COLORIZERS HAVE NO REGARD FOR THE MEN WHO MADE THESE MOVIES

AND WHEN A GREAT AMERICAN DIRECTOR LIKE JOHN HUSTON SAYS HE

DOESN'T WANT HIS SUPERB MYSTERY "THE MALTESE FALCON" MADE

INTO A COLOR MOVIE BECAUSE THAT MAKES THIS HARD BOILED BOGART

FILM SILLY LOOKING:

THEY COULDN'T CARE LESS WHAT HUSTON

WANTS.

THE COLORIZERS ALSO TELL US THAT A VIEWER CAN SIMPLY

TURN OFF THE COLOR AND SEE THE FILM IN BLACK AND WHITE.

THE

FACT THAT THE MAN WHO MADE THE FILM WANTS NO ONE AT ALL TO

SEE IT IN COLOR MEANS NOTHING TO THEM.

FINALLY, THEY SAY WE

LIVE IN A DEMOCRACY AND THE PUBLIC WANTS THESE FILMS IN COLOR

ALTERATIONS TO SUIT THEIR TASTE THE WORLD WOULD HAVE NO REAL

ART.

NOTHING WOULD BE SAFE.

PICASSO WOULD HAVE BEEN CHANGED

YEARS AGO AND JAMES JOYCE AND STRAVINSKY AND THE LIST GOES

ON.

THE EXAMPLE OF JOHN HUSTON, INCIDENTALLY,

IS PARTICULARLY

MEANINGFUL TO ME BECAUSE THE AESTHETIC DIFFERENCES BETWEEN

COLOR AND BLACK AND WHITE IS A SUBJECT THAT HITS HOME IN MY

OWN WORK.

IN AN ERA OF ALMOST EXCLUSIVELY COLOR FILMS,

I

HAVE CHOSEN ON A NUMBER OF OCCASIONS, EVEN FOUGHT FOR THE

PAGE FIVE

BLACK AND WHITE IS OFTEN SO WIDE IT ALTERS THE MEANING OF

SCENES.

IF I HAD PORTRAYED NEW YORK CITY IN COLOR RATHER

EVOCATION OF THE CITY FROM OLD PHOTOGRAPHS AND FILMS WOULD

HAVE

BEEN

IMPOSSIBLE TO

ACHIEVE IN GLORIOUS TECHNICOLOR.

WHEREAS IF I HAD FILMED "ANNIE HALL" IN BLACK AND WHITE, ALL

THE SCENES THAT NOW COME OFF AMUSINGLY WOULD TAKE A 'GIANT

STEP TOWARD GRIM SERIOUSNESS BY MERE VIRTUE OF THEM SUDDENLY

BEING GRITTIER AND LESS CARTOONLIKE.

ONE HAS ONLY TO THINK

OF A FILM LIKE "THE BICYCLE THIEF" AND IMAGINE THE LIFE AND

DEATH SEARCH THROUGH POST-WAR ROME FOR THE PRECIOUS BICYCLE

BEING IN REDS AND YELLOWS AND BLUES RATHER THAN THE HOT

WHITES AND DIRTY BLACKS AND GREYS AND ONE SEES HOW ABSURD THE

WHOLE THING IS.

AND IT'S NOT JUST DRAMA

MUSICALS JUST

BECAUSE THEY ARE BOUNCY ARE NOT HELPED BY THE ADDITION OF

COLOR WHERE IT DOESN'T BELONG EITHER.

PART OF THE ARTISTIC

EXPERIENCE OF SEEING OLD GINGER ROGERS AND FRED ASTAIRE FILMS

IS THE PERIOD QUALITY

THE BLACK AND WHITE PHOTOGRAPHY

GIVES IT ITS ENTIRE FEEL.

WHEN ASTAIRE MADE COLOR MUSICALS

IN A LATER PERIOD THEY HAVE A TOTALLY DIFFERENT QUALITY THAT

PAGE SIX

AND WHAT OF THE OTHER INSULTS

THE EDITING, THE ARTIFICIAL

PANNING, THE CUTS MADE TO ACCOMMODATE THE COMMERCIAL SALE OF

RESPECT FOR PEOPLE WHO CONTRIBUTE TO THE SOCIETY BY DOING

CREATIVE WORK TO ALLOW ANYONE TO SUBVERT THEIR CREATIONS AT

RANDOM.

MY PERSONAL BELIEF IS OF COURSE THAT NO ONE SHOULD

EVER BE ABLE TO TAMPER WITH ANY ARTIST'S WORK IN ANY MEDIUM

AGAINST THE ARTIST'S WILL AND THIS PRINCIPLE CAN BE ARGUED

JUSTLY BY ANY CITIZEN.

IT DOES NOT NEED A DIRECTLY INVOLVED

ARTIST.

THE COLORIZERS MAY THINK THEY HAVE A LEGAL LOOPHOLE BUT THE

MORALITY OF WHAT THEY ARE DOING IS ATROCIOUS.

FOR DIRECTORS

WITH ENOUGH CLOUT TO MAKE SELF-PROTECTING CONTRACTS THIS IS

NO PROBLEM.

BUT FOR THOSE LESS FORTUNATE AND, OF COURSE,

THE

DECEASED ONES, PROTECTION MUST BE GUARANTEED.

IF A PRODUCER INSISTS ON COLOR AND IF A HELPLESS DIRECTOR IS

FORCED TO FILM IT THE STUDIO'S WAY, DESPITE HIS OWN FEELINGS

THAT IT SHOULD BE BLACK AND WHITE

WELL A DEAL'S A DEAL.

SIX SEVEN

BUT ONCE A FILM EXISTS IN BLACK AND WHITE AND HAS

BEEN

THRILLING AUDIENCES FOR YEARS, THEN TO SUDDENLY COLOR IT

ULTIMATELY, OF COURSE, THE COLORIZERS WILL LOSE THIS BATTLE.

IF IT'S NOT IMMEDIATELY THEN FUTURE GENERATIONS WILL FOR SURE

DISCARD THESE CHEESY, ARTIFICIAL SYMBOLS OF ONE SOCIETY'S

GREED.

THEY WILL, OF COURSE, GO BACK TO THE GREAT ORIGINALS.

PRACTICE TO CONTINUE ONE CAN EASILY PICTURE YOUNG MEN AND

WOMEN SOMEDAY DISCUSSING US WITH DISGUST AND SAYING, "THEY

DID THIS AND NOBODY STOPPED THEM?"

"WELL THERE WAS A LOT OF MONEY INVOLVED."

"BUT SURELY THE PEOPLE COULD SEE THE DEEPER VALUE

TO AMERICA OF ITS FILM TREASURY, OF ITS IMAGE AMONG

WILL.

DON'T TELL ME IT WAS THE KIND OF NATION THAT

ADORED PROFIT AT ANY COST AND HUMILIATION."

HERE I FINISH BECAUSE IT'S TOO EARLY TO KNOW HOW IT TURNS OUT

BUT I HOPE DEARLY THAT I WILL NOT BE PART OF A CULTURE THAT

IS ONE DAY RIDICULED AND REVILED AS A LAUGHING STOCK.

Senator LEAHY. Thank you, Mr. Allen.
Mr. Forman.

STATEMENT OF MILOS FORMAN Mr. FORMAN. Mr. Chairman, I was born and I lived the first 37 years of my life in Europe, and that, I feel, qualifies me to testify that the only U.S. Ambassador who is welcomed with open arms and love and admiration by everybody everywhere in the world is American film. The emotional impact that American movies have on hundreds of millions of people everywhere every day is astonishing, and we can be very proud of it.

You can give the audiences Hollywood glamor. You can show them films showing our dark side, criticizing ourselves, and they admire our freedom with which we can talk about ourselves.

So, whichever end of the stick you grab, the American film always wins, except at home.

You can imagine how saddened I was when, after coming to the United States, I learned that these wonderful and proud Ambassadors of our culture, when they return home, to the homes of Americans on television, they are treated by the money people not even as second-class citizens, they are treated as sausages on the butcher block.

They are cut. They are colorized. They are panned and scanned, sped up and altered, and I learned it myself the hard way. I made a musical for United Artists, which was sold to 115 syndicated stations all over the country in the United States with nine entire musical numbers cut out, and numerous little cuts here and there throughout the whole film.

But the interesting thing is my name was still on it. The film was still sold to the audiences for profit as an original, as a Milos Forman film. I asked the lawyers if there was any way to protect my work against this mutilation. I was told if you are not protected by your individual contract, there is nothing in American law which protects the rights of creative authors of motion pictures. Whoever buys them can do with them anything they wish. They can even sell them after the alterations as the original work.

It was shocking for me to discover that the creative authors of this genuinely American art form are much better protected in every other country in the civilized world than they are in the United States. For example, if I commission a painting, it does not matter if it is a Picasso or from an unknown, it is mine. I paid for it, and I can do anything-anything. It is mine. I can do anything. I own it. Nobody can protect the painting against me doing anything with it I wish. I can change colors, I can alter the lines. I can even cut a few inches here and there to accommodate the space on my wall. But should I still be able to sell this as a Picasso or an unknown for profit as the original work? I believe not.

I realize that I am hired and paid by the money people to make a film. But so was Michelangelo whom Medici hired and paid to paint the Sistine Chapel. And still none of the Medicis went inside during the night and changed the colors or repainted or otherwise altered Michelangelo's work. But, of course, those were the Middle Ages, or were they?