Didja ever notice – “movies that mix black-and-white with color” in film?

Posted by highhurdler on September 16, 2007

It’s been more than 40 years since the choice about whether to shoot a movie in color vs. black-and-white was a financial issue; subsequently, it became a matter of artistic choice. When color processing was in its infancy, two and three strip Technicolor sequences were inserted into some major motion pictures for effect, and the practice continued even after the technology maturated.

At one time, I could reel off a dozen or more B&W features films that contained Technicolor scenes, but just now I can only remember these few:

The Affairs of Anatol (1921), which was produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille, includes several experiments in color: some scenes are tinted (as were many silent films) and at least two appear to have been shot in 2-strip Technicolor.

The original Ben-Hur (1925) which, when it was later remade – with Charlton Heston in the title role – won the Academy’s top prize (e.g. the Best Picture Oscar), features several 2-strip Technicolor scenes: those with Jesus Christ, including his birth and the Last Supper.

These were the only two which I could recall before the release of the first full length 3-strip Technicolor movie – Becky Sharp (1935), featuring Miriam Hopkins in the title role – but I feel certain that there must have been many others.

Vogues of 1938 (1937) – though some will insist that the original version of The Women (1939) or even Ziegfeld Girl (1941) contains a Technicolor fashion sequence, this is the one that does. In fact, the entire movie is in color!

The Wizard of Oz (1939) – of course, which begins in B&W on a farm, features Judy Garland’s performance of the Oscar winning song “Over the Rainbow” and a harrowing tornado sequence before Dorothy “awakes” to find that she’s “not in Kansas anymore”.

The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945) – all the action was shot in B&W, but the living painting of the title character is shown somewhat dramatically in Technicolor.

The Secret Garden (1949) – after the children have surreptitiously tended to its previously neglected plants, the titled garden comes alive in full color (though the scenes outside its walls remain in black-and-white).

The Solid Gold Cadillac (1956) – a B&W movie till the very end, when the titled automobile appears in the final sequence (narrated by actor-comedian, radio personality George Burns).

Days of Heaven (1978) – much like TWOZ, the opening sequences of this one (which earned cinematographer Nestor Almendros his only Academy Award on his first of four nominations) are in black-and-white as well; it serves to emphasize the differences between the squalor of an industrial city (Chicago) and the beauty of the wide open spaces in the Southwest (rural Texas).

What other classic movies can YOU think of which mix “black-and-white with color”?

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21 Responses Didja ever notice – “movies that mix black-and-white with color” in film?

Posted By White Rabbit : September 16, 2007 1:30 pm

Famously, there's If…, Lindsay Anderson's English public school drama/fantasy.

Posted By moira finnie : September 16, 2007 3:34 pm

"The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945) – all the action was shot in B&W, but the living painting of the title character is shown somewhat dramatically in Technicolor"-HighHurdlerBoy, Highhurdler, you must've been a pretty tough youngster if you ever saw the sequence revealing the Portrait of Dorian in black and white or color and only found it "somewhat dramatic"! Personally, I'm glad that I didn't see this part of the film in color until I was an adult. As a kid, after seeing this movie, (where were my parents?), I couldn't sleep without the light on and the closet double checked most nights for at least six months. Are you sure there wasn't a color fashion show tacked on to The Women (1939)? I thought that it might've been one of those sequences that used to be cut, (mercifully, since the clothes were pretty ghastly, imho), when this movie was shown on tv and in theatres to allow for more commecials & to get more showings in the theatre. While I like to see films restored, putting the fashion show back in this one seems like one big bore to this fashion fugitive.Oh, there was a Disney movie blending animation and live action and color with b&w in the forties called The Reluctant Dragon (1941) with Robert Benchley too. Have we forgotten the imaginative use of color and its lack in Pleasantville (1998)?

Posted By Jenni : September 16, 2007 9:14 pm

Last year, I discovered Sergei Eisenstein's movie about Ivan the Terrible, at our local library. I am a history fan, so I rented it, and in one part of the movie, which is black and white, there is a burst of color when some men begin dancing a traditional Russian dance. When the dance is done, (it's quite a long scene), the movie returns to black and white.

Posted By Michael E : September 17, 2007 6:12 am

Agnes Varda's Cleo from 5 to 7 starts in color then reverts. I always enjoyed colored tints in movies. Many silents feature tinting, but a few later films do too, notably Mighty Joe Young and Portrait of Jennie. And let's not forget colored objects in more recent b&w films, like Coppola's Rumble Fish.

Posted By MDR : September 17, 2007 8:37 am

I probably should have used the word "rather" in lieu of "somewhat", eh Moira;-) Thanks everyone for the responses thus far! Per my opening paragraph, I was primarily trying to remember older B&W films that contained Technicolor sequences, else I would have included (e.g.) Schindler's List (1993) – the girl in the red dress – on my list.

Posted By Ken Loar : September 17, 2007 9:44 am

Let's not forget the party scene in the original "Phantom of the Opera"?

Posted By Frostbite : September 17, 2007 3:26 pm

Ray Milland popping into color for the dance scene in "Irene" works for me. Oh ya, Anna Neagle is in the scene too. ;)

Posted By YancySkancy : September 18, 2007 3:32 pm

I suppose the passage of 27 years makes this qualify as "older:" the color home movies in Raging Bull.

Posted By Soundpropeller : September 18, 2007 10:31 pm

I love the silent era, and especially some of the early groundbreaking and experimental films like the Melies, but there is this one film by Winsor McCay in 1911, "Little Nemo" (based off of his comic strip character, famous since its introduction in 1905) that is a good, lesser known example of mixing color sequences and black and white. This short film combined live action and animation, and McCay hand colored the animated sequences, that is, hand colored them frame by frame. Though to watch it now, it may seem very simplistic and dated, and by todays standards, it's downright archaic, but in a historical sense, it can also still stand right alongside other great innovative films of the same era, and if you are familiar with the Little Nemo comic strip (reprinted nicely in the Fantagraphics book editions), the film is a bit more amusing.There are many other silent films that experimented with tints, sometimes in attempts to accent the mood of a various scene (some early horror films some to mind), but that could get to be a bit exhaustive, and I've already given quite an eyeful.

Posted By MDR : September 19, 2007 8:05 am

More great additions from our Morlocks readers, thanks! Yes, Soundpropeller, I also thought that a list of silents which simply used color tinting for effect would be too exhaustive. Thanks for the info about Little Nemo.

Posted By Jhickman : September 22, 2007 11:21 am

I didn't realize this until I saw it recently, but the title of the classic sci-fi movie Them is in red, although the rest of the movie is in black & white.Although it can't be considered classic yet, there's also Pleasantville, where as characters lose their innocence, they go from black & white to color.

Posted By Allen : September 24, 2007 11:10 pm

William Castle used a bit of color in The Tingler during the LSD scene. The bathtub is full of red blood.

Posted By Pax Romano : September 25, 2007 11:40 am

While it is a more current movie, Spike Lee's "She's Gotta Have It", which is filmed in black and white; has one scene where the main characters are at a park watching a dance number. I recall seeing this movie in a theater, and when that scene came on, it knocked me out of my seat.

Posted By Tom : September 25, 2007 7:50 pm

Death Kiss starring Lugosi, Manners, and Van Sloane has color gun shots in the climax.

Posted By rojen : October 25, 2007 12:43 pm

I might be imagining this, but I remember this as real (lol) When I saw "Wings of Desire", with its use of color and B/W, I loved a B/W scene where one of the characters passes by a pet shop window but the goldfish in the aquarium had color.In watching it later on TV (maybe the scene was cut?) and on VHS, the scene wasn't there or was all B/W, don't remember which. But it makes me wonder if I imagined it all or my mind's eye added the goldfish color in "post-production". Help me, lol………

Posted By MDR : October 26, 2007 8:27 am

I'm sorry I don't remember the specific sequence you've noted Rojen, but Wings of Desire (1987) definitely qualifies as a movie that mixes black-and-white with color.

Posted By Ian W. Hill : November 28, 2007 12:01 am

The film Rojen's thinking of is Coppola's Rumble Fish, which was mentioned above.Maybe the flash frame of red with the gunshot into tyhe camera at the end of Spellbound counts?

Posted By MDR : October 10, 2008 10:28 am

Jour de fete (1949), which aired last night on TCM, is a B&W film with color tinting of various features in the fair scenes: the flag, the top of the carousel, balloons, etc..

Posted By Lindsey : March 26, 2009 6:31 pm

There was a film in the late 70’s, early 80’s, that was about a boy and a girl that discovered long ago that a girl had fallen in a well on the property and died. One night, when the family of the two children are having a party, the ghost of the dead girl dances with the boy and instead of being black and white, she takes on color like a living person. Does anyone know what the name of this film was that i remember?

Posted By CineMaven : March 27, 2009 10:19 am

I would say “The Women” should be included among your list of black and white color films. The fashion sequence is in color. It kind of was a shock to go back to black and white after that.

But Paulette Goddard’s in the second half…and that brought me back to my senses.

Posted By MDR : June 11, 2009 3:25 pm

The Sam Fuller B&W thriller Shock Corridor (1963) contains at least three color sequences.

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