This is topic South Pacific - What's with the colors?? in forum The Afterlife at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.


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Posted by Mark J. Marshall (Member # 1409) on 02-06-2010, 10:37 PM:
 
What a weird artistic decision. Between the yellows and reds and oranges and blues and what not, and the foggy lens that pops up sometimes... I dunno. Just weird.

I haven't finished watching it yet. Maybe tomorrow.
 

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Posted by Paul Linfesty (Member # 214) on 02-06-2010, 11:44 PM:
 
And the tragedy is that this was all done on set, not in the labs. Joshua Logan wanted to experiment with shots with the filters and then without. The studio said no, they could always remove it in the lab if it didnt work out. Well, of course they couldn't. The look was meant to capture the look of colored lights on stage, which was very bizarre, since they shot on location to NOT have it look like a play (although its still quite stagey. The film was knocked quite a bit by critics of the day for its lackluster pacing and acting, and yet it was was one of the biggest box office hits of the 50's.
 

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Posted by Paul Mayer (Member # 355) on 02-07-2010, 12:30 AM:
 
And it was the second film my parents worked on together - she, a dancer; he, a music editor. I still have the commemorative cast and crew book boxed up around here somewhere.

This is one I'll buy on Blu-ray someday.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 02-07-2010, 02:38 AM:
 
I did run a Mag/Optical of this movie in the early 70's - sounded excellent in classic 4channel stereo in a big house.

-Monte
 

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Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 02-07-2010, 04:47 AM:
 
I never could figure out the color thing either... always had a hard time getting through that movie cause of it. Just like watching a movie photographed by William A. Fraker... He used diffusion all the time to the point it gets annoying!
 

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Posted by Mark Lensenmayer (Member # 134) on 02-07-2010, 05:14 PM:
 
Those color changes ruin the movie for me. Todd-AO is best with clean, clear images, and those color sections look terrible.
 

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Posted by Bruce McGee (Member # 131) on 02-07-2010, 08:49 PM:
 
Remember, Nellie sings about the sky being a "bright canary yellow..."

The pan and scan version that used to play on local TV really stank when the colors started bouncing around like they did. It doesent look as bad in widescreen.

One local engineer at a PBS station in Tennessee actually requested a replacement print when the color shifts started happening... When he got the replacement, he actually tried to color balance the funky colors... What an idiot.
 

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Posted by Joe Tommassello (Member # 4632) on 02-08-2010, 03:48 PM:
 

quote: Paul Mayer

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the second film my parents worked on together - she, a dancer; he, a music editor

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quote: Joe Tommassello

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Paul - which one is your mom? You should let us know so we can all make you uncomfortable saying "Dude - your mom is hot!"

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It's funny, South Pacific is the one film she did where I have absolutely no clue as to what shots she's in. She was just one of the "line" in that film, so I know she's in the dance scenes somewhere. One of these days I'll have to go through those shots frame by frame to see if I can spot her.

And yes, at the time she was hot!
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 02-08-2010, 06:07 PM:
 
I am with Bruce on this -- it's a great musical with a very strong socal statement which, btw, the producers of the Broadway show tried to tone down by trying to get R&H to remove the "You've Got To Be Taught" song from the show. They said that would totally wimp out the whole theme and refused. The show was a huge success and made them wheel barrels full of money. All of a sudden the producers thought it was a great song.

Sure the unnatural color overlays were an idea that just didn't work for most people, but the film is still highly entertaining and the music is certainly worth the minor distraction that the color creates. In fact, I think perhaps Joshua Logan was saying, you know, if we are asking the audience to accept people breaking out in song in the middle of the drama, maybe it would be interesting to do the same thing visually, breaking with reality and emphasizing that the musical numbers are indeed an artistic device which don't happen in real life. Indtead of asking the audience to ignore the fact that the characters start singing as normal, instead acknowledege it as an artistic device and mirror that acknowledgement in the picture as well. For me it didn't work and it's comes off pretentious, but you have to give him credit for the effort.

Anyone ever notice that they do this same kind of thing on the CSI-Miami series. Every so often they put a graduated color filter in front of the lens - it's very dark orange on the top of the picture with the color gradually lightening so that by the middle of the picture it is natural, ie., normal clear. I can't figure the reason for this -- it just looks pretentious and with out purpose.
 

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Posted by Claude S. Ayakawa (Member # 1401) on 02-10-2010, 01:27 PM:
 
I am still feeling pretty bad after Mama left us the other day but if I do not try to concentrate on other things I have enjoyed doing before she died, I might wind up as a basket case so here is my two cents worth regarding SOUTH PACIFIC and the dreadful filtered scenes. I first saw the movie at the Kuhio Theatre in Honolulu during it original Road Show engagement in 70mm Todd AO. Everything was wonderful and I was enjoying the movie until the color filtered scenes flashed on the screen and I hated them! There were two very lengthy filtered scenes and it was two too many. The Blu-Ray of SOUTH PACIFIC is wonderful and the technicians at Fox did a very excellent job with the 4K digital transfer but I still dislike the filtered scenes. I forgot who the film's cinematographer was but I am sure he was not nominated for an Academy Award that year for SOUTH PACIFIC. If what Paul said about shooting the scenes with and without the filters is true, it was a very tragic mistake for the studio to refuse to have the scenes photographed twice. I have all of the Rodgers & Hammerstein's film versions of their musical in my DVD and Blu-Ray collection from Fox and SOUTH PACIFIC is my least favorite because of the filtered scenes. I can hardly wait for the Blu-Ray of THE KING & I, OKLAHOMA,, CAROUSEL and THE SOUND OF MUSIC. I also do not mind having the original and remake of STATE FAIR on Blu-Ray too.

-Claude
 

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Posted by Bill Gabel (Member # 1105) on 02-10-2010, 02:26 PM:
 
Leon Shamroy was the Cinematographer for "South Pacific". And yes his work was one of the nominated films for Best Cinematography, Color for that year.

Nominated Color films:

• "Gigi" (Winner)
  "Auntie Mame"
  "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof"
  "South Pacific"
  "The Old Man and the Sea"

• "The Robe" (CinemaScope)
  "The King and I" (CinemaScope 55)
  "South Pacific" (Todd-AO)
  "Porgy and Bess" (Todd-AO)
  "Cleopatra" (Todd-AO)
  "The Agony and the Ecstasy" (Todd-AO)