Glorious Technicolor

Now available on DVD, this documentary looks at the ups and downs of Technicolor and the importance of film milestones such as 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'; 'Becky Sharp'; 'The Black Pirate'; and 'Gone With The Wind'. It shows how colour in films grew from experiments in two-strip and three-strip bits to full-length mistakes, travelogues and total triumphs.

It makes interesting points about the fear of actresses that colour would remove their mystique (until Dietrich and 'The Garden of Allah' that is); about the constant interference of Natalie Kalmus ('creative consultant' on all Technicolor films); and about the eventual acceptance of the process as industry standard worldwide. The examples shown prove that the colour palette available to films in their heyday enhanced the 'golden age' - later films in Eastmancolor and the like look washed-out in comparison.

This is an interesting but pretty worshipful account of the company and some of the films made in the process. It mostly ignores the competition, especially that of the 1920s when Technicolor wasn't really all that good. It also slights the hand-painted features of the Silent era, which were often far more beautiful (and far more expensive) than the early color films. It's also hard on Natalie Kalmus, the meddling company "consultant". But for better or worse, Kalmus had something to do with what people like about some of these films.

The best parts are the backstage bits some of which I've never seen anywhere else. There's a stunning wardrobe test of Vivien Leigh and some color snippets of the Marx Brothers. They give time to "La Cucaracha", an early feature, which many accounts of color skip right past to "Becky Sharp". Also good are the excerpts of interviews with cinematographers. It would be nice if we got to hear more from these under-appreciated guys, especially since so many of the clips and trailers that get shown instead are in lousy shape. Many of these faded clips frankly seem like a bad way to celebrate Technicolor films, especially since the films themselves have often been restored to mint condition ("The Adventures of Robin Hood" is a fine example of this).

There's a brief section on the use of Technicolor in England. They ignore the 1940 "Thief of Bagdad" (maybe the best-looking English color production) and spend a lot of time on the somewhat overrated "The Red Shoes", which has only one good sequence. I think they also fail to mention that Huston's "Moulin Rouge", which for my money is still the most beautiful use of color in a film to date, was made in England. (The "Moulin Rouge" DVD looks a lot better than the trailer they include here.) The show covers a lot of ground, especially Vincent Minnelli for some reason, so some innovative uses of Technicolor are ignored, like "Nothing Sacred" and "Leave Her to Heaven" and Lubitsch's "Heaven Can Wait". The show also more or less stops with the films of the 1950s. Technicolor continued to be used into the 1960s and 1970s, usually with a less saturated look, as in "The Godfather".

This entertaining documentary is now available on Disk 2 of the 2003 re-release of The Adventures of Robin Hood. Angela Lansbury narrates a history of color in the movies. The emphasis is on the development of the Technicolor process. Clips of dozens of feature films and shorts are featured.

this is a great documentary about the history of Technicolor, the wonderful, lush color film process responsible for so many beautiful motion pictures. like Visions of Light for the history of film cinematography, this documentary shows you the early advances in the technology and has many striking scenes from a variety of Technicolor films. the only sad thing is that i saw this on TCM or AMC (the best things about cable tv), but i don't have cable anymore and really wish i could buy this, particularly if if there was a quality release on DVD!

This is a documentary on the history of Technicolor, starting right from the inception and through until recently. It consists of clips from films, interviews, rare footage of stars in two colors, stills and voice-over by Narration She Spoke. We see the progression(early on, flesh tones weren't deemed important! Instead, focus was on the backgrounds, set and FX) and the early skepticism... not only did people in the business not believe that we didn't want to hear the actors speak, they didn't think that it should go beyond black and white, either! Hearing from the people who experienced it first-hand(and some of them even worked with it, directly) is quite interesting, and any film geek will enjoy the one-hour running time of this. It's well-edited and thoroughly researched. If you aren't already into this subject, however, this isn't likely to win you over and get your attention. There is no offensive material in this, except for the old gender roles and the like... the one bit of strong language is carefully bleeped out. I recommend this to those who want to know about it. 7/10