On October 17, 2007 I wrote an entry called “This Movie Has Been Modified from Its Original Version” where I discussed pan & scan and the colorizing process. I also mentioned in my last entry that during my last crazy couple of months I’ve bombarded myself with projects, one of those was a Japanese short titled Yuki Star. In this entry I will follow up on October 17, because I’ve decided that Yuki Star will be in black and white.
It’s no secret that I love black and white movies, I love watching them and I love making them. My first feature The Meatball Story was shot in black and white. Yuki Star, I actually shot in color and only when watching the footage did it strike me that this movie belonged in black and white. As a filmmaker, with every project I do, I try to have fun by experimenting and doing something I’ve never done before. Like I said, The Meatball Story was shot in black and white, while in preproduction and development, my vision of the movie was for it to be in black and white, when I thought about the characters and the nature of the story, I could not picture it in color. So when we got on set, we shot it in black and white. With Yuki Star, while I was writing it and developing it everything was in color. In fact I wanted to give it the rich 70’s style color saturation. However, the day after we shot, I watched the footage and though there was nothing wrong with it, something felt off, it didn’t feel right somehow. I threw the first part of footage into Final Cut Pro and decided to cut a quick opening to the film—again it felt off in color. So I converted into black and white, I didn’t just dump a black and white filter on it, I really tinkered with it to get to look like I shot and lit it for black and white. After watching the same scene in black and white I smiled… this story wanted to be told in black and white.
If you were to throw a rock, you’d be more than likely to hit a black and white nay sayer. More often than not, when I talk to people about black and white they just scoff at me and ask me what year it is. Talk to people like that makes me wish the controlled public usage of nunchuks was allowed. Black and white photography is a form of expression, color is as well (just look at Wong Kar-wai’s use of color in his films). If you take the time to sit down and watch classic or modern films made in a black white medium, then try and imagine them in color, I am ready to bet it will not work (though Ted Turner, may fleas of a thousand camels infest his toupee, tried it and was almost smacked silly by so many people). I don’t know how to explain it better, but movies often times tell the filmmaker how they want to be told. When I watched the footage for Yuki Star, that’s what happened, the story, the acting, the camera work all screamed black and white to me. There are few movies out there that were shot in color and later converted to black and white. The Coen brother’s “The Man Who Wasn’t There” was shot in color, but was presented and released in black and white (ironically, except for Japan where it was released in color). Frank Darabont’s vision for his film “The Mist” was in black and white, but the studio got antsy and so it was shot in color and released in color—however, the 2 disc special edition DVD has both the color and black and white version of the movie, I’ve watched both and the black and white version is far more frightening than the color. It’s the exact same film, not added scenes nothing—one is in color the other in black and white. The color one looked hokey and cheesy, yet the black and white version sent shivers down my spine and the ending, to me, had a much stronger impact in black and white. That being said, black and white should be respected as its own form of expression and like color it is tool used to help tell a story, express a point or convey emotions.
Long live black and white cinema.
It’s no secret that I love black and white movies, I love watching them and I love making them. My first feature The Meatball Story was shot in black and white. Yuki Star, I actually shot in color and only when watching the footage did it strike me that this movie belonged in black and white. As a filmmaker, with every project I do, I try to have fun by experimenting and doing something I’ve never done before. Like I said, The Meatball Story was shot in black and white, while in preproduction and development, my vision of the movie was for it to be in black and white, when I thought about the characters and the nature of the story, I could not picture it in color. So when we got on set, we shot it in black and white. With Yuki Star, while I was writing it and developing it everything was in color. In fact I wanted to give it the rich 70’s style color saturation. However, the day after we shot, I watched the footage and though there was nothing wrong with it, something felt off, it didn’t feel right somehow. I threw the first part of footage into Final Cut Pro and decided to cut a quick opening to the film—again it felt off in color. So I converted into black and white, I didn’t just dump a black and white filter on it, I really tinkered with it to get to look like I shot and lit it for black and white. After watching the same scene in black and white I smiled… this story wanted to be told in black and white.
If you were to throw a rock, you’d be more than likely to hit a black and white nay sayer. More often than not, when I talk to people about black and white they just scoff at me and ask me what year it is. Talk to people like that makes me wish the controlled public usage of nunchuks was allowed. Black and white photography is a form of expression, color is as well (just look at Wong Kar-wai’s use of color in his films). If you take the time to sit down and watch classic or modern films made in a black white medium, then try and imagine them in color, I am ready to bet it will not work (though Ted Turner, may fleas of a thousand camels infest his toupee, tried it and was almost smacked silly by so many people). I don’t know how to explain it better, but movies often times tell the filmmaker how they want to be told. When I watched the footage for Yuki Star, that’s what happened, the story, the acting, the camera work all screamed black and white to me. There are few movies out there that were shot in color and later converted to black and white. The Coen brother’s “The Man Who Wasn’t There” was shot in color, but was presented and released in black and white (ironically, except for Japan where it was released in color). Frank Darabont’s vision for his film “The Mist” was in black and white, but the studio got antsy and so it was shot in color and released in color—however, the 2 disc special edition DVD has both the color and black and white version of the movie, I’ve watched both and the black and white version is far more frightening than the color. It’s the exact same film, not added scenes nothing—one is in color the other in black and white. The color one looked hokey and cheesy, yet the black and white version sent shivers down my spine and the ending, to me, had a much stronger impact in black and white. That being said, black and white should be respected as its own form of expression and like color it is tool used to help tell a story, express a point or convey emotions.
Long live black and white cinema.
