Color Cinematography

[Gordon]

Colour as a psychological effector is something that seems to totally underused in modern Cinema. Michael Powell (The Red Shoes, Tales of Hoffmann), Hitchcock (Vertigo), Antonioni (The Red Desert), Roger Corman (Tales of Terror, The Masque of the Red Death), Melville (Le Samourai) to mention just a few, understood the power that colour can have on the viewer. Most colour films are unintentionally ugly (name me an unintentionally ugly black and white film) and do not use the spectrum as part of the grammar, merely as a 'flashy' device, which isn't a bad thing, but it undermines the possibilities of expression in Cinema. Films like Point Blank, thanks to DVD, continue to appear and reveal themselves to be lessons in Cinema on so many levels.

[Narshty]

Most colour films are unintentionally ugly (name me an unintentionally ugly black and white film)

Do you mean 'ugly' or 'undistinguished'? There are countless visually uninspiring black-and-white films.

[Gordon]

"Undistinguished" is a better word, Narshty. Most Eastmancolor negative stocks from 1952-1963 weren't that great and once they got better, experiments with colour didn't amount to much. The emphasis was on 'realism', but most colour films do not have realistic representations of colour. Films like Bertolucci and Storaro's, The Conformist or Vertigo are very rare in Cinema, most colour films look like cheap magazine photos. This doesn't particularly bother me, as the story is the most important aspect of a film to me, but the unimaginative use of colour in most colour films is something that most people - including filmmakers - are not even aware of. In black and white, this isn't something that you have to think about. Colour is either a distraction or an attraction in a film and 99% of the time, it is a distraction. In black and white, this problem disappears. So many good films of the last 40 years would have been better off being shot in monochrome. Raging Bull would have been a far lesser film, had it been shot in Eastmancolor. In fact, it originally was to be shot in colour, but Michael Powell suggested that red boxing gloves would have been a distraction in the fight scenes. The blood in the shower in Psycho would have altered the tone of the film considerably, had the film been shot in colour.

Alice in the Cities
The Elephant Man
Europa
In Cold Blood
Seconds
Paper Moon
Night of the Living Dead
The Last Picture Show
Manhattan

No one would say that those films would have been 'better' in colour: Why?

It seems to me that the evolution of sound in films has far surpassed the use of colour and subtle photographic techniques. The gap that has been generated, has been filled with ridiculous CGI effects. CGI is a great tool, but so far, it has been used like Technicolor was in the 30s and 40s, ie. maxed-out, OTT 'flashiness' that does not serve the story or emotionality of the particular scene.

Film Noir, which is a very broad term in general, actually means something very different to each person. To me, it suggests a psychological 'darkness' within a fatalistic Universe that cannot be overcome through action. The more the protagonist(s) tries to fight Fate, the deeper they thicker the fog will become and the darker the Night will become. Private detectives in films are, to me at least, Archetypes of the Modern Age: they are Searchers for Truth in an Existential Universe and represent Man, who lost his way in a Material World, where Salvation is nowhere in sight. The melodrama inherent in almost all of the Noirs I have seen, masks - and often undermines - this greater, fundamental aspect of these films. Most Noirs should be scored with requiems or, even better, Bressonian silence.

The reason that many superb films like Night Moves or Body Heat (both shot in colour) that have identical themes or plots or characters or metaphorical locales as many famous Noirs are not considered "Film Noir", is because of that lack of true darkness that films like He Walked by Night or Double Indemnity or Lang's Human Desire is due to to the picaresque 'colourfulness' that is engendered by shooting in colour (and on location). The attitudes of American Cinema (and life in the Global Village!) has only got darker in the last 45 years since the end of "Film Noir", yet the sub-genre (if it so be deemed) should still be recognised. Just because private eyes are no longer what they used to be, it doesn't mean that Film Noir is no longer a valid term for many films.

The search for Truth or Meaning or the struggle against of Fate in a hostile situation is a great theme for Cinema.

[viciousliar]

Alice in the Cities
The Elephant Man
Europa
In Cold Blood
Seconds
Paper Moon
Night of the Living Dead
The Last Picture Show
Manhattan

No one would say that those films would have been 'better' in colour: Why?

Curiously, Manhattan was shot in Technicolor but printed in black and white. Could anyone please enlighten me as to why and how the final look of the film benefitted from this most unusual approach? The cinematography is of course uniformly praised by the critics. Flixy, could you possibly give me a hint of what prompted the cameraman to make this choice?

[viciousliar]

Vicious I didn't know that, but it can't have been Technicolor as the US Techni lab shut down in 1974 (and the British and Italian labs a few years later.) Presumably it was an Eastmancolor process, then desaturated. I guess this idea originated with Allen.


Another interesting if not entirely successful experiment in Technicolor jiggery pokery is Huston's Reflections in a Golden Eye which was shot in "full strength" Techni but then desaturated to a golden tone with full color only exploding onto the screen in the final scene with Liz and Brando. This version was only released for a couple of weeks in New York and Los Angeles with the movie's prem in 1967 (I saw this print in NY on my first trip there as a schoolkid), and it was subsequently withdrawn and went into general release in full color.

Is this OT or what??

Oh, I LOVE when you share stuff like this, Flixy. It really makes my day!! Reflections in a Golden Eye's ending must have appeared even more effective when Taylor did that wonderful screaming act. I so envy you for having seen the premiere version.

Re the case of Manhattan - that was something I read in a film magazine (Sight & Sound, perhaps) quite a while ago. The only online "evidence" I could find is a link that is out of date now. It's the tenth entry here http://tinyurl.com/d3ms8.

[viciousliar]

Yes Liz definitely inherited Queen of the Screamers mantle from Fay Wray.
(Have you seen X Y and Zee??)

(And she's a saint for being the only one to stick by Rock Hudson.)

XYZ - yes I love that one, a sort of rehash of the bitch persona she displayed in Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf?. She's in ill health now, practically living as a recluse - suffering from a serious heart and lung failure that develops slowly. She was the one who got the entire AIDS research funding going, even before Hudson exited the closet. That woman has a heart of gold.

[viciousliar]

Now that you mention it, Flixy, I did get a bit carried away last night. The effect at the end of Reflections must have appeared very obvious indeed.

That line from Taylor is priceless, implying it could pass as ladylike to cut one nipple off - but that was the absolute limit! ROFL!!
I have to say that Brando was much better casting than the original choice, Montgomery Clift.

Now, please tell me, how exactly did Huston manipulate the Technicolor in Moulin Rouge, and why don't you like the overall effect? I personally find it gorgeous...and I've heard a lot about the tricks Huston employed, but never actually what they consisted of...

One last thing, Flixy, have you seen the absolutely HYSTERICAL Boom! I laughed so hard my stomach hurt, talk about camp candy!! And sooo pretentious to boot, adding immensely to the entertainment value!! =P~
Curiously Noel Coward turns in a quite credible performance, but he works in a vacuum...

[Gordon]

Now, please tell me, how exactly did Huston manipulate the Technicolor in Moulin Rouge, and why don't you like the overall effect? I personally find it gorgeous...and I've heard a lot about the tricks Huston employed, but never actually what they consisted of...

He and DP Ossie Morris used fog-filters, smoke, coloured gels on the lights. When, after a few days shooting, a few minutes of dye-transfer footage was shown to the Technicolor supervisors, they were shocked at the results and demanded that the film be shot according to the standard Technicolor standards; Huston turned to Ossie and said, "Whadda, ya think, kid?" and Ossie said that it looked great; Huston turned to the Technicolor fascists and said, "Gentlemen, fuck you!" and they both walked out and the final results were one of the greatest colour films of all time.

[Matt]

Wasn't the odd color effect meant to mimic the physical effects of excessive absinthe consumption? Or maybe I'm thinking of some other film.

Remind me to spin this off into its own thread.

[Gordon]

Huston's intent was to film Moulin Rouge, "as if Toulouse-Lautrec directed it" and he and Ossie Morris worked towards this end, though is was a difficult production, though in his biography, Morris speaks of it as a wonderful process.

Remind me to spin this off into its own thread.

You could actually have a fascinating discussion on Ossie Morris alone, as almost every film he shot had unique cinematography and/or lab processing techniques. Fiddler on the Roof was shot with a light brown pantyhose over the lense for the whole shoot! Everyone goes ga-ga over Storaro, but Ossie was experimenting and creating highly unique palettes almost two decades before Il Conformista. But even in addition to that, he shot some beautiful black and white films in the 60s - The Entertainer, Lolita, The Pumpkin Eater, The Hill. Even on lousy films like The Wiz, his work is a joy to watch.

[Anonymous]

Gordon cited some excellent examples of creative and expressive use of color up there. But let's not forget John Ford and Winton C. Hoch, who used color so perfectly in THE SEARCHERS and THE QUIET MAN. Also, there's BARRY LYNDON, Paradjanov's SHADOWS OF OUR FORGOTTEN ANCESTORS and LE MÉPRIS, as well as a couple of films by George A. Romero and Martin Scorsese. Lately I can only remember three examples of interesting use of color: Luhrmann's MOULIN ROUGE!, Romero's LAND OF THE DEAD and Scorsese's THE AVIATOR. In the latter, Scorsese deliberately tried to pay tribute to two-strip Technicolor in approximately the first half of the film and three-strip in the second. Alas, he was unable to achieve that look without digital technology.

[MichaelB]

There's also Dario Argento's Suspiria, one of the last films to be shot in old-fashioned three-strip Technicolor, and which makes terrific use of deep reds and blues - I've been lucky enough to see it twice in 35mm, though sadly I had to wait for the Anchor Bay DVD before I got to hear the soundtrack in anything other than mono.

In fact, a great many thoroughly disreputable Italian films could easily be cited in this thread, starting with much of Mario Bava's output.

[Gordon]

Suspiria wasn't shot in 3-strip - it was shot on Eastmancolor and the original Italian release prints were dye-transfer. In any case, was shot with Technovision cameras, which have unique configurations that would have been incompatible with 3-strip cameras. It's a myth that has been perpetuated throughout the film's life - even on the Anchor Bay DVD - but it isn't true, unfortunately.

[Anonymous]

Oh yes, one shouldn't forget the Italian horror cinema. Most of Mario Bava's color films could be listed here, particularly BLOOD AND BLACK LACE and KILL, BABY... KILL!

And Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg's PERFORMANCE, as well as some of Ken Russell's stuff.

[MichaelB]

Suspiria wasn't shot in 3-strip - it was shot on Eastmancolor and the original Italian release prints were dye-transfer. In any case, was shot with Technovision cameras, which have unique configurations that would have been incompatible with 3-strip cameras. It's a myth that has been perpetuated throughout the film's life - even on the Anchor Bay DVD - but it isn't true, unfortunately.

Well, it's not entirely untrue - you're right about it being shot in Eastmancolor, but it was intended from the outset to be printed in dye-transfer Technicolor, with cinematographer Luciano Tovoli deliberately lighting to exploit colour effects that come across most effectively in the process.

Oh, and while we're on the subject of twisted melodramas set in remote and vaguely disreputable Mitteleuropean academies, Guy Maddin's Careful definitely belongs in this thread.

[miless]

I'm surprised no-one has mentioned the beautiful cinematography from Christopher Doyle for Wong Kar-Wai... particularly In The Mood For Love.
My personal favorite color cinematography is by Sven Nykvst with Tarkovsky's The Sacrifice (the color reduction is splendid) Bergman's Fanny and Alexander and Polansky's The Tenant.

I also really enjoyed the beautiful visuals in The Return (the russian film, not the crappy jap-horror-remake).

Fellini is also worth a mention here (just look at the Criterion re-relase of Amarcord or Juliet of the Spirits). I am also a big fan of the cinematography of Sacha Vierny (Belle du Jour, Belly of an Architect, etc..) and Harris Savides (particularly Van Sant's Gerry, Elephant and Last Days)

[Gordon]

Which part of my statement wasn't "entirely true", Michael? I state that Suspiria was wasn't shot in 3-strip, but that the original Italian (and perhaps other European countries) prints were dye-transfer. The U.S. prints were by DeLuxe. There is no falsity in my statement!

[portnoy]

Sirk was one of the great color stylists of the cinema - he was very conscious of how gaudy Eastmancolor stock could look in the 1950s, and his pictures are overwhelming in their use of colors (especially reds and yellows) accordingly.

I believe there is (or, at least up to the mid 90s was) one last existing three-strip Technicolor processing house - in Shanghai, hence the unbelievable color in Fifth Generation films like RAISE THE RED LANTERN and YELLOW EARTH.

[Fletch F. Fletch]

One of my favorite cinematographers is Darius Khondji. His work and use of color in The City of Lost Children is incredible, so vibrant and really enhances the fantastical elements. And then the absence of color in a lot SE7EN is equally impressive, creating this very effective oppresive atmosphere. I also like his work on The Ninth Gate -- the use of earth tones and lighting to create a, at times, almost noir-ish vibe draws me in every time.

I remember reading an interview with him around the time SE7EN came out in an issue of Sight and Sound and he mentioned that his dream project would be a 16mm b&w adaptation of On the Road. Oh man...

[Gordon]

I remember reading an interview with him around the time SE7EN came out in an issue of Sight and Sound and he mentioned that his dream project would be a 16mm b&w adaptation of On the Road. Oh man...

Well, the Jose Rivera scripted, Walter Salles directed - the makers of The Motorcycle Diaries - film, which seems to be in pre-production limbo at present, is apparently going to be shot in black and white. Coppola is the producer. Now, is this a film that fits with the times? Isn't there a danger of people - even those who have read the novel within the last 40 years - saying, "Hasn't this been done before?". How could it possible appear 'fresh' or have cultural penetration? Think of the countless films that took the gist if the book as the foundation of their narrative. I tried to read the book last year and I found it hard-going and at no point did I think that it would make an interesting movie - and I do that with almost everything I read, be it factual History, bio or autobiography - even philosophy, in asking: How could these ideas be presented visually? But with On the Road, it was like reading Pygmalion - an conceptual story which has been filmed in many forms: straight drama; comedy; musical and offensive 'modern setting', ie. Pretty Women (shudder). It sometimes seems that we are in an age where books that were previously deemed as being 'unfilmable' are now being considered for production, regardless of how relevant those books now are. Don't get me wrong, Kerouac's book was a landmark in post-war literature, but what it inspired has overshadowed it and as far as I am concerned, those fruits that it bore were predominantly sour and so going back to the root might only depress - an American that no longer exists, that land of freedom, open highways, of optimism, a land where a better future may have been furnished. But it was not to be.

[Greathinker]

Interesting thread. I've been thinking about this question ever since I read something by Tarkovsky, saying he was afraid, or it was undesirable, to shoot colour films because they are inherently expressive, whereas black and white films are not. I've nothing to say at the moment but it's a shame its not given more consideration.

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

Im pretty sure the Techni facility is in Beijing.

It was in Beijing. It closed in 1992 or '93, depending on the source. From what I've read there was another, older facility in Shanghai that did three-strip IB prints via a Technicolor-like Soviet process (as opposed to the Beijing facility, which apparently used genuine Technicolor equipment). I don't know what became of that one. Technicolor themselves deployed a three-strip IB process of some kind in the mid '90s, which was used for a handful of films -- including reissues of The Wizard of Oz and Gone With the Wind -- and then dropped when Thomson bought out the company. There's also one dye-transfer print of The Thin Red Line, which has been screened a few times and must be a sight to behold...

[Fletch F. Fletch]

Well, the Jose Rivera scripted, Walter Salles directed - the makers of The Motorcycle Diaries - film, which seems to be in pre-production limbo at present, is apparently going to be shot in black and white. Coppola is the producer. Now, is this a film that fits with the times? Isn't there a danger of people - even those who have read the novel within the last 40 years - saying, "Hasn't this been done before?". How could it possible appear 'fresh' or have cultural penetration?.

Well, I think that "cultural penetration" is completely irrelevant. The problem any filmmakers face trying to adapt this book (as with other beloved and famous books like, say Catcher in the Rye) is that you're doomed from the get-go because everyone has their own perception of what the characters look and act like, etc. So, it's bound to disappoint because of that. But who knows? I really liked what Salles did with The Motorcycle Diaries, capturing the road movie aesthetic quite well and Coppola's Rumble Fish felt very much like a Beat Generation vibe like something out of a Kerouac novel so maybe they can do it.

Think of the countless films that took the gist if the book as the foundation of their narrative. I tried to read the book last year and I found it hard-going and at no point did I think that it would make an interesting movie - and I do that with almost everything I read, be it factual History, bio or autobiography - even philosophy, in asking: How could these ideas be presented visually?

Very easily, I think. Kerouac was a very visual writer and, in fact, On the Road was really just another draft of his masterwork, Visions of Cody which is almost purely description and virtually no narrative at all. He spends pages and pages describing things he sees and people he encounters. A smart filmmaker would incorporate elements of both books in an adaptation of On the Road as Kerouac clearly saw them as part of a bigger story.

Don't get me wrong, Kerouac's book was a landmark in post-war literature, but what it inspired has overshadowed it and as far as I am concerned, those fruits that it bore were predominantly sour and so going back to the root might only depress - an American that no longer exists, that land of freedom, open highways, of optimism, a land where a better future may have been furnished. But it was not to be.

Well, I think that the book is relevant for the sheer fact that it continues to stay in print so someone must dig it to keep it on shelves year after year. If anything, in this current depressed climate filled with war, unemployment, etc. we need a bit of hope and optimism and what better way than a film about the love of and endless possibilities of the open road? Something that inspires people to take cross-country trips every year.

[Cinetwist]

Re: Kerouac and On the Road. Young people still find this book to be inspiring and the maasterpiece it is. I read it a couple of years ago and lent it to a friend (he never gave it back). Today I bumped into that friend at my university in the cafe. He was reading my copy of On the Road again. The book endures and is an extremely visual experience, even if the characters in the book (and probably Kerouac) don't like cinema.

[Fletch F. Fletch]

The book endures and is an extremely visual experience, even if the characters in the book (and probably Kerouac) don't like cinema.

Actually, Kerouac was a fan of cinema... If memory serves, he even mentions going to see Citizen Kane somewhere in Visions of Cody. However, he was not crazy about the adaptations of his work into movies. A movie version of The Subterraneans was made and he hated it.