Interview: Editor Matt Platts-Mills Discusses Episodes Four, Six, and Eight of ‘The Gentlemen’

What’s most incredible about Guy Ritchie‘s body of work is how he can shape most of his stories within the edit, particularly in how his approach to working on set differs from other filmmakers, preferring improvisation to sticking to the screenplay. That creates a rather unique set experience but also an intricate editing process.

In stepping into the world of Guy Ritchie for Netflix’s The Gentlemen, editor Matt Platts-Mills, who worked on episodes four, six, and eight, tells Awards Radar on Zoom that the filmmaker has “this incredibly lively and examining mind, and he won’t rest until he’s very reactive to what he sees. He’ll watch something and go, “Ah, you know what, we could do this, we could do that, this person should say this, this scene should actually be about something different.” It’s quite exciting to be part of as an editor. I’ll be honest: sometimes, I’d sit in the cutting room with Guy. He gave us a couple of hours every day during the final part of the cut. I watched the cut with him and took notes, thinking, “There’s no way I can achieve any of this. I don’t think it’s in there.” But it does work. I don’t know how he knows it, but it does.”

While Guy Ritchie did not direct the episodes he worked on, his imprint was felt throughout the series. Still, the filmmakers who contributed to episodes four, six, and eight were also able to put their own mark on the material while also fulfilling Ritchie’s original vision:

“In the opening scene of Nima Nourizadeh‘s episode four, you have this insane man with a gas mask and not much else but a machine gun. He brought that stylistic approach to it with all the slow-motion shooting, and that episode has a particular start.

Obviously, we also have Eran Creevy, who I worked with, and that is why I came in initially to the show with episode six. I really love the way that he shoots. He shoots enough to make cuts easy but not too much to complicate the cut.

He has a really great range of material. He loves mixing formats and shooting styles, and I liked seeing those pressure-filled scenes where the camera is slowly creeping toward the actors. There are several scenes of that. You then get more relaxed scenes where we’re much wider, and the camera is looser. Then you’ve got a frenetic boxing sequence, also shot in slow motion. In the ring, it’s all handheld and easy rigs. But outside, you’ve got these great, sweeping tracking shots on the ground. He has this wonderful range of material, which I’ve enjoyed cutting the most for a long time because it had such a big range of ideas regarding how they shot it.”

The aforementioned boxing scene is a parallel montage of Jack Glass (Harry Goodwins) in the ring. At the same time, Susie (Kaya Scodelario) watches the match as she converses with Harry (Max Beesley), who tells her the match is rigged. In working on that sequence, Platts-Mills explains that it took a very long time to get it right as the two scenes play off each other:

“You sit down and start working your way through the rushes. The first cut is 14 minutes long because you put everything in there. Then, it becomes a process of paring it back. I think it took me the longest time of anything to cut that scene than anything else in the show, partly because I wanted it to be really good. We also had to mix the sound, which took a lot of time. You have to have the crowd, and the boxing hits, and you might think that’s a fairly simple thing to do. But we layer different sounds into one sound. You get something at the top, for the mid-range, and for the bass. Every sound must hit differently; you must mix it all together. That whole experience was very time-consuming, and I spent many hours working on it all, but it was ultimately very fun.”

We, of course, discussed Guy Ritchie’s crazy work ethic, as he shoots five movies a year (that’s, of course, an exaggeration, but you get the idea), which led to a very interesting tidbit on how he and his go-to editor James Herbert work with each other. We also discussed the challenges of working with Ritchie in building the show’s pace within the edit, utilizing quick cuts to subvert audience expectations, and the intricacies of working on the classic Ritchie montages for episodes four, six, and eight.

You can listen to my full interview with Matt below and see all episodes of The Gentlemen on Netflix today:

[Some of the quotes in this article have been edited for length and clarity]