[Pyrrho]

Originally Posted by Urchinn

Good grief...this has got to be one of most ridiculous thing to argue over...as far as cinematic arguments go!
First of all, no black and white movie is ONLY available in a colorized version! When Ted Turner's lackeys began this craze they always did extensive restoration work on the original film before colorizing it. This resulted in new fgmp (fine grain master prints) of films that had been long neglected. And, of course, nobody was actually coloring the original negative/positive filmstrip anyway (that hasn't really been done on a large scale since the silent days of Pathe and Gaumont).

If my memory is right, Turner originally wanted to have only his colorized versions available to the public, because he could copyright his colorization of the films, and then he would control and, more importantly, profit from every copy of the film. But there was a public outcry against it, and he decided that things available in B&W, too, might be in his own best interest.

Originally Posted by Urchinn

Second...I watched Wizard of Oz, Gone With The Wind, and The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T at least 6 times before I ever knew they were fimed in color. Why? My family didn't have a color TV till 1971! Amazingly enough, I enjoyed all those films (and more) without knowing what I was missing.

There is a huge difference between taking something away from something and adding to that something. In most cases, it would be better to remove color from a color film than to add color to a B&W film.

Originally Posted by Urchinn

Dangit...the Venus De Milo doesn't even have arms but I know it is a beautiful bit of sculpture!

Yes, but if the original arms could be found and restored to it, it would be better. We put up with the imperfection because there is no good alternative. With old things, some parts can be lost or damaged, and there is nothing to be done to alter that fact. True, we could add arms to the Venus de Milo, but since we do not know precisely what they should look like, it would ultimately be changing the work of art to something else. (And that, by the way, is exactly what is done when colorization is done to a film; the selection of color is not what the original people selected, it is just something someone else tacks on later. Additionally, some films are intentionally in B&W; e.g., Manhattan.)

In the case of the Venus de Milo, if there were photographs of the original, but the arms were destroyed, it would be possible to recreate them with some degree of authenticity. But as things are, no one knows what they should look like, so it ought not be done.

Originally Posted by Urchinn

This same "enjoy it even though something is missing or added (color)" theme is directly related to aspect ratio: ALL OF US learned to love movies with the help of television...and ALL OF US loved those movies on a 4:3 screen...no matter how they were originally filmed.

This only shows that it is possible to enjoy something in a less than ideal state. This reminds me of a story about Kubrick, who, when he saw what network TV did to his 2001, was horrified, and decided to film his later films in 4:3 but keep the action and everything he wanted in a narrow band in the middle of the film. That way, for theatrical release, he cropped the top and bottom to get the image as he wanted it, but when the film was shown on TV, people saw material above and below what he wanted. That was, in his opinion, preferable to the severe cropping that people did to show 2001 on TV. That way, everyone saw all of what he had wanted people to see, though on TV, people saw more than was necessary.

Originally Posted by Urchinn

Third, and this is a big one to me, is the fact that most director's give little honor to source material. If Peter Jackson can hack up and distort/reinvent Tolkien's source material then he could never, ever complain if his (Jackson's) work was released only as a 4:3 dvd (or only a black and white version). Why? Because in disregarding the original work how could he complain if his version was altered in any way.
I've had too much coffee, folks! Sorry 'bout the rant.

A film is different from a book, and there is no getting around that fact. If you want to keep exactly true to a book, you should simply read a book. A film may be inspired by and based upon a book, but a film is not a book. That does not mean that one should butcher a film to see it, any more than one should butcher a book to read it. You may as well tell us that no reader should complain if publishers started altering all books on purpose (as opposed to printing errors that often are introduced), omitting chapters that they regard as unnecessary, and be fine with condensed versions of your favorite novels. The integrity of a book should be honored, and likewise, the integrity of a film should be honored.