BAM presents ‘Black & White ’Scope: American Cinema’
The post-World War II era brought forth a flood of color films, so it seemed that the monochromatic images of the silver screen were destined for irrelevance. Only some productions opted to tell their stories in black and white, but several did so on CinemaScope, a widescreen format introduced in 1953.
The resulting imagery is striking.
This month, the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s BAMcinématek presents “Black & White ’Scope: American Cinema,” a collection of black and white films from a time when cultural buzz was largely focused upon color films such as Walt Disney’s “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” and “The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit.”