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AT JUST 2.1 SECONDS LONG, THE ROUNDHAY GARDEN SCENE IS CONSIDERED THE FIRST “MOVIE” EVER FILMED. IT WAS BY FRENCH INVENTOR LOUIS LE PRINCE. BUT IT WAS THE PUBLIC SCREENING OF A NUMBER OF THE LUMIÈRE BROTHERS’ SHORT FILMS IN PARIS IN DECEMBER 1895 THAT IS BELIEVED TO BE THE BIRTH OF THE MODERN MOTION PICTURE INDUSTRY. GREG LANDMAN REPORTS ON ITS DEVELOPMENT.

Technology is constantly changing the world around us. Consider if you will the changes that have happened in the last 50 years. Just in movies, the news reels preceding the main event are no more, the video industry came and went, superceded by the compact disc and also the Blu-ray disc. High-definition and even 3D have made the movie watching experience almost unimaginably lush and rich in detail – even celluloid film no longer exists. Almost everything is shot digitally. And that’s before considering how George Lucas and Star Wars with its special effects created its own world, one in which CGI – or computer generated imagery – has altered the entire business of movie making.

And it’s only been a little over 100 years that the world has been able to watch moving pictures! Wikipedia reports that in the 1890s, films were acts in vaudeville programmes or travelling exhibitions. Extremely brief – literally a minute or two long – they portrayed something from everyday life; a horse pulling a cart, a busy street in New York or London, a ship being unloaded, nothing of any great import but the novelty of watching a moving image was startling to those fortunate enough to view it.

But early adopters of this new technology grew the motion picture industry to where it is today, a multi-billion dollar worldwide industry. There’s the original Hollywood, and since imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, India has Bollywood and Nigeria Nollywood!

When the limitations of the filmic medium were restricted to black and white, that’s what the audiences got – black and white. And then along came sound in the late 1920s. By 1930 talking pictures saw a number of the smaller producers fall by the wayside because of the cost attached to this new medium.

Colour made its debut in 1932 but the first technicolour film was 1935’s The Vanities Fair. 85 years later and anyone with the right app and software on their mobile phone can make a movie! So why, with all this technology available, do some moviemakers and directors still choose the medium of black and white?

Possibly because this world we live in is one of light and shade and man has always been intrigued by the infinite varieties of colour – so stripping out all that visual stimulation is the challenge to directors. Strangely enough, the modern use of black and white is more expensive as labs

“Certain things leave you in your life and certain things stay with you. And that’s why we’re all interested in movies- those ones that make you feel, you still think about. Because it gave you such an emotional response, it’s actually part of your emotional make-up, in a way.” - Tim Burton

ABOVE: Betty Parker, played by Joan Allen, starts to become colourful in the 1998 movie Pleasantville. The concept is so alien in this 1950’s sitcom world that she applies grey makeup to fit in with her peers.

worldwide are geared to the colour process.

When it comes to black and white filmmaking there are some superb examples, from the early classics to some modern ones. The use of colour as a metaphor for enlightenment has also intrigued some filmmakers, notably in the 1998 film Pleasantville.

The story goes that David and his sister Jennifer are 1990 TV addicts who somehow are sucked into a rerun of a 1950 sitcom called Pleasantville. They find themselves in a squeaky clean world of the US in the ’50s, a world where nothing goes wrong and everyone is happy – all the time. David works out that they are now the characters

Bud and Mary Sue and while figuring out how to get back to their own world, they’d better play along.

Their way of living and thinking begins to influence those around them – they gradually begin to colour. The effect is riveting and makes a wonderful point as the viewers – and the protagonists – see the transformation. Naturally, some characters are afraid of what’s happening, but most embrace it. One of the most touching scenes is where their Pleasantville mother finds herself with more and more colour but is reluctant to reveal it to the neighbours. Bud helps her to apply grey makeup to hide her gradual metamorphosis, her journey to full enlightenment. Here colour is seen to be enhancing their lives.

One of the most famous uses of colour versus black and white is in the classic Wizard of Oz where Dorothy lands in mythical Oz after a hurricane and, as she opens the door of the house she was in, is transported into a magical beautifully coloured bright world. This is especially effective on a Blu-ray disc of the cleaned up version where the leaves have a shine never before seen in previous versions. And Mad Max: Fury Road – although filmed in colour was released in two versions on DVD by director George Miller; the other called appropriately Black and Chrome.

While the colour version is superb, the monochrome picture seems even more compelling with an edgy grittiness denied it in colour. Schindler’s List (1993) used targeted colour in a scene where a young girl wears a red coat while the rest of the film is in black and white, symbolising the sacrificial nature of the Holocaust.

Possibly the most acclaimed modern monochrome movie was The Artist (2011) which effectively used its black and white photography to evoke the era in which it was set, while the gorgeous soundtrack helped convey the spirit of the picture. Interestingly, although the film was presented in black and white, it was shot in colour! It was a controversial choice for the Oscars, winning Best Picture and Best Actor, but ultimately was embraced by the cognoscenti. It was the first black and white winner since Schindler’s List and the first almost all silent picture since 1929’s Wings. Director Michel Hazanavicius said: “We have made The Artist as a love letter to the silent era of Hollywood”.

Comedies that worked wonderfully in black and white include Young Frankenstein, Mel Brooks’ hilarious sendup of classic horror pictures, and Billy Wilder’s tenderly funny Some Like it Hot, in which the last line, when Joe E. Brown is told that Jack Lemmon is not a woman says “Well no-one is perfect” is one of the most quoted in movie lore.

ABOVE: Is it a long time ago and in a galaxy far, far away? Star Wars’ use of darkness and light, and special effects advanced movie making significantly.

South African actress Charlize Theron is central to the action in Mad Max: Fury Road. The commercial release was in full colour but director George Miller gained huge critical acclaim for releasing a second DVD version – in black and white which made the dystopian tale so much more edgy and grittier.

Others in this genre include The Apartment, Tim Burton’s Ed Wood and Stanley Kubrick’s brilliant satire Dr Strangelove with the genius Peter Sellers. Here too is Kevin Smith’s breakout 1994 comedy Clerks which was filmed in black and white because his budget (reportedly only $28 000) didn’t stretch to filming in colour.

No story like this would be complete without mentioning classics like Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane with its innovative techniques – like deep focus in which an entire scene is in focus, not just the foreground. Or Psycho with its terrifying shower scene in which Hitchcock used watered down chocolate syrup to get the real look of blood without colour, and Casablanca with its evocation of nostalgia.

And what about Sunset Boulevard which opens with a body floating in a swimming pool shot from below? Director Billy Wilder achieved this by placing a large mirror on the floor of the pool and then filming the images of the body and the cops in refection. Bette Davis and Joan Crawford had a ball in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane and Woody Allen made one of the best homages to New York ever in Manhattan.

Whichever way you look at it, the method a director uses to make his point only works if it is gripping and holds your attention from the get go.