The trend of showing just about everything in media, even if it seems unnecessary. I'm not talking about censoring, but about limiting the audience's act of imagination to fill in the rest of the picture. What happens when a level of subtlety, implicitness, and mystery is lost? I was thinking of some classic black-and-white films such as M, The Innocents, Nosferatu, The Third Man, Gaslight, etc. whose atmosphere is heavily reliant on what is shrouded by shadow. A lot of suspense, dread, as well as intrigue is created by what we can't see. When many movies now are so well-lit and in high-definition color, has something been lost? It seems like there is a strong desire to expose and reveal as much as we can instead. Has this transition affected how movies are filmed in other ways?
This is a great topic, and I do agree. The unspoken leads to contemplation, inquiry, and suspense. Though people fixate on the evolution of film technology, which is without a doubt extraordinarily impressive, some of basic cinematic concepts that make film so wonderful have been lost--what you are posing here is one. – danielle5778 years ago
Interesting but if you pay attention to independent film(not commercial ones) they still adopt fade to black in their scenes. Maybe not common but it doesnt mean no more. When i 'm writing my script, I would sometimes use fade to black and fade in for transitions. I dont think it is fully abandoned. – moonyuet8 years ago
I definitely agree with what you're saying about independent films. I'm not just talking about transitions, though, but about the general use of shadows or unseen areas in movies. I feel like we as an audience are often granted greater access to scenes we either would not have been shown before or would not be able to view with as much clarity, which is probably especially true in the case of commercial films. I hadn't intended to sound like I was making a generalization about all recent movies, just that it was a trend I had noticed. Sorry for not making myself clearer in that regard. – aprosaicpintofpisces8 years ago