end !! For months, we had no certainty of how the film would end; we were concerned with who would win and how that would affect the story. There was a lot of pressure to find an end, but we found one. I was very proud that the message of our film was about community and not competition.
“The end wasn’t about winning, but about coming together as a community - that was the final true highlight of editing the film. ”
What did you find most challenging?
Elisa: The challenge and beauty of editing a multi-character story lies in dedicating enough meaningful screen time to each character; ensuring a balanced introduction, defining their individual arcs, and weaving the storylines together in a cinematic and impactful way.
With less than 15 minutes per character, achieving this balance in editing is always a demanding task. In Maestra, the challenge was even greater, as the director filmed more than five stories.
During the editing process, we had to evaluate and decide which ones had the most meaningful arcs and how to craft a strong ending.
The boldest choice we made was selecting Melissa as our main character, the conductor who was eliminated in the first round. By choosing an antihero, we took a creative risk, pushing ourselves in the editing process to foster both empathy and identification with a "loser", ultimately subverting the traditional concept of winning. This was only possible thanks to the exceptional footage our director captured, providing us with all the necessary material to explore the best storytelling possibilities.
Fin: A challenge and priority for me was showcasing the conductor's art form - so little people get to experience what it is a conductor does, or when they do they are watching them from behind and viewing the orchestra! To be fully invested in the competition, I wanted to make sure that each conductor's style and the art form they'd spent years perfecting was showcased appropriately and accurately - without slowing down the story or compromising the information that needed to be delivered in each scene.
Another significant challenge was balancing the women's stories - both with each other, but also with the technical aspects of what it means to be a conductor - and make this accessible and compelling to people even if they don't know anything about conducting before watching - as the films speaks to more than just conducting but women's wider experiences.
Quickly in the editing process we realised that we needed to reach the competition much faster - and this meant cutting a number of our characters "backstory" sequences entirely, and shortening others. It was a challenge to make sure that people felt like they knew and loved the characters, AND we reached the competition stage swiftly.
Connect with Fin and Elisa on Instagram, and be sure to follow Red Wolf Films