How ‘The Seed of the Sacred Fig’ Editor Worked in Secretive Process

When Andrew Bird steps into the editing booth, he’s used to collaborating with and bouncing ideas off of a director. But in the case of “The Seed of the Sacred Fig,” Germany’s official Oscar submission for Best International Film, he had to learn to trust his own instincts.

That’s because the Iranian thriller, which follows a family unit being torn apart after the father figure accepts a controversial job as an investigating judge signing death sentences, had to be shot entirely in secret by director Mohammad Rasoulof. Bird anonymously edited Rasoulof’s 2013 film “Manuscripts Don’t Burn,” another politically stirring film about Iranian censorship.

“Part of my job as an editor, when I’m working closely with a director, is to always kind of question everything,” Bird tells Variety. “I never really accept anything. But to be on your own doing that is a bit of a different process.”

Not only were Bird and Rasoulof never physically in the same room together during filming or post-production, but Bird was receiving footage irregularly. “It was basically being uploaded whenever the footage was strong enough, or whenever they were in a place where it was safe enough. So I never really knew what was coming.”

With Bird not knowing Farsi, the language spoken in the film, Rasoulof admits that even he “was wondering how [Bird] was going to get by with just a script and cut dialogue in a language he doesn’t understand.”

But as an editor with credits on many international films, Bird is used to working on projects not in his native language. The focus becomes on “judging an actor’s performance without knowing what they’re actually saying.” And with the original script that Rasoulof gave him before filming started, he was able to get on board with the overall concept.

Some of the most challenging moments for Rasoulof to pull off as a director were all of the interactions between the family…