I'd like to see ML colorize, sharpen, etc., older B+W movies. Silent movies would be greatly improved with the addition of a soundtrack (music[2], foley effects[1], and replacing the dialog cards with voice actors).
1. Yes, they already do add some foley effects. But very little.
2. Yes, they do add a music soundtrack. But it's almost always awful period music.
> the ethical and artistic arguments
Those are all baloney. Doing what I suggest does not destroy the originals in any way. It's simply making the movies more enjoyable. Apparently, a lot of purists want people to suffer watching them: suffer with grainy, blotchy film, difficult to make out flickering black & white, and bad piano music.
There's a reddit newsgroup where people colorize old B+W photos. They really do an amazing job. By colorizing key frames in a movie, ML can take care of the rest.
BTW, I've seen many bad attempts at colorizing old footage, like those "WW2 In Color" documentaries. You can always tell because the teeth & gums of the people are grey :-/ and the faces are a uniform brown. ML ought to be able to do a lot better.
>Those are all baloney. Doing what I suggest does not destroy the originals in any way. It's simply making the movies more enjoyable. Apparently, a lot of purists want people to suffer watching them: suffer with grainy, blotchy film, difficult to make out flickering black & white, and bad piano music.
I think there's 2 separate issues actually: there's the "artist's intent", and then there's refusal to utilize any modern technology. The latter I agree is baloney: if you can use modern technology to clean up and improve old stuff (such as taking an original Star Wars film print and removing the scratches in the film, improving flaws in the FX, etc.), I think it's ridiculous to argue against that kind of thing. Then there's the artist's intent: if the original artist intended that the movie have "bad piano music" as you call it, should you be changing that? It's like changing the dialog in Lord of the Rings so the characters all talk like modern American hipsters: how is this helpful? These movies are a product of their time, and the music is too.
If you could bring the original artists back from the dead, and ask them if they'd like to use modern technology to clean up their old silent movies to sharpen them, remove the noise, etc., I'm sure they'd agree: why wouldn't they want the print to look as good as possible? If you ask them about colorizing, there might be some debate; some might like it, others might not. It's not like they had a choice back then, but even today some people like B&W photos for artistic reasons. If you ask them about adding modern music, I don't think they'd like that much at all.
How many movie arteests today would choose black and white? A number indistinguishable from zero. How many would choose dialog cards over voice? Zilch. How many would make a film and says to the movie theater "play any music you want for the show"? Zip.
If I made a movie, I'd be pleased if people far in the future watched it. If that meant using their technology to improve it, that's fine with me. After all, I've suggested to many people that they improve my game Empire with modern graphics and AI and sound.
Worth noting, among the “number indistinguishable from zero” are contemporary classics such as: Schindler’s List, Dead Man, Good Night & Good Luck, Ed Wood, Clerks, Raging Bull, Nebraska, et al…
Anyone who studied Media Theory will be well aware of the ubiquitous Marshall McLuhan quote, “The medium is the message,” and understands that the means with which a piece of media is produced and distributed tells a story in and of itself. Sometimes that’s in service to the broader narrative, and sometimes it’s simply a product of circumstance, but either way it carries its own value for the audience, and I would argue that it would be arrogant for one to unilaterally decide whether such things are important or not to preserve.
I don't think you can change a work that drastically without the change itself being a piece of art. And the original artists might not want to be left out of that process. See David Simon's experience with the HD remaster of the Wire for similar themes: https://davidsimon.com/the-wire-hd-with-videos/
> ... Apparently, a lot of purists want people to suffer watching them
The tech and information of the time is worth preserving, as is the experience. I, for one, enjoy seeing the original, more analog versions of things. I cringe inside when I watch much of ML filtered or otherwise artificially colorized footage. Many films were shot with the intent of leveraging the strengths of the medium. Limitation often promotes its own form of innovation which can only be recognized in the context it was created in.
Saying that purists want people to suffer is quite misleading. A similar statement in the other direction might be, ML enthusiasts want people to forget what art actually is.
Ever listen to a Gregorian chant? They are cool, partially because they had no idea what they were (musically) doing... much like the product of an ML model today.
> Saying that purists want people to suffer is quite misleading
Not at all. I've watched enough movies where the director clearly wanted the viewer to suffer, based on the idea that only through suffering can the viewer be enlightened. The suffering is in the form of making a bad movie.
Solaris comes to mind. I've tried to watch it multiple times, but the director (and the director's fans) clearly revel in the notion that one must suffer through the movie, and that's the point of it. The movie is boring on every level - bad dialog, bad plot, bad cinematography, bad pacing, bad acting, everything is bad about it. And it's (small) number of fervent fans love it for its wretchedness. They can keep it :-)
I saw a colorized version of Metropolis a few decades ago. The technology to do it right wasn't there, but it was enjoyable in a way the original was not. I've since watched the full version when the missing footage was found, and there's an ideal film that would benefit from the application of modern technology. I bet Fritz Lang would love it.
TCM also ran a version of the silent "Wings". They added some color in a few spots, and some airplane engine sounds. Even just that little bit made the picture much more watchable.
I'd like to see the FM Busby musicals fixed up.
Some movies I wouldn't touch would be Top Hat. It's perfect as it is :-)
> ...I'd ike to see ML colorize, sharpen, etc., older B+W movies.
In case of old media, I think their historical value is not in their own existence but in their effect on people of the time.
Older movies were perceived back in time through the old technology, that is b/w, small screen, choppy, silent or with musical accompaniment.
It's a document, similar to language dialects used back in time - localizing this for present time would shave away the cultural skin it had for its time.
I can recommend a film festival and silent movies with live bands.
If it works, it works great. For me the silent movie is always the highlight at the midnight sun film festival.
It's a bit closer to theater or reading a book. It's less directly realistic. Somehow your brain fills the gaps more and you get even more invested.
1. Yes, they already do add some foley effects. But very little.
2. Yes, they do add a music soundtrack. But it's almost always awful period music.
> the ethical and artistic arguments
Those are all baloney. Doing what I suggest does not destroy the originals in any way. It's simply making the movies more enjoyable. Apparently, a lot of purists want people to suffer watching them: suffer with grainy, blotchy film, difficult to make out flickering black & white, and bad piano music.
There's a reddit newsgroup where people colorize old B+W photos. They really do an amazing job. By colorizing key frames in a movie, ML can take care of the rest.
BTW, I've seen many bad attempts at colorizing old footage, like those "WW2 In Color" documentaries. You can always tell because the teeth & gums of the people are grey :-/ and the faces are a uniform brown. ML ought to be able to do a lot better.