One never knows when a little quirk of a hobby or interest can lead to a calling to work in an industry one never imagined. That is the case for former Valley resident and film editor Andrew Gust. Gust started playing around with a camcorder and is now working on Hollywood feature films.
“Film making, for me, started when I was a kid and my dad had a camcorder that he would use to take videos of the farm and family events,” said Andrew Gust. “When my friends and I started snowboarding and skateboarding, we were really excited to capture our new stunts and tricks on video. We were constantly borrowing our parents’ camcorders to do that. It wasn’t long before we realized we had endless amounts of footage that we couldn’t do much with.
“Finally, when we figured out how to edit a bunch of clips together into a montage, it began to take on a whole different energy,” he continued. “Then we would add whatever music we were into at the time, and it suddenly had this larger-than-life feel. I think that was the first time that I realized I was passionate about filmmaking and editing.”
Gust was first exposed to the art of editing during his time at Swan Valley Regional Secondary School (SVRSS). It was here that he was given the freedom to explore his creativity and develop a keen interest in filmmaking and editing.
“The SVRSS was in its earlier stages of introducing video classes when I was in attendance there,” said Gust. “George van der Walt was the instructor at the time, and the school had purchased some camcorders and computers with editing software.
“He pretty much gave us free rein to have fun with it, so we would go around the school recruiting classmates for silly sketch comedy videos and making various montages that the school would play with the O Canada anthem in the morning. Those classes were really valuable because they provided the tools for us to explore our creative side.
“Near the end of high school, I hadn’t considered making videos to be a career path,” continued Gust.
Once I realized there were schools solely dedicated to teaching filmmaking, I decided to go to Vancouver Film School (VFS). It was a one-year course that covered everything from screenwriting to cinematography. The year that I attended VFS was the last year they were still shooting on 16mm cameras, so we got to work with real film stock, which was pretty special.
“All throughout that year I took different classes, but I found myself to be particularly drawn to editing,” said Gust. “Filming something and working on set can be a chaotic experience with a million different moving pieces and a hundred people on set doing different jobs. It only takes one mistake and the whole thing can fall apart. At the end of the day, you take all that hard-earned footage to the editing room and piece together the best version of the film you can. I really enjoy that process of exploring different versions of the film, because depending on how you put it together you can make entirely different movies out of the same footage. Working with the director to find the best way to put the movie together is what really excites me.”
Working in film requires a number of people doing separate jobs that all impact the outcome of the film. It not only takes everyone doing their job, but a sense of harmony onset in order to make things go smoothly and to produce a successful finished product.
“It takes a network of people to make a film happen from start to finish,” said Gust. “What I would tell upcoming filmmakers is that it’s really important to make the right relationships because there’s more than just one person involved. There has to be cohesiveness amongst the entire group working together.
“The relationship between the director and editor has them spending sometimes 12 hours a day putting the film together and if they don’t get along, it doesn’t matter how talented they both are, it won’t be a good end result.”
Gust has had film editing experience in both Canada and in the U.S., where he now resides. Both areas have had ample film editing opportunities, but Gust really wanted to set his horizons on bigger pictures.
“I first left the Valley and moved west for schooling and some warmer weather in Vancouver,” said Gust. “Now I moved south for some even warmer weather in Los Angeles, Calif., and now it’s too hot, so I don’t think I need to move further. All jokes aside, my mother was born in South Dakota, so when I was born I had dual citizenship.
“After going to film school in Vancouver and working there for a few years, I realized that the biggest concentration of filmmaking was happening in Los Angeles. I knew I would have to make that move to find a bigger variety of projects and opportunities. I do, however, travel between here and Vancouver to work on film projects.”
Over the course of time, Gust has worked for companies like Disney, 20th Century Fox, Lionsgate, and Apple. Recently he has been working a project for Netflix which will be premiering later on this year.
“One of the first companies I started working for in Vancouver made the original Air Bud movie,” said Gust. “A lot of people don’t realize that movie was made entirely in Canada by a Canadian company. It was only after they started filming that Disney bought the distribution rights and put their name on it.”
When I started working at that company they had already run out of sports for Air Bud to play, so my first job was on Super Buddies, which was about superhero dogs (that talk!) trying to save the world. It was a slightly bizarre start to my career, and I wouldn’t change a thing.”
“There’s a lot of film production that happens in Vancouver, but then the editing often continues in Los Angeles,” he continued. “After arriving in Los Angeles, I worked on a few smaller films for Lionsgate and some TV movies for Lifetime, and eventually a feature called The Hate U Give, which is based on the book by Angie Thomas. Most recently I was a film editor for a series on Netflix called Pup Academy and now I am working on a Netflix animated film called Entergalactic starring Kid Cudi and Timotheé Chalamet. That film will come out this fall.”
Gust has his sights set on doing more film editing work for feature films. He hopes to do more work on films that have a social impact and would like to get the opportunity to work on a film that was shot in Winnipeg.
“I want to continue working on feature films with directors that are making more character-driven dramas that focus on social issues, like The Hate U Give,” said Gust. “The most powerful films are those that are not only entertaining but have some sort of commentary about society. Those films make you think about things in a different way and those are the kinds of films I would like to work on.
“I would also love to continue not only in Los Angeles but also to work on films made in Canada. The industry is always in flux there, but right now Manitoba has some excellent tax breaks for films that are shot there. I would absolutely love it if I could wind up working on a feature film in Manitoba someday.”