This video essay by John Hess is great to understand the foundations of movie editing. It talks about George Melies who invented the Jump Cut by accident and also talks about D. W. Griffith and how he ended up creating the first invisible cut in his movies. The video talks about how these editing practices have evolved over time but the basics remain the same even today. 

It talks about the Soviet theory of montage in historical perspective and delves into the details of the Soviet editing school. One of the most valuable lessons from the video is Sergei Eisenstein’s classification of the five film editing methods.