The Best Looking Films of All Time (B&W)

When I was drafting my list of My 11 Favorite Cinematographers, I quickly noticed a disconnect: some of the best looking films of all time were not shot by my favorite DPs. Every single cinematographer listed in this post has proved that they are a master of their craft, but I was bothered that so many great films were left off that initial list.

To curb my troubles, I’ve drafted my list of the best looking films of all time, in two parts. Today, we’ll look at the black and white films I’m most visually drawn to. Tomorrow, we’ll tackle color.

One final note: there are dozens (actually, hundreds) of films that I’ve left off this list. The marvel (or anguish) of a list is in exercising the act of exclusion as much inclusion. There are so many more to name, but these are the 11 that strike me most. If I left off your favorite, tell me. And why. But let’s limit it to black and white for now. Color comes later.

Citizen Kane (1941)

Dir. by Orson Welles – Shot by Gregg Toland

As I said earlier this month, Citizen Kane is the best-shot film of all time. Period. Its structure, tone, use of angles, shadows, mirrors – every single shot is thought out exhaustively and executed masterfully.

Take, for example, the handful of shots that open the film. We’re simply staring at Kane’s once imperialesque Xanadu, right? Then we fade in closer, and closer, and closer. No big deal. Look again. The sole, brimming light from atop of Xanadu doesn’t move from its position in the frame. Even as we move closer, the light stays exactly where it is. It’s attention to detail like that (an infinite amount of which can be heard on Roger Ebert’s commentary track for the film), that make Citizen Kane as sharp as it’s ever been.

The Third Man (1949)

Dir. by Carol Reed – Shot by Robert Krasker

As Peter Bogdanovich expertly notes in his Criterion introduction for Carol Reed’s postwar noir, black and white photography implores a lack of distraction. Instead of focusing on the actor’s bright blue eyes, we’re focusing on Krasker’s use of shadows, Dutch angles, and moisture (those Vienna streets just feel wet, don’t they?).

In fact, the underground tunnel sequence alone is enough to justify The Third Man’s photographic greatness. And, of course, its ingenious, beyond audacious concluding shot.

12 Angry Men (1957)

Dir. by Sidney Lumet – Shot by Boris Kaufman

Most of the films on this list are here because of their tone – the way they look and feel and live. Others, like 12 Angry Men, are here mostly because of their technique.

By now, it’s common knowledge that as filming progressed on Sidney Lumet’s set-in-one-room masterpiece, Lumet and Kaufman did two things to make the room look and feel smaller. First, they slowly pushed the set walls closer together, thereby forcing his actors to stand closer to one another. Secondly, Lumet had Kaufman constantly increased the focal point by changing lenses, giving the film its unsettling claustrophobic look. 

Common knowledge or not, 12 Angry Men is a perfect example of elementary practices implemented to perfection.

The Seventh Seal (1957)

Dir. by Ingmar Bergman – Shot by Gunnar Fischer

I hope you don’t mind the name Bergman, because you’re going to see him a few times here. Frequent Bergman collaborator Gunnar Fischer did plenty of notable work with Bergman, none better than his iconic cinematography for The Seventh Seal. Two infamous sequences in particular come to mind: the Knight playing chess with Death, and the final dance of doom.

For the chess match, Fischer bathed both of the subjects in bright light, while keeping the crashing waves behind them in full focus. The result makes the image look almost fake, as if it was shot on a green screen. Almost.

If you’ve seen The Seventh Seal, you know that once you witness its final moment, in which the main characters dance with Death on top of a large hill, it is forever imprinted in your mind. Shot in gorgeous silhouette, that dance remains one of the best, most iconic shots in the history of film. Interesting fact: those aren’t even the actors dancing. Bergman had sent them home for the day, so he instructed a few crewmembers to get up on the hill and dance. The shot was done on the fly. If that isn’t masterful filmmaking, then I don’t know what is.

Psycho (1960)

Dir. by Alfred Hitchcock – Shot by John L. Russell

The long tracking shot intro, the extended take of Janet Leigh driving, the game-changing shower scene, there’s nothing normal about the way Russell shot Psycho. Even when the camera is calm in conversation, the film just looks real.

Of all the feats pulled off in this movie, the one that baffles me most is the extended take in which Norman and his mother talk off screen in Mother’s bedroom. The camera slowly, hesitantly, pans up the steps then, somehow, slowly moves up to the ceiling. Higher, and higher, and higher, before Norman walks out from the room and carries his mother to the basement. It’s a phenomenal achievement by today’s standards. In 1960, it was unheard of.

8 ½ (1963)

Dir. by Federico Fellini – Shot by Gianni Di Venanzo

The whole point of Fellini’s 8 ½ (photographically, that is), is to never let the audience become fully aware of what is real, what is being filmed, and what is really being filmed. 8 ½ tells the story of a director’s inability to shoot the movie he’s working on. So, more often than not, the audience doesn’t know if they’re watching a segment of the director’s frequent dreams, his day dreams for his new film, a scene from his new film, or just 8 ½ in general. There’s a lot going on here, and Venanzo matches the tone(s) seamlessly.

8 ½ looks and feels like an extended, lucid fever dream. Which is precisely the point.

Winter Light (1963)

Dir. by Ingmar Bergman – Shot by Sven Nykvist

Dig this: after Bergman had constructed a large church in the countryside as the main setting for his Winter Light, he and Sven Nykvist sat in the church for days on end, fastidiously logging exactly where the sun hit different areas of the church at different times of the day. So, essentially, Bergman shot his film around the sun’s rotation. Wherever it was, he was (or wasn’t, depending on his use of shadows).

Now, just think about this for a second. If the sun was hidden by clouds, or overcast completely, Bergman and Co. would have to wait it out, until the coast was clear, so to speak. If a shot was ruined because an actor flubbed up, or the sound engineer faltered, the scene would have to be reshot immediately, if not the next day. Aside from obvious dedication to the craft, Winter Light is one of the best visual examples of the Bergman/Nykvist collaboration ever caught on film. It is breathtaking.

Persona (1966)

Dir. by Ingmar Bergman – Shot by Sven Nykvist

I said Winter Light was one of the best, as a means to make room for Persona, which is arguably my favorite looking film ever. Going for a far more experimental guise this time, Nykvist’s work on Persona is one of the main reasons the film plays out as mysteriously and ingeniously as it does.

Take, for example, an early shot of a small boy waving his hand in front of the camera. We cut to the boy’s point of view, and in front of him is a large, projected image of an out-of-focus woman. It’s so poetic in its anonymity. Or the haunting dream sequence bathed in quiet, Swedish summer light. And, of course, the miraculous conclusion in which the same character delivers the same monologue twice, first with the camera on the listener, second with the camera on the speaker. Listen to what is being said, sure, but, more importantly, watch how it is being received by the two characters. Like I said, poetry in motion.

Manhattan (1979)

Dir. by Woody Allen – Shot by Gordon Willis

Woody Allen made the early decision to shoot his masterpiece Manhattan in black and white because he thought it would give New York City a unique look, and act as a character in and of itself. He was right, and with Gordon Willis on board, and his pioneering use of the 2:35:1 aspect ratio, Manhattan is justly remembered as Allen’s best looking film.

Aside from its color and inventive widescreen style, Willis, better here than ever, has a flawless command of his use of shadows. This is none more prevalent than in the scene in which Allen and Mariel Hemingway discuss their relationship from opposite ends of a large room. Hemingway sits all the way to the left of the frame, with Allen pacing feverishly to the right before he joins her. Between them is nothing but a dimly lit living room. Do we need to see what’s between them? I don’t know, it never occurred to me.

Raging Bull (1980)

Dir. by Martin Scorsese – Shot by Michael Chapman

Scorsese broke every rule in the book when shooting the fight scenes for Raging Bull. He used fake smoke to evoke visual metaphors, extended the ring, made it smaller, and so on. But most importantly, he and Michael Chapman did what no other boxing film up until that point had: he never left the ring. All of the fight scenes are filmed from the boxer’s point of view, not the spectator.

In addition to the fight scenes, Raging Bull uses a number of fancy tricks to make the film so memorable. It ingeniously uses slow motion to evoke Jake’s present, curious mood, tracks its subjects from the locker room to the inside of the ring (in one glorious unbroken shot), and on and on. The positive analysis one could lend to Raging Bull’s cinematography is endless. The film is an uncontested masterpiece, and Chapman’s contribution to it only helps cement that notion.

Schindler’s List (1993)

Dir. by Steven Spielberg – Shot by Janusz Kaminski

There’s something about Schindler’s List that just feels dreadful. Long before the ghettos are liquidated and Amon Goeth starts sniping people from his balcony for no reason, Schindler’s List suggests a dark, wet, cold mood in which nothing but dread is to come. That is, except whenever the titular Schindler is on camera, and Kaminski washes him in flawless rays of bright light. (Really, has anyone ever smoked a cigarette as artistically as Liam Neeson does in this film?)

Schindler’s List is a perfect example of a contemporary film that simply would not work in color. For if it was, how could we possibly stomach it?

What’d I leave off that you love? Remember: keep it monochrome for now, color comes tomorrow.