# Why did audiences tolerate B/W movies for so long? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 1, 2009, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293 "2009-06-01T00:09:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2009, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/101 "2009-06-02T18:04:25Z")
> [@Markxxx](#): > > The answer is really simple -\> “The Great Depression.” Movies didn’t really hit their stride till then. Compare the 1910s and 1920s with the 1930s: **Features produced in the U.S.** 1915: 617 1920: 744 1925: 755 1929: 524 1930: 530 1931: 541 1932: 557 1935: 605 1940: 523 > [@Markxxx](#): > > That means everything was owned by the studio. They “owned” the movie, the actors (each actor was tied to a studio), the writers, they even owned the theatres which the movies played. Other way around. The theaters owned the studios. The usual progression was a theater chain went into the distribution business, then went into the production business. For example, M-G-M was controlled by Loew’s Inc., a theater chain. > [@Markxxx](#): > > If you were rich and lucky enough to have a, say maid, and the maid saw you doing something wrongs, she’d quit and go make just as much, if not more, in a war plant. Was it really that different during the war? Until World War II, middle-class American families typically had one or more servants to help around the house. In 1940, the Bureau of Labor Statistics counted 2.6 million domestic servants, almost one job in 20. > [@Markxxx](#): > > In the early 50s, the Supreme Court ordered the movies to sell off their theatre chains or face anti-trust law suits. [_U.S. v. Paramount Pictures_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Paramount_Pictures,_Inc.) was in 1948. > [@Markxxx](#): > > This marked the end of the studio system, after which actors, over the next ten years became essentially “free agents.” It had nothing to do with contract players. The contract system continued for another decade. ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2009, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/102 "2009-06-02T22:48:55Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > [_U.S. v. Paramount Pictures_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Paramount_Pictures,_Inc.) was in 1948. > It had nothing to do with contract players. The contract system continued for another decade. More like another two decades, no? ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2009, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/103 "2009-06-03T01:04:58Z")
I’d say the contract system pretty much died out in the late 1950s. I can’t think of anyone who was under a long-term contract, outside television, in the 1960s. ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2009, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/104 "2009-06-03T02:01:52Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > I’d say the contract system pretty much died out in the late 1950s. I can’t think of anyone who was under a long-term contract, outside television, in the 1960s. Sorry, for some reason I conflated it with the Code system, without really thinking much. ---
**Author:** ![MichaelQReilly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@MichaelQReilly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MichaelQReilly)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2009, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/105 "2009-06-03T02:38:49Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > There were no video cameras at Normandy. You mean a film camera. Yeah, I’m not really a videophile so I used the generic modern term. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2009, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/106 "2009-06-03T04:16:38Z")
So but for the fact the Markxxx had ten or fifteen factual errors, he makes a good point. ---
**Author:** ![Kevbo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e47774/32.png) [@Kevbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kevbo)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2009, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/107 "2009-06-03T05:12:35Z")
People who like to read rarely feel a screenplay does justice to the book it is based on. Even when they don’t cut out much or change major points, it is still never as good as it was when I read it. Part of this is due to the mental images one comes up with when reading. All the FX and CGI can’t hold a candle to the human imagination. When an author writes that the heroine is a stunning beauty, she becomes the reader’s idea of perfection. When she appears on screen, she is only the casting department’s idea of perfection, and only part of the audience will agree. Before TV came along, going to the movies twice a week would be a lot. I suspect that an audience raised on books and radio dramas found that color didn’t add all that much and often took something away. I also suspect this is why directors tended to make the early color films REALLY colorful…they were trying to make them as vivid as they were used to imagining. I’m old enough that only one family in the neighborhood had a color TV when I was in grade school. They’d invite us over when something special was due to be on. I don’t recall being all that impressed with the color. Heck I still have a little B&W TV I watch when Kevbabe really wants to see some reality dreck on the main set, and I mind the small screen a lot more than the lack of color. I honestly only notice that a good movie is in black and white for the first couple of minutes. Once I start to suspend disbelief and get into the story, my mind is filling in the color. ---
**Author:** ![CutterJohn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/91b2a8/32.png) [@CutterJohn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CutterJohn)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2009, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/108 "2009-06-03T14:40:07Z")
Calvin: Dad, how come old photographs are always black and white? Didn’t they have color film back then? Calvin’s dad: Sure they did, in fact, those old photographs ARE in color. It’s just the WORLD was black and white then. Calvin: Really? Calvin’s dad: Yep. The world didn’t turn color until sometime in the 1930s, and it was pretty grainy color for a while, too. Calvin: That’s really weird. Calvin’s dad: Well, truth is stranger than fiction. Calvin: But then why are old PAINTINGS in color?! If the world was black and white, wouldn’t artists have painted it that way? Calvin’s dad: Not necessarily. A lot of great artists were insane. Calvin: But… but how could they have painted in color anyway? Wouldn’t their paints have been shades of gray back then? Calvin’s dad: Of course, but they turned colors like everything else did in the 30’s. Calvin: So why didn’t old black and white photos turn color too? Calvin’s dad: Because they were color pictures of black and white, remember? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![garygnu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garygnu/32/2924_2.png) [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2009, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/109 "2009-06-03T14:42:33Z")
Psssssst… **CutterJohn** … [Post 8](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=11197740&postcount=8). ---
**Author:** ![CutterJohn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/91b2a8/32.png) [@CutterJohn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CutterJohn)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2009, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/110 "2009-06-04T01:04:13Z")
> [@garygnu](#): > > Psssssst… **CutterJohn** … > > [Post 8](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=11197740&postcount=8). :eek: :smack: Move along people, nothing to see here[/Officer Barbrady] ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2009, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/111 "2009-06-04T01:15:57Z")
> [@Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](#): > > Everyone switched from silents to sound movies within about two years. And there was a lot of angst among silent cinemaphiles about people pouring into theaters to see crappy talkies. On the other hand, Charlie Chaplin’s silent _City Lights_ was released in 1931, well after the advent of talkies, and it was a big hit. Technology alone does not trump really great entertainment. By the way, I’ve always liked B&W movies and photos. But I switched to digital photos over a decade ago and even with the capability of shooting B&W, I’ve rarely bothered. Maybe it’s because lots of the photos I take are of plants/gardens, and no matter how well you shoot a perennial garden in B&W (check out some of those 1930s garden books) it looks like something out of Edward Gorey. ---
**Author:** ![Rocketeer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocketeer/32/4437_2.png) [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2009, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293/112 "2009-06-04T14:04:51Z")
> [@lissener](#): > > Absolutely not. It was not seen as an “absence” of anything. > > It helps to try to imagine the mindset of the day: no one saw a silent film as a Will Ferrell movie with the sound turned off; it wasn’t \*missing \*anything. The historical context, obviously, is what came before, not after; they weren’t looking backward at an earlier technology, as many people in this thread are doing. Rather, in the context of the day, film–yes, even silent film–was seen as a great leap forward, not a half-step somewhere on the way to _Underworld: Rise of the Lycans_. Think of what films were called: _moving pictures._ If your paradigm included no such phenomenon–a picture was by definition something static; still and flat. But suddenly a photograph could _move_, could tell stories! Think of the possibilities! No one looked at this astonishing miracle of visual storytelling and thought, “Hmm, get back to me when they can talk.” > > Silent film was an incredible sensation, a worldwide phenomenon, an artistic medium that utterly perfected the art of visual storytelling: some of the greatest masterpieces of human creation are silent films. And none of them \*lacked \*sound, any more than Monet’s _Waterlilies_ lacks a soundtrack or \*Guernica \*lacks dialog. Well said. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-did-audiences-tolerate-b-w-movies-for-so-long/498293.md?page=5)