spinalman

Wow, excellent work Alan....you were right: plenty of thunder left. can you apply your talents to the other long term quest - windyridge and appleby from "the Green Man"? see current thread
http://www.britmovie.co.uk/forums/lo...locations.html


Looking at the frame grabs....why is it modern views always look less appealing?

Paul

Ady

! !! ! ! ! Quite right , Paul. - I've been convinced ,for a long time now, that it's the sharp focus and fidelity of modern colour that seems to take the 'magic' out of a shot ( no to mention all the 4x4s parked in the gutter ).

For me, it's anthing in B+W at a location I could imagine being in - perhaps back in my childhood . Black and white emphasizes the fact that it's pre 1968'ish.


Missenden 1957


Just clutching at magic I suppose.

Ady

PS68060

I was thinking the same thing just a few days ago. Our streets now look so crowded and cluttered, claustrophobic almost.

"Oh! Pete!"

tvden

at least years ago you stood much less chance of getting run over

Steve Crook

Au contraire. Well, 1957 possibly. As there was very little traffic (and no driving test), motorists used to steam through small villages at great speed, often knocking down a lot of people.

When the driving test was introduced in 1934 (with vehicle registration in 1903 which helped to identify offenders) the accident figures plumetted. Given the way we take pedestrian signals as for guidance only, there being no offence of jaywalking, road traffic accident figures remain remarkably low. A lot lower than in many other countries.

Steve

Ady

2007 / 1957 ( forgot to remove whitelines )

? - so is it the colour that makes it less appealing ? - I can't tell now !

stevie boy

brilliant sleuthing

alan gowdy

Agreed. Getting back to an earlier point, and one which I think these comparitive shots show, the different 'look' is partly down to the perspectives achieved with the prime lenses which film cameras used as opposed to the zooms that are on most today.

Automotivehistorian

The film was on again this afternoon. The collection of vehicles used was impressive...what appears to be an ex-GPO Morris J type with rubber front wings, Ford Zodiac, various Woleselys .... note the Lord Neilson Ice Cream Commer BF van.

PaulPlowman

I think the thing about B&W is that the physical composition of an image is what's important. A DP can move the camera around and play with lenses until he gets a pleasing composition. With colour, you can't really change the colour of things in the shot (once you're on-set), so you have to make the best of what's there.

When you get a director/DP who appreciates the importance of all aspects of the image (like, say, Peter Greenaway), I think colour is far superior.

...but then I'm a child of the colour-age, so maybe I would say that !? :)

<- Insert witty comment here ->
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DB7

I'd say somebody like Freddie Francis could achieve similar in b&w, but a far greater sense of atmosphere.

batman

I watched The Good German the other night, mainly 'cos it was billed as 'an homage to the noir films of the 40s' and was in black and white. While the film was very good and I enjoyed it, the cinematography looked like a colour film with the colours taken out. I have since found out that is how it was made, shot in colour and then changed to black and white in post production. There was none of the special atmosphere that real black and white cinematography has and they might as well have left it to be released in colour. Does anyone know if film schools still teach the art of black and white cinematography, or is it all colour these days?

Bats.

There are 31 excellent quizzes to bamboozle you on the Quiz Page. Just click on the 'Quick Links' icon and scroll down!

PaulPlowman

Erm... I think we're actually agreeing here. I was trying to say that I thought B&W was better, unless (and only unless) the Director/DP was as concerned with colour as every other aspect of the image.

For instance - I don't believe that any DP could have made Peter Greenaway's The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover look as good in B&W as it did in colour. Only because colour is obviously something which is important to Greenaway.

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Merton Park

To Batman

I also saw The Good German, but found it very disappointing. Clooney is a bit of a wooden actor as in Michael Clayton , and I thought the sets looked just that. They lacked realism. I had waited a long time to see it and was really looking forward to it , and then wondered why I bothered.

batman

I didn't really know of the film until last week when Mrs Bat mentioned it, she being a Clooney fan.

I had no expectations of the film and found it to be very enjoyable, if a tad predictable. Clooney was Clooney but I thought Tobey Maguire was excellent. The big disappointment for me was Cate Blanchett, an actress I admire. I felt she was incredibly wooden and failed completely to convey anything other than a vacant stare.

I agree about the sets, and this was something that I felt highlighted the lack of atmosphere of the b/w images. They also failed to match up very well with the real footage of post war Berlin.

I think if I had been looking forward to this for a while I could have been disappointed too.

Bats.

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