The cinematography....

I've got the DVD version, and the print used on that is pretty good. Whatever you saw on TCM, it has to be leagues better than the 16mm version that was seen on TV until the early 90's (somewhere I've still got a VHS copy that was broadcast).

My "complaint" about the cinematography was out of Morris' hands, however. The script called for an inordinate amount of night location shooting (on the ocean in longboats, no less). Obviously, film speed was not fast enough in the mid-1950's to allow outdoor shooting in anything less than optimum lighting conditions, so Huston and Morris had to shoot these scenes day-for-night and, by today's standards when night scenes are actually shot at night, they look pretty fake. Still, that first scene of Moby Dick breeching in the night (done in a studio tank, by the way) is breathtaking.

According to some information included on a Laser Disc version of this film. Oswald Morris and John Huston invented a process to obscure the Technicolor in the film to give it the look of 18 Century photographs. I wasn't too impressed when I first saw it ether, but now that I know this, I can understand what they were trying to do.

Maybe the film does need some restoration, but as far as the coloring, that's the reason for it.