Does the process of Editing make Film unique to other arts?

"Editing is often regarded as the fulcrum of film art, since it is in this process that film most clearly separates itself from competing arts."
                                                       - James Monaco, How To Read A Film ( Fourth Edition, page 141)

This is a really interesting quote that jumped out at me in the book 'How To Read A Film' by James Monaco. I've never truly thought about film in comparison to other arts, in fact I've never thought about arts as competing at all.

However, after thinking about this quote I understand how it could be seen to make sense that editing is the thing that makes film unique from the others, although I don't fully agree.

Film editing is taking a number of clips and cutting, ordering and mixing them together to make structurally sound film. This is a similar process to recording music. Within a band's recording session the drums are usually recorded first, then the bass, rhythm guitar, lead guitar and finally the vocals. These are all separate recordings (similar to the clips) and are then cut, ordered and mixed together (also similar to the clips) to create a song. In writing for an orchestra, the composer is carefully choosing when to include an instrument and when to take an instrument away from the score similar to how a film editor would choose when to add and take away clips.

Even in literature, a writer is choosing what words to use, when to stop to end a sentence or a paragraph or a chapter, similar to how an editor chooses what clips to use and when to include a transition such as a dissolve.

Therefore, as interesting a quote as it is, I don't really agree with it because I believe that all of the arts are structured similarly. They're all a form of expression and are made up of lots of different elements that are carefully chosen, ordered and mixed up by the artist.

2001: A Space Odyssey (Match Cut)

Within editing, a match cut is when two consecutive shots have compositional elements that match. A match cut can be used for aesthetic reasons, for a greater flow of action or to show metaphoric or thematic connections.

One of the most famous match cuts is in the opening to Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. It opens with a sequence of apes fighting. One of the apes picks up a bone and realises that it can be used as a weapon and uses this to win the fight. Other apes catch on and use bones from the floor as weapons. This sequences represents one of the first discoveries of tools. An ape then throws a bone into the air. After a close up tracking shot of the bone flying into the air, the next shot we see is that of a space craft in space. The space craft is of a similar shape to the bone, in the same part of the frame and angled the same.

This match cut shows a vast temporal shift but represents the cause and effect of how that ape making the first discovery of tools led to the great technological wonder of a space craft.