ABSTRACT
COLOR IN CLASSICAL HOLLYWOOD CINEMA was a supple means for directing attention, punctuating action, amplifying emotion, signaling subtext, and augmenting visual spectacle. It was also one of the most carefully monitored and painstakingly crafted aspects of the moving image. This was possible largely because Technicolor had shaped color aesthetics through cautious negotiation and experimentation. Technicolor’s engineers, cinematographers, and consultants sought to weave color into the fabric of classical style, a goal that was more or less accomplished during the 1930s. Filmmakers of the 1940s and 1950s refined, developed, and strategically departed from the Technicolor aesthetic, deepening and broadening color’s contributions. When Eastman Color supplanted Technicolor in the 1950s, the aesthetic grip was eased but not erased. Technicolor design proved a resilient and flexible system for harnessing chroma to the demands of storytelling, and its influence can be felt through the end of the 1950s.
