It’s understood that the “Jazz Singer” revolutionized sound in cinema. But which film was color? Which film would be considered the “Jazz Singer” of color?
You could make a good case for The Wizard of Oz, which used color not only as an improvement on the medium, but as an integral part of the storytelling.
Maybe The Black Pirate (1926).
Becky Sharp (1935) was a landmark Technicolor film and The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) was another Technicolor production that was the highest grossing film of that year.
Color was always a desirable trait; the problem was technical, not artistic. Some silent films had hand-tinted scenes, but the process was time consuming and expensive, so it was only rarely used.
Technicolor was developed in the early 20s, but due to its expense was used not used for a full feature until The Black Pirate. The color was somewhat muddy and limited, though.
The first full-color Technicolor film success was the Disney cartoon “Flowers and Trees” in 1932. I think that’s probably the best answer to the OP; it showed more colors than earlier films, and was a big success.
Because I always see the dark cloud behind the silver lining, I need to point out that the answer is “there is no answer.”
There is absolutely no equivalent to The Jazz Singer for color. Sound took over the industry in about three years. Movies that were already in production were often scrapped or hastily converted.
Color took over 30 years to become the norm. Studios used color for a few major movies and relegated all the others to b&w. The Apartment, the Oscar winner for 1960, was still in b&w. There was never a single movie or a single year that converted the industry.
I suspect Gone with the Wind (1939) and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) could also be considered landmarks in the use of color.
Has anyone ever compiled a list of color films according to year? It would be interesting to see how the number grows.
You mean it wasn’t “Police Squad: In Color?”
I remember being so blown away by The Wizard of Oz after having known it only on my parents’ B&W TV.
This. Consider that Gone With The Wind was in color in 1939, but Dr Strangelove was in B&W in 1964. It was a case of color quality vs. cost (both filming and print processing), gradual improvements of which slowly displaced black and white.
Wiki has a list of early color feature films from 1902 to 1936 (plus an Indian one in 1937). Many are lost, including the first feature length narrative film in natural color, The World, the Flesh and the Devil (1914). List of early color feature films - Wikipedia
Technicolor was the dominant color technology until about 1952; here’s a list Listal - List the stuff you love! Movies, TV, music, games and books
The first Technicolor feature was The Gulf Between (1917), also lost.
I remember that CBS made it a point to remind viewers that the scenes with Dorothy in Kansas were in black-and-white so that people who were watching the film on a color TV wouldn’t think something was wrong with their sets.
Yep. That’s what my father told me when we first watched it, anyway. And he’s the technology and film enthusiast of the family, so I pretty much took his word for it.
And, of course, Ted Turner colorized the opening and closing scenes.
Just kidding…
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I, too, thought of *Wizard of Oz *as the answer to this question, even though it’s not the first color movie and, as Xap points out, there isn’t a really solid answer anyway. It’s the first truly enduring movie that made excellent use of the new property. (GWTW could just as well have been in B&W, IMHO.)
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Any answer to this is purely subjective but, like others, the Wizard of Oz is the first one that came to mind for me.
I seem to recall being told as a child that they didn’t make the whole thing in color because it would’ve been too expensive. Obviously that couldn’t be more wrong, but it’s what I was told.
There is the red dress that Scarlet wears to Melanie’s party, and the burning of Atlanta. 
Oh, sure, it used color, but I think the impact would have been much the same if they’d shot it monochrome.
WoO really USED color.
5 words: The Adventures of Robin Hood, which is just as enduring a film in the canon of Hollywood classics and predated GWTW & TWoO by one year.
1938 was also a turning point in the industry’s embrace of color. Up until that time, all the Cinematography Oscars were in B&W and color cinematography was designated as a “special achievement” award (The Gardens of Allah & A Star Is Born) won those in '36 & '37).
But in 1938, they created an entire competitive category for Color Cinematography, which Robin Hood won. In fact, the film’s 3 Oscars were the first time a color film won more Oscars than any other in a single year.
In Jezebel, Bette Davis’ character wears a red dress to a ball where all the other girls are in pastels or white. Since it’s a black and white film, her dress was brown in real life, which looked more “red” on screen. I’ve seen the movie. It’s a powerful scene.
That must have been difficult to bring off. I will try to see it.