In film, a cutaway is the interruption of a continuously-filmed action by inserting a view of something else. It is usually followed by a cutback to the first shot, but not always.

Cutaways usually don't contribute any dramatic content of their own, but help the editor assemble a longer sequence. For this reason, editors choose cutaways related to the main action, such as another action or object in the same location. blank">Cutaways, article from WNEO.org For example, if the main shot is of a man walking down an alley, possible cutaways may include a shot of a cat on a nearby dumpster or a shot of a woman watching from a window overhead.

Probably its most common uses in dramatic films are to adjust the pace of the main action, to conceal the deletion of some unwanted part of the main shot, or to allow the joining of parts of two versions of that shot. For example, a scene may be improved by cutting a few frames out of an actor's pause; a brief view of some listener can help conceal the break. Or the actor may fumble some of his lines in a group shot; rather than discarding a good version of the shot, the director may just have the actor repeat the lines "in one" and cut to that solitary view when necessary.

These are journeyman techniques. Cutaways can also be used for reasons of art.

One example of a cutaway being used deliberately to break continuity, for comic effect, appears in _Shoot the Piano Player (Tirez sur le pianiste), by François Truffaut: the pianist and his female companion are being followed; she opens her compact and uses it to show him the two gangsters behind them, impossibly large in the reflection.

On television, That '70s Show, Scrubs and Family Guy frequently used cutaways widely to introduce brief gags before returning to the episode's main storyline. The Simpsons writers cut back on cutaways around the time the technique was adopted by Family Guy .

Cross cutting is a series of cutaways and cutbacks.

In news and documentary work, the cutaway is used much as it would be in fiction. On location, there is usually just one camera to film an interview, and it's usually trained on the interviewee. Often there is only one microphone. After the interview, the interviewer will usually repeat his questions while he himself is being filmed, with pauses as he pretends to listen to the answers. (The comedy Micki and Maude shows this process quite accurately.) These shots can be used as cutaways. They may be necessary just to ensure that the audience can hear the questions correctly.

Cutaway is a 2000 action film about skydiving, directed by Guy Manos and starring Tom Berenger, Stephen Baldwin, Dennis Rodman, Maxine Bahns, Ron Silver, Casper Van Dien, and Thomas Ian Nicholas. The film features numerous aerial stunts and much of the film was shot in Miami. This was Dennis Rodman's third film. The term "cut-away" is used frequently in the film, in reference to parachuting and also in reference to life in general.

The successful undercover agent Victor Cooper (Stephen Baldwin) is assigned for his ninth mission: to find how the loadings of drug is being brought to Miami. He suspects that the drug is coming through the air and joins a team of sky diving, under the leadership of Red Line (Tom Berenger), a fanatic and considered the athlete number one in this sport in the world. Due to his profile of winner, Vic gets involved with the group and he "disconnects" from his position of infiltrated agent, "connecting" with the team. Written by Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil