I remember watching this film for the first time and loved it in Black and White, but after seeing It's a Wonderful Life in the new colorized version I think this film could be colorized with the same company. It would give a nice view of Washington in the 1930s when it was filmed.
shareI think Jimmy Stewart would hate that...This is from Who the Hell's In It by Peter Bogdanovich:
In the senators' offices, his hat quite literally in his hand, his overcoat by his side--it was wintertime--I saw Jimmy Stewart plead for help to preserve his life's work from being destroyed. He would explain that the colorization was extraordinarily distracting and severely altered the performances, the lighting, everything the director, actors and writers had spent their painstaking time achieving. "Just paint right over it!" He shook his head, and with a world of meaning in each pause, and the classic Jimmy Stewart intensity, he said, "It's...it's just...it's...terrible!"
Why should they colorize it? I honestly see no reason for it at all. It would ruin the integrity of the film, not to mention everything in our world today is in color, why do we need to mess with a perfectly good thing? In the end, a film is not about color or no color, it is about the story, the acting, directing, and everything else that goes into a film that makes it great. Color has no effect on the quality of a film at all. Why this need for colorization?
shareWhat a disgusting idea, I'm totally with Jimmy on this one, (of course). Some of the best modern films have been made in Black and White. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance was brought out in B&W when other films were in colour at the time. Schindler's List is a fine example of the use of B&W filmstock to create a certain atmospehere. Leave the old movies alone, they are works of art, or do you want to start correcting Rembrandts too?
"Which it will be ready when it's READY!" Preserved Killick, Master and Commander
As has been point out, both Capra and Stewart were not happy about colorization of IT'S A WONDERF LIFE some years back. Well, colorization techniques have improved over the years, so, wanting to upgrade my WONDERFUL LIFE DVD I purchased the lastest that features that film on two seperate discs. With my wife, we watch the colorized version for about forty minutes. It is much better than the earlier attempt, BUT its NOT right! All of the face tones seem to have the same color. At any rate, I finally stopped the color disc and went to the black & white version. The great black & white classics [CITIZEN KANE, HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY, LOST HORIZON, etc.], which must include MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON should be seen as they were created. Having recently viewed a High Definition copy of CASABLANCA, I can honestly say it would be exciting to see the classics upgraded to HD or Blu-Ray. Then we would see them in all of their glory!
shareAdd 12 Angry Men to that list. There's no reason for these films to be colorized, it won't add anything to them, it can't make them any better and it certainly won't make young people more interested in seeing them...
"Help! I'm being severely back-lit!"
You should be shot for wanting a colorized version. And Wonderful Life should have NEVER been colorized.
Leave the classics alone!
Sorry to burst your bubble, but colorization wouldn't give a "nice view of Washington in the 1930s when it was filmed". Only something filmed in color at the time could do that. Colorization is very, very ugly for a number of reasons, technically and artistically.
You think adding color *today* would give us an accurate vision of what D.C. looked like almost 70 years ago? I can imagine a technician at the colorization company saying to himself, "Hey, I think those leaves should be light green." How is that providing an accurate picture of the past?
Sorry for the rant, but I believe colorization (virtually all done without the consent of the original filmmakers) is absolutely vile. Colorizing a B&W film is only acceptable if that was the intention of the filmmakers in the first place.
If what you're saying is true...then I still don't care
Who says color is an upgrade from black and white? B/W is used for a reason.
shareNo...Never, it would ruin this great classic...leave it alone
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I think we should colorize it in a different way: remake it with Eddie Murphy playing every role
shareLOL!
shareBrilliant idea!
shareWell, I agree with the majority here....colorization, no matter how technically advanced, is a modification of the original art. I find it a violation of both the art and the artists who created it. I rank this up there with editing films to fit a time slot on TV, and pan & scan versions of films. All of these are butchery. What's next?.....let's see.....let's add 3D and some CGI to jazz things up so the kid's will watch it! If kid's need colorization to be induced to watch a film, they probably won't get the value of the film anyway.
The only change to a film I agree with is a director's cut, which usually restores a film to the director's original intent. And then I like to see this on a DVD with the original theatrical cut for comparison. Too often, a film is cut at the direction of the studio executives to make it more commercially palatable (or so they think). Two examples: Kingdom of Heaven (Ridley Scott) and Dances with Wolves (Kevin Costner).... the director's cut of both of these films were a great improvement over the theatrical releases.
Colorized versions of B&W classics are as good as adding dialogues to silent films.
Colorizing a classic movie should be considered a crime.
Colorizing films is silly and only approved of by philistines.
As a photographer I can tell you that black and white films (similarly to black and white photography) are made totally differently from color.
Color filters are used over the lens to emphasize, darken, lighten, increase or decrease contrast in certain areas. If you're not familiar with this; a green filter will produce a completely different image than a red filter in b&w photography for example.
Also as it states above, the lighting is meticulously set up to create particular moods. Colorization just obliterates the whole image.
The only place colorization seemed a good idea, was before color film existed. And hand painting b&w photos was the latest craze.
Someone above stated the same shade for everyone's faces. That's right. Colorizing human skin tones produces the most appalling sight. If you ever look at people's faces, they are many different colors. Just put a color photo in Photoshop (or other) and get the dropper tool to sample different parts of the face. You'll find blues and greens and everything, because people's faces (black and white) reflect the colors around them. (look at tennis players' green chins at Wimbledon!)
Even non reflected colors such as around the nose and eyes can often be different colors. Colorization is like a two year old painting over mom and dad's wedding photos!
(And for a Brit, that's a LOT of spelling adjustments I just had to make! Did I miss any?)
"I have pills for everything. Some make you taller... some make you forget... "share
You must be nucking futs
The it is perfect the way it is.
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