Colorized movies on MST3K? Yea or Nay?

MST3K Central
,
1

Surprisingly, I don’t think we’ve ever asked this question before:

Should MST3K use colorized prints for black and white movies if available?

  • Yes
  • No
  • “I don’t care!”
0 voters

I know the modern era of MST3K has shied away from using black and white movies from the 40’s and 50’s, and this has mostly been explained away as wanting to make sure the film has a good enough print to look decent on modern HD televisions. However, a lot of the old classic D-grade sci-fi films that have been restored from that era (especially by Legend Films) have also been colorized at the same time.

So given a choice between seeing these movies riffed in the original black and white or modern computer-assisted color, which do you prefer? Are you a cinematic purist, down for anything that makes them a little easier to swallow, or like Johnny and the makers of Attack of the Eye Creatures, do you simply not care?

A prime example of the sort of print I’m talking about would be Phantom from Space (1953), which some of you may have seen The Mads riff the black and white version of last year. The color print doesn’t make it any better a movie, but it does make some of the really boring scenes where everybody stands around in the same drab office set being out-acted by a flashing light slightly easier to sit through without nodding off.

1 Like
2

Eh, I’m a purist. Black-and-white movies should stay in black-and-white.

For one, I love that Mike Nelson recorded a commentary track for a Night of the Living Dead… but I hate hate hate that it was converted to color.

Color doesn’t necessarily add pizzazz to a movie any more than a black-and-white movie signifies something dull and boring.

3 Likes
3

I consider modern computer-colorized films an abomination* and would be amenable to that at all. I do not appreciate people messing around with other people’s movies in that fashion.

*The one exception being Richard Elfman colorizing his own movie, Forbidden Zone, and giving it the palette of an early processed color film, which improved it.

4 Likes
4

Furthermore, lighting, makeup, etc. for a black and white film was designed to look good in black and white. You’re specifically making it look worse by colorizing it.

7 Likes
5

I figure if someone’s gone to the effort of restoring a print, but also insisted on colourising it, that probably means there’s a nicely buffed-up B&W version also available that they used to add the colours to. And it’s probably an option on disc 2 of the re-release.
And if it isn’t, the riffers can just adjust the colour level all the way down on their interociters anyway.
I’ve occasionally fooled around with colourisation software for images, and the process is always more fun to do as a challenge than the final result is worth.

5 Likes
6

A good B&W print is richly saturated and stylish.

Don’t paint eyebrows on the Mona Lisa.

8 Likes
7

The only colorized movie I’m ok with is Rifftrax’s live show of Reefer Madness. That made it even more over the top! Otherwise, no.

6 Likes
8

Good point; there is some trash that can be made even more lurid. I might countenance a colourisation of “The Incredibly strange Creatures etc.” as long as it wasn’t tasteful in any way.

2 Likes
9

There’s a colorized version of Bride of the Monster!

1 Like
10

That’s already in color.

3 Likes
11

My kids find B&W virtually unwatchable, which amuses me because I don’t even notice the difference once I’m more than a minute into viewing.

4 Likes
12

My daughter has always been fine with B&W movies. Now if only she liked riffing.

3 Likes
13

So it is. What movie was I thinking of, then?

2 Likes
14

The Maltese Falcon? That’s in black and white.

2 Likes
15

Puh-lease, no!
Something trashy and scuzzy and cheap. Maybe not even a riffed flick.

2 Likes
16

Horror of Party Beach perhaps?

I will say that a bad colorization job is certainly way worse than just sticking with black and white. Just a few seconds of this is enough to give me a migraine:

3 Likes
17

This does imply you had a Mona Lisa to start with. I’d say most MST3K movies look like this, even before somebody decides to “restore” it:
ecce-homo-after-342x454

3 Likes
18

It really depends on the movie and the quality of the colorization. The Rifftrax version of Plan 9 From Outer Space, for instance (at least the one they did live which they made available to backers of the original Bring Back MST3K campaign) is a fine example of one I’m good with.

4 Likes
19

I can’t really call myself a “cinephile” but I am a cinematic purist. I want to see a movie as it was created.

4 Likes
20

I’ll admit that this is one where I don’t really have a strong opinion either way. I picked “I don’t care!” but I would have a slight preference for the original over colorized.

2 Likes