Briefly define classical cutting, and explain how a director like John Huston used it in one of the boxing scenes in his film Fat City

What will be an ideal response?

Answer: The ideal answer should include:
1. Classical cutting involves editing for dramatic emphasis, to highlight details that might otherwise be overlooked, through the use of the close-up within the scene.
2. In its most refined form, classical cutting presents a series of psychologically connected shots—shots that aren’t necessarily separated by real time and space.
3. For example, if four characters are seated in a room, a director might cut from one speaker to a second with a dialogue exchange, then cut to a reaction shot of one of the listeners, then to a two-shot of the original speakers, and finally to a close-up of the fourth person. The sequence of shots represents a kind of psychological cause–effect pattern.
4. In John Huston’s film Fat City, the entire boxing match could have been presented in a single setup. Such a presentation would probably strike us as underwhelming.
5. Instead, Huston broke up the scene into a master shot and various closeups according to the psychological actions and reactions within the fighter protagonist (Stacy Keach), his manager (Nicholas Colosanto), and two friends in the auditorium (Candy Clark and Jeff Bridges)