Posted on 02/12/2011 9:19:45 AM PST by JoeProBono
"There's been a recent debate as to the validity of black-and-white films. Many of the youngsters say, "I just don't get it." Well, don't feel like the Lone Ranger young children. Ted Turner has similar thoughts on the supposed curse of black and white.
Whether one would like to admit it or not, the greatest films in history, to include horror, science fiction, suspense and drama, have been made in the breathtaking anti-color of black and white. According to film director John Carpenter in his inventive opus They Live, the reason films are now in color is because of an invasion of aliens during the 1950s. Nice going John, for you are not far from the truth.
I have compiled an unquestionable list made up of the 20 greatest black and white films in the history of mankind. And mind you, I have added a bonus of five Honorable Mentions. For those of you unacquainted, this list is as good a place to start as any. Enjoy some of the greatest films ever made, and they are all in glorious black and white."
Orson Welles and Charlton Heston in Touch of Evil, 1958
Has anyone mentioned, “The Bad Seed”?
1) and 2) are all-time great movies. I guess beauty is in ther eyes of the beholder.
read
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
I really appreciate a war movie where the Germans speak German, the French speak French, etc.
The Bad Seed
Different types of craziness. I never cared much for the Marx Brothers, for example. Too clever by half, too much of the time.
Early Chaplin was the best, before he got sentimental he was cruel and hilarious, as in ‘Behind the Screen’ (the two screen shots above.)
I can’t take seriously a list that excludes Passion of Joan of Arc, or Brighton Rock, or Kind Hearts and Coronets, whilst having the temerity to call Portrait of Jennie “underrated”....
Passion of Joan of Arc,
Honorable mention - The Last Picture Show
The great cinematographers, instead of viewing it as a limitation, used it to heighten a certain mood and exploit light and shadow.
I agree with you. That's what I understood to be the author's point - not just that it was a great move AND it was in black and white, but that the director and cinematographer made use of medium of black and white to create moods, tell visual stories, and capture scenes that were enhanced by the use of black and white and would not have been possible with color film.
It's like trying to imagine Ansel Adams' "Moonrise, Hernadez, New Mexico" in color. It's a great piece of art because of the tonal qualities of the gray. It's why photographers chose to sprint on Ilford paper instead of Kodak: to capture the entire tonal range of gray.
Everyone's throwing out the names of good or great movies that just happen to be in black and white, but they aren't necessarily movies that took advantage of the black and white medium. Stagecoach would have been a better movie in color, with the red rock scenery. There was nothing magic about the use of black and white in that movie. The same goes for The Longest Day in my opinion. I could have been shot in color and been as, or more, effective. Or Harvey. They were great movies, but the fact they were shot in black and white did nothing to improve the movie.
The Seventh Seal could only have been filmed in black and white; Ingmar Bergman used black and white as a palette. The same goes for The Maltese Falcon and Treasure of the Sierra Madre. In one case, the use of shadow was integral - and you don't get that in color - and in the other case, the collapse into sweat and dirt that accompanied the loss of the human spirit could only have been captured in black and white. Casablanca in color? Don't make me laugh.
The same for anything film noir.
The point is that there are great films that happen to be black and white. Then, there are films that use the black and white medium to enhance the story through light and shadow, and human sweat and dirt, and silhouette. There are plenty of black and white movies with no real blacks and no real whites. Just grays. A lost cinematographic opportunity.
IMHO, I'd vote for Raging Bull (or The Deer Hunter) as the greatest American film of all time.
Robert De Niro Raging Bull
Good stuff!
:-)
Thanks G. I’ve seen very few of them, but I’m not going to say which one on the list I like very well. :’)
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