Why do they make black & white films?

Denerick

I'm just after watching the excellent 'Somerstown' by Shane Meadows and one question dogged my mind. WTF is with the black & white? What does that add to the cinematography? How does that add to the mood and/or artistic depth of the film? I see other rather good film makers adopting this style with 'arthouse' films and it never ceases to seem silly and perversely pretentious.

So what is going on, and what, if any, is the artistic motive behind this?

johnny_ultimate

Various reasons. It can lend a film a nostalgic and old-fashioned atmosphere. It can be a statement of simplicity - a simple story simply filmed. In terms of cinematography it has very distinct strengths, such as being able to capture lights and shadows in a very different way than colour film. It could also be a challenge for the filmmakers - tackling a different visual style would surely be of interest to a cinematographer bored with grimy digital photography.

Mostly, it just looks pretty.

Nolanger

Another problem is that most modern-day black and white films don't take into account the different shades of black/grey that the costumes and sets produce. The old Hollywood directors knew that actors wearing purple coats and yellow trousers produced different hues of black. That's why the older movies look like 'proper' black and white films while most of today's ones look like arty ****!

sxt

It works wonderfully for the film ,"The White Ribbon" (2009), by Michael Haneke, which is one of the best contemporary movies you will see that is shot in Black and White.

If the subject matter is appropriate. Transitioning from dark/gloomy to light/bright to intense bright etc. has far more dramatic/narrative effect than multi color in my opinion.

johnny_ultimate

A lot of people see black & white as inherently 'past it' which is such a shame. You have to remember that there was the best part of seven or eight decades where black & white was the only option realistically open to film-makers. Like silent film (look at the achievements of silent film in a very short period of time - imagine what would have happened over the next decade if sound didn't come along and steal its, ahem, thunder! Classics like Sunrise or Battleship Potemkin still look and flow astonishingly well today), it developed its very own visual language during that time, and it's why so many filmmakers were reluctant to abandon it well into the 1960s. The stuff cinematographers were doing with b&w well after the advent of colour is mindblowing stuff - the cinematography in Persona by Sven Nykvist is one of the main reasons it is one of my favourite films. It took a lot of time for 'young' colour film to catch up black & white in terms of freedom and quality - barring the biggest budget Cinemascope epics, it was just way too expensive to make the best out of it. Ironically it's the opposite today - anyone can make a colour film cheaply, but a budget would begin to struggle if b&w stock is decided upon.

If you really want to see the strengths of black & white, I'd recommend watching any classic Hollywood film. There's a very distinctive way they used to 'light' people's faces in close-up, usually females. You can spot it a mile off, and it's just wonderfully cinematic. Distinctive lighting is definitely a casualty of colour cinema (still can astound in the right hands, of course).

Denerick

I don't share this love for the black & white. I've watched a fair few films made before 1960 and I have to say I've always liked the films in spite of the cinematography and acting (Invariably tacky, cheesy, irritating, and belonging to an earlier time) Call me a philistine, but the people who elevate very average early films as some kind of artistic bravado are fooling themselves. Films, like novels before them, were a cheap and silly entertainment force before they became more meaningful and artful as time progressed.

johnny_ultimate

Denerick wrote: »

Call me a philistine, but the people who elevate very average early films as some kind of artistic bravado are fooling themselves. Films, like novels before them, were a cheap and silly entertainment force before they became more meaningful and artful as time progressed.

No, I'm not fooling myself, and I'm sure the plethora of other film fans out there aren't either. Black & white photography was crucial in bringing cinema to where it is today, and the film-makers working in the earlier days of cinema were far fonder of experimentation and rule breaking than most today. The best classic cinema still has the ability to enthrall - anything by Wilder, Kurosawa, Bergman, Ozu, Truffaut, Eistenstein, Murnau, Lang: the list goes on. These films are as 'meaningful and artful' as the most 'meaningful and artful' films of today.

This isn't me being pretentious: I genuinely feel few modern films have had the profound effect on me something like Rashomon has. Sure, certain elements age, but there's something captivating about classic cinema, and for me there always will be. To write off black & white is to write off a majority of cinema's greatest achievements, and IMO you're doing yourself a serious disservice in the process.

Not for you? Fair enough. But it's unfair to presume anyone who likes a b&w film is just doing it out of some misguided snobbery.

Denerick

I'm simply asserting a rather obvious truism. Whilst the novel had some early artistic highs (Cervantes, Swift etc.) it didn't properly bloom until the late 18th century. It was, and still is in some quarters, regarded as a trivial waste of time for air headed young women (Think Twilight/chick lit) This is not disputable. Although I'm sure in 50 years time we'll be inundated by people who claim Twilight as a pinnacle of 21st century literature (Mainly by virtue of it being old) I think it is more reasonable to suggest that what was trivial and primitive then is trivial and primitive now. I think people instinctively like to think that something 'early' or 'experimental' was intrinsically worthy, a flawed assumption I fear and one that is bound to result in misjudgement. But to each his own I suppose.

I should also underscore that I have enjoyed some pre 1960 films, but that is usually in spite of the primitiveness of the art form, not because of it.

Fysh

If you cannot see the art and skill involved in films like The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, Battleship Potemkin, Nosferatu, or Metropolis, I'd suggest the common factor concerned is not the films but the viewer.

Filming in black & white is like any other technique; used well by the right cinematographer it can have exceptional results, but used poorly by someone who doesn't really know what they're doing it can have abysmal results. Claiming there's an unarguable and objective standard that applies to all black & white film is just daft.

Denerick

Fysh wrote: »

If you cannot see the art and skill involved in films like The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, Battleship Potemkin, Nosferatu, or Metropolis, I'd suggest the common factor concerned is not the films but the viewer.

Filming in black & white is like any other technique; used well by the right cinematographer it can have exceptional results, but used poorly by someone who doesn't really know what they're doing it can have abysmal results. Claiming there's an unarguable and objective standard that applies to all black & white film is just daft.

Ah. I'm glad to see that you're content to have an argument built upon strawmen. Very well then, argue away with my misrepresented arguments as you will. I didn't suggest that no film before 1960 is any good, I'm arguing that the art and the tools at its disposal where primitve and therefore incomplete and lacking as compared with films produced in its maturity. I'm arguing that films evolved naturally and became more sophistaced over time. And yes, Battleship Potemkin is a load of **** by modern standards.*

*And before you go off on one I'm not referring to blockbusters and Hollywood extravagansa's - the penny dreadfuls of our day - but some of the more cerebral flicks produced by less 'well known' directors.

Fysh

Denerick wrote: »

Ah. I'm glad to see that you're content to have an argument built upon strawmen. Very well then, argue away with my misrepresented arguments as you will. I didn't suggest that no film before 1960 is any good, I'm arguing that the art and the tools at its disposal where primitve and therefore incomplete and lacking as compared with films produced in its maturity. I'm arguing that films evolved naturally and became more sophistaced over time. And yes, Battleship Potemkin is a load of **** by modern standards.*

*And before you go off on one I'm not referring to blockbusters and Hollywood extravagansa's - the penny dreadfuls of our day - but some of the more cerebral flicks produced by less 'well known' directors.

Films, like all other art, will reflect the culture in which they are created. Given the comparatively high technological requirements for filmmaking, and the developments that have occured since the advent of cinema, I don't see the point in dismissing given phases of film history as being intrinsically immature or primitive, because there are plenty of examples of sophisticated storytelling from any given phase, which will use whatever techniques were available and best suit their narrative requirements.

The language of film depends on what techniques and technology are available at the time, but access to more advanced technology does not guarantee better film-making. I don't agree that film's language was immature and primitive before the advent of colour, I think that colour is just another technical evolution that contributed to the ongoing development of the language. I've seen too many excellent old b&w films and too many crappy colour films to accept that a limitation of the language has somehow held filmmakers back until colour came on the scene.

Denerick

Its not a visual thing, its to do with sophistication. I don't particular care about colour one way or the other - apart from the fact that most directors in a modern setting who choose black & white do so because they think its retro or something, but whatever - its about the sophistication of the storytelling and the maturity of the craft. But I doubt I'm as big a film buff as some here are so I'll politely leave the room while I still can.

Hank_Jones

I'm just going to leave this here, it explains better than I ever could.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wwItkoapuA

krudler

I couldnt imagine watching Casablanca, or Citizen Kane, or hell, Sin City, in colour, it'd just be wrong. b&w is gorgeous when used correctly, see the colur vs b&w versions of The Mist for a perfect example, the b&w one looks much better.

johnny_ultimate

Denerick wrote: »

Its not a visual thing, its to do with sophistication. I don't particular care about colour one way or the other - apart from the fact that most directors in a modern setting who choose black & white do so because they think its retro or something, but whatever - its about the sophistication of the storytelling and the maturity of the craft. But I doubt I'm as big a film buff as some here are so I'll politely leave the room while I still can.

'Sophistication' absent in early film? I think you may be watching the wrong films. Let's look at the themes and issues addressed by some classic black & white cinema. Three pre-1960s (a decade you seem to focus on) examples off the top of my head:

1. Sunset Boulevard - a damning critique of the Hollywood system, and the sad plight of once popular 'idols' relegated to a life of loneliness and misery once their star faded.

2. Rashomon - a detailed look at the very nature of storytelling and subjectivity. A film that causes the audience to question the very nature of the 'unreliable narrator' and provides no easy solutions.

3. The Seventh Seal - a reflection on life, death and religion that utilises complex, iconic symbolism to make its rather complex points.

All these are entertaining films with far more bite (excuse the pun) than modern examples like Twilight (not that Twilight is by any stretch a good representation of the artform as it stands today). I actually feel more than a little ludicrous defending what are widely regarded as timeless classics. You bring up the concept of the novel - are modern novels automatically worthier and less 'primitive' because the author has access to a word processor? You cry straw man, but this is in essence the very suggestion you make by asserting that any film made in anything less than modern technology is automatically less worthy than a film produced in 2011.

"the art and the tools at its disposal where primitve and therefore incomplete and lacking as compared with films produced in its maturity." - your argument is applicable to every artform out there, then. You also make the assumption that cinema was not mature by the 1940s or 1950s. I'd wager many 'film buffs' would agree that a certain maturity was reached even decades prior to the Golden Age of Hollywood.

This is a very silly argument altogether: you started this thread asking the strengths of b&w. People replied with various reasons. You seem uninterested and instead insult them by telling them they are deluded for appreciating classic cinema (and yes, this suggestion is present in many of your posts).

And Battleship Potemkin is anything but **** by modern standards. It is the rare film that has the same intensity of editing, clarity of vision and passionate delivery of BP.

So in short I have to wonder why you posed the initial question "why do they make black & white films?" when you seem entirely uninterested in the response.

EDIT: And having just seen your response to a thread about the future of the written word, I think it provides an interesting contrast to your argument here:

Denerick wrote:

A kindle has its uses, I'm sure, but it can never replace the smells and the heft (The heft is a big one for me, I don't think I'm reading anything unless I can feel the weight in my arms...)

The technology is always improving, but even with a paper and a pen, a phone camera or a primitive black & white video camera, talented people will make great art.

krudler

All Quiet On The Western front is still better than a lot of more modern war movies,and thats 70 years old. same as something like Paths Of Glory, cinema was plenty sophisticated back when b&w was more widely used.

BostonB

I think they had to be more skill full in telling the story, in B&W and it focused people more on that. Of course it suits some films better than others.

Of course some films need colour. Lawrence of Arabia.

mike65

Just LOL.

bnt

Fysh wrote: »

Filming in black & white is like any other technique; used well by the right cinematographer it can have exceptional results, but used poorly by someone who doesn't really know what they're doing it can have abysmal results. Claiming there's an unarguable and objective standard that applies to all black & white film is just daft.

If you want to see an example of a modern B&W film that gets that right, I recommend The Man Who Wasn't There (Coen Brothers), cinematography by Roger Deakins and period props. Just to confuse matters - it was shot in colour and transferred to B&W.

Dermighty

The Man Who Wasn't There is worth watching. A modern film with big name actors but it's black and white.

Kess73

BostonB wrote: »

I think they had to be more skill full in telling the story, in B&W and it focused people more on that. Of course it suits some films better than others.

Of course some films need colour. Lawrence of Arabia.

Funnily enough the first time I saw that film was on a B&W tv in a holiday home at the very start of the 80's.:)

BostonB

Kess73 wrote: »

Funnily enough the first time I saw that film was on a B&W tv in a holiday home at the very start of the 80's.:)

Its still a great film and script. But the star of that move for me is the cinematography, and those sweeping vista's of the desert.

I remember TV switching to colour. I wonder is that why I love old B&W movies. I don;t think so though.

Da Shins Kelly

Denerick wrote: »

I'm simply asserting a rather obvious truism. Whilst the novel had some early artistic highs (Cervantes, Swift etc.) it didn't properly bloom until the late 18th century. It was, and still is in some quarters, regarded as a trivial waste of time for air headed young women (Think Twilight/chick lit) This is not disputable. Although I'm sure in 50 years time we'll be inundated by people who claim Twilight as a pinnacle of 21st century literature (Mainly by virtue of it being old)

Just thought I'd interject to point out that the idea of something being lauded simply because it's old very rarely happens in literature. The greatest works of literature are considered so because they are timeless and they are masterpieces. I think it is very unlikely that Twilight and the likes will be considered great works of art in the future. A cultural phenomonen? Maybe. A great piece of literature? No.

But that is off-topic. Sorry.

duckworth

If you have to ask the question...........

Miguel_Sanchez

bnt wrote: »

If you want to see an example of a modern B&W film that gets that right, I recommend The Man Who Wasn't There (Coen Brothers), cinematography by Roger Deakins and period props. Just to confuse matters - it was shot in colour and transferred to B&W.

Some studios will make people who want to release in B&W shoot in colour before making it Black & White in post so they still have a colour version to release in certain markets which just won't take black and white movies.

Wasn't The Mist shot with the intention of being released in B&W before the studio chickened out and made them release it in the cinema in colour?

RGDATA!

Denerick wrote: »

Call me a philistine, but the people who elevate very average early films as some kind of artistic bravado are fooling themselves.

what movies are you thinking of here though, that people are unnecessarily elevating? you surely can't be writing off all black and white movies because of the technical limitations of the time?
there were of course very average early films, but there were certainly early films that deserve to be elevated

edit:
incidentally, do you also apply this same logic to music?

facepalming at your comment about battleship potemkin being "**** by modern standards"

Eggy Baby!

They usually use it in film noir because its a throwback to that era; also it usually gives a film a bleak sort of feel- look at Schindler's List. Black and white was also used in that film to give a sense of age, it being set in the Forties. Definitely for nostalgia too.

durandal

If you take American History X as an example, the flashbacks are shot in b&w, which you could suppose is an attempt to convey visually Dereks' unenlightened world view at the time, things were literally black and white to him.