The honorary society of film editors called the ACE (which stands for American Cinema Editors) has been around since 1950. They are based around a voting system, in which new members can only join if the majority of the society agrees. Thus, they are not an industry union. They are merely an organization to honor the best editors of our times. In order to join ACE, an editor must meet at least one of the following requirements: sponsorship by two active members, five years of editing experience on television or movies, a personal interview by the Membership Committee, approval by the Board of Directors, or acceptance by the general membership. Another common way to become a member is to win an ACE Eddie award.
The Eddies have their roots from all the way back when the ACE was first formed. In 1950, they began hosting a dinner that would honor nominees for the Best Editor Academy Awards. They also invited people from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences after they created their own film editing category. However, soon the ACE got tired of relying on other people to hand out awards. By 1962, the very first award for the Best Edited Feature Film was handed out by the ACE. This first award went to The Parent Trap (the original 1962 version). Most of the Eddies that are handed out generally go to the same films that win Best Editor at the Academy Awards.
For a long time, these awards functioned in a pretty vanilla manner. Though entertainment journals and magazines would cover them, people began to get bored with the single award handed out. So, by the year 2000, the Best Edited Feature Film split into two distinct categories — one for dramatic films, and one for comedies and musicals.
Splitting up the Best Edited category worked wonders for the Award show. However, there were a few more categories deemed necessary for efficiently running this show. For example, the category Best Edited Animated Feature Film was introduced in 2010, with Up taking the first award of this type. Other secondary awards include Best Edited Miniseries, Best Edited One-Hour Series, and Best-Edited Feature Documentary (among many others).
The sheer variety of awards these days has brought a lot of needed spice to the Eddies. The 68th ACE Eddie awards just recently premiered as well. The ceremony took place at the Beverly Hilton hotel, and several new Eddie recipients were chosen. Among the 2018 winners are Lee Smith of Dunkirk, Steve Bloom of the animated feature Coco, and Tatiana Riegel of I, Tonya. Because they won an Eddie, they are now eligible for membership in the American Cinema Editors organization. It remains to be seen whether these three will accept their invitations.
One quirky benefit they will get is the ability to put the letters ACE after their name. It really doesn’t signify anything too important. However, it is highly likely that editors who are members of the ACE are more likely to score more and better jobs than those who are not. So, those three little letters might just be worth the effort.
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