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Great in Black & White

AH,

B&W has an amazing quality that of reinforcing the abstraction and artificiality of movies. When it is well done, there is a sense that colour would somehow disrupt an important part of the atmosphere. Just a few movies that would be destroyed by colour:

"The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" - and sound would ruin this movie!
"Nosferatu" 1922- compare the much less fightening Herzog colour remake
"Son of Frankenstein"- the dramatically shadowed expressionistic sets
"The Third Man"- the B&W communicates the bleakness of post-war Vienna
"The Wizard of Oz"- the B&W communicates the bleakness of pre-war Kansas
"Touch of Evil"- one of the best photographed movies
"Manhattan"- the B&W communicates the bleakness of Woody Allen's emotional life
"Stranger than Paradise"
"Pi"- the very hard, high contrast B&W suits the inner tension of the main chcarcter

Films that I would like to have been in B&W:

"Fanny and Alexander"- I would do this reverse to "Wizard of Oz" where the film becomes B&W after the father's death
"Tout les Matins du Mond"

These definitely acquire much of their qualities from the B&W.

After I post this, I will think of a hundred more.

B&W is like a magic window that reminds us we are looking through a frame to a remote world.

Cheers,

Bambi B


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