MovieChat Forums > The Sea Hawk (1940) Discussion > Color vs. B+W

Color vs. B+W

posted 18 years ago by t_rex_td
15 replies | jump to latest

For this type of movie, I much prefer the color version. There are alot of films i have no problem watching in B&W, such as Zorro, but the color transfer enhances the film's spectacle.

[–] deadlypen 18 years ago

I believe that Warners opted to make the movie in B&W because they wanted to use shots from both the silent and sound versions of 'Captain Blood', plus other seaborne movies; also they built two full sized ships (which moved on rollers inside a vast sound stage flooded to a depth of just a few feet - apart from deeper areas which allowed stunts like diving and jumping from deck level). When the cost of the ships and sound stage was added up (I think it came to over $2 million), Technicolor was well and truly ruled out by the budgetary limits on top of the technical preference for B&W.

[–] schappe1 17 years ago

They'd just made Elizabeth and Essex in color using the same sets and Black and White made them look just enough different to underscore that this was not the same film. Besides, it meant they could use the money to do other things, such as create that water-tank they used so well.

I think it looks fine in beautiful black and white, particularly the scene where Donna Maria arrives too late to prevent the Albatross from sailing.

[–] turtletommy 17 years ago

Oh yeah B&W worked great in The Sea Hawk- and indeed they used a lot of older B&W scenes from earlier (silent film) WB movies in the battle scenes to save some film reel.

[–] Rodger001 17 years ago

Kudos to the director and the cinematogapher. Every single frame is an individual work of art. Every frame of this film is gorgeous.

[–] turtletommy 17 years ago

The studio system sure gets its share of criticism but it sure did turn out some well-crafted art and entertainment. They were cranking out films right and left compared to more modern film's schedules but the art really didn't suffer. Curtiz was supposed to be just a hack studio director too!

[–] liscarkat-2 14 years ago

If you have to have black and white explained to you, you'll never understand.

[–] Pegasuspizza 14 years ago

Agree. It's drearily predictable, when one looks at the Profile and past Postings, of someone that sees nothing wrong with Colorizing a Black and White Masterpieces...Their other film postings are almost inevitbably a expose on the fact that the Poster is some where in the 15-20 year old age bracket....
Let your imagination do the rest..............
Or better yet....think in terms ,,when they were Three, they thought that Peanut Butter and Jelly was gourmet food, and that "Scooby Doo" was the best thing they had EVER seen......Just go a bit further ( not much) down that evolutionary road...and you'll understand......

[–] egonzinc 14 years ago

I for one liked the B&W on this movie.
I thought it was well done and once in a while it is a nice chage of pace.
Too much of the shadows though, but in general I like this movie a lot and recently got it in an EF DVD set. Captain Blood next!

[–] gayspiritwarrior 12 years ago

What three-year-old doesn't like peanut butter and jelly? Ridiculing someone for disagreeing with your opinion is juvenile in the extreme, and all the worse if you're numerically an adult.

"The value of an idea has nothing to do with the honesty of the man expressing it."--Oscar Wilde

[–] rctc595 14 years ago

I haven't seen this in decades. Watching it in BW, I could never see it in color. The version on TCMHD is amazing, even with a few parts that seem grainy.

Adventures of Robin Hood was on earlier and the colors were so over the top it was almost unwatchable.

I think I can safely say they don't make them like this any more.

[–] jstang411 14 years ago

I think I can safely say they don't make them like this any more.

Can't argue with that.

I far prefer the original B&W over the colorized version.

No idea whether I would have liked it better if it had been shot in technicolor at the time. Would have to see that version to decide, but I'm pretty sure I'll never get the chance.

[–] turtletommy 14 years ago

The Sea Hawk may have been fine in color but I agree that after seeing The Adventures of Robin Hood in that exceedingly garish Technicolor treatment it may have lost some of the grittiness and atmosphere that I feel b&w and sepia enhanced. Flynn would have again had his costume accented with sparkles/rhinestones like in Robin Hood- ugh! He's supposed to be a man's man not Tinkerbell.

[–] chungjose 13 years ago

As my wife and I were watching this (in black and white), I remarked that they should have sprung for color. I didn't know there was a colorized version available. I don't mind black and white, but the exotic locations weren't served well.

[–] turtletommy 13 years ago

What exotic locations? The studio backlot and LA area? Lol

[–] ScopeWatcher 9 years ago

The Sea Hawk may have been fine in color but I agree that after seeing The Adventures of Robin Hood in that exceedingly garish Technicolor treatment it may have lost some of the grittiness and atmosphere that I feel b&w and sepia enhanced.

I'll post here in this old thread to assert that three-strip Technicolor was not a "garish" process; and among the reasons for my thinking that THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD is among the few perfect films ever made, is the compelling quality of its Technicolor.

Although I have never watched ROBIN HOOD on either TCM or Blu-ray, I felt its DVD transfer was a decent attempt to translate the picture's original hues to video. However, the dye-transfer Technicolor process conveys a look -- an atmosphere -- that doesn't translate precisely to electronic display; on TV screens and monitors from any video format. The results are not the same, even for High Definition transfers. But someone who has never seen Technicolor except on a video screen has never seen how Technicolor really looks.

By 2015 it already has become increasingly harder and rarer for the general public to access screenings of any movies projected on actual film stock, let alone surviving, authentic Technicolor copies of pictures which were originally filmed and distributed that way. (The company abandoned that printing process in the USA, including for older films, as of January 1975.)

I was lucky enough to have been dragged, as a 20-year-old, to a 1974 screening of a true Techicolor print of ROBIN HOOD from the Warner Bros. studio lot. When afterward I told my better-informed friend that I had never seen a movie look like that before, he changed my life by explaining to me what three-strip photography and Technicolor printing were.

But as surely as films such as SUNRISE, THE WILD BUNCH, SLEUTH (the 1972 version), and THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD have been edged off IMDb's Top-250 list by the flood of votes for the latest of fresh, disposable, less-than-eternal new hit releases every weekend, more and more people who consider themselves informed film lovers (but who by direct experience know only digital projection) will dismiss what they think of as Technicolor as "garish," or other equivalent assessments. Too bad for them. I guess none of humanity's achievements will end up eternal after all.

HOWEVER -- since this is a message-board thread for THE SEA HAWK, I'll mention that even though I earlier claimed that THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD is a perfect movie, it's in fact Michael Curtiz' THE SEA HAWK that is my favorite swashbuckler and Flynn picture of all ... as well as one of the most beautiful films ever shot in sumptuous black and white.

Most great films deserve a more appreciative audience than they get.