In a special feature on the DVD of "Last Picture Show," director Peter Bogdanovich says he made the movie in black and white at the suggestion of Orson Welles — mainly to get greater depth of field. As I was watching the movie, I found it almost impossible to imagine it in color, because of the time period and the setting, which Lois herself described to her daughter as being "so flat and empty."
And yet I've seen other movies involving bleak landscapes and content that were successful in color.
What did you think? Could color have worked? Would it really have changed the film in an important way?
("Sunset Boulevard" could have been shot in color, couldn't it have?)
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I don't think it would have worked as well if it had been in color. The film is set in the '50s, and being in black and white adds to the throwback feel. Gives the town sort of a "locked in time" quality.
You're right -- it is easier to imagine Sunset Boulevard in color than Last Picture Show.
Thinking about what movies looked like in the early seventies, I think color would have dated the film to that time. As it is, the film looks as though it could have been created quite a bit earlier or later than it was, which I think is a very good thing.
The black and white film was extremely sharp. There were times when certain scenes appeared even sharper than I thought they should. I thought it reduced the dreariness slightly in a way that lessened the visual impact (but only very slightly).
I agree that the b&w gave the movie a timelessness. With other movies set in the '50s, color sometimes heightens that bubblegum feeling of happy teens at the sock hop, which obviously would not have worked in "Picture Show." The bleakness might have been conveyed using color, but I think the b&w did it best.
I think the depth of field thing is really significant, too, because it relates to the layers of action in the town: the outside inactivity, the behind-closed-doors conflicts and relationships, the characters' motivations.
Bogdanovich did "Paper Moon" in B&W a couple of years later. It's Depression-era and also hard to imagine in color.
The sequel to LPS, "Texasville," which I suspect is pretty awful, is in color. Here's the imdb description:
Summer, 1984: 30 years after Duane captained the high school football team and Jacy was homecoming queen, this Texas town near Wichita Falls prepares for its centennial. Oil prices are down, banks are failing, and Duane's $12 million in debt. His wife Karla drinks too much, his children are always in trouble, and he tom-cats around with the wives of friends. Jacy's back in town, after a mildly successful acting career, life in Italy, and the death of her only child. Folks assume Duane and Jacy will resume their high school romance. And Sonny is "tired in his mind," causing worries for his safety. Can these friends find equilibrium in middle age?
Ugh, and what's with that nauseating picture of Jacy and Duane on the cover? The movie can't possibly be as lame as it looks.
I’ll give a dissenting voice here. Color would have worked if it was carefully controlled and compressed. Each setting would have a limited palette and low saturation but fairly high contrast. A small number of objects could have bright deep colors with Duane’s car being the most important one. This new bright object would show how beat and worn everything else is including the people. The depth of field could have been preserved by using bright light and small apertures. Thus there might have been more hot summer scenes and fewer winter ones.
Has anyone seen “Northfork”? It is an extreme case of limiting the palette of a color film to the extent that the sets, clothing, and props were mostly all gray tones.
I liked the black-and-white in part because of the odd sensation of watching '50s-era characters watch black-and-white films themselves. It enriched the feeling of a bygone era. At least, I'm sure "Father of the Bride" was actually black and white. I didn't know about the John Wayne movie.
I haven't seen "Northfork." I had the same concern about color as Erin, that it might look bubblegummy. I prefer the black and white, but the kind of color I was imagining was something like on HBO's "Carnivale," sort of rich and desolate at the same time. The lush interiors of the carnival trailers really stand out against the grungy, Dustbowl browns, like DW would have Duane's new car stand out.
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