I noticed the other day that the first season of “Gilligan’s Island” has been colorized to make it more accessible, but i don’t know how long ago this was done.
Perhaps, more bothersome isn’t the blatant colorizing of old black-and-white movies, but rather the other changes that can easily be made with the advent of computers.
Movies are routinely edited, sped up, cut up, logos are erased, changed or added, soundtracks are changed, and no one seems to really care all that much.
Sadly, this wouldn’t bother me nearly as much if the movie companies were required to alert the consumer as to any and all changes made to a film from its initial release.
There is also the argument that its ok as long as the director approves, such as Lucas and his re-editing of the Star Wars trilogy. Or Spielberg’s cutting out a scene from E.T. which featured a joke about terrorism.
And then there are the subtle edits, like Fantasia’s video release not panning over to reveal characters which may appear racist in today’s society.
Sadly, I feel the idea of movies as an artform is dying, and its now more important that its commercial, thus justifying any and all changes. How long before the color version of “Schindler’s List” is released, or “Saving Private Ryan” with a toned down first 30 minutes, so as to make it more acceptable to be shown in classrooms. Spielberg is a powerful enough director to stop such changes, but he’s one of the few…
Sorry, if i got sidetracked. To answer your question, colorizing old movies has gotten much better than the 80’s, but is probably not being done nearly as much as other forms of editing…