GLORIOUS TECHNICOLOR (1998) C 60m documentary

narrated by Angela Lansbury; interviews include Esther Williams, Oswald Morris

From the TCM Viewer's Guide, Now Playing: "A TCM Original Production ... about the process that brought the rainbow to the silver screen. Dr. Herbert Kalmus and his colleagues founded the Technicolor Corporation in 1915. Among the sequences in lavish silent-era productions that feature two-color Technicolor are the masked ball in The Phantom of the Opera (1925) and the Biblical scenes of Ben-Hur (1926). The David O. Selznick productions A Star Is Born and Nothing Sacred (both 1937) proved that three-strip Technicolor, when used with restraint, could benefit a romantic drama or a screwball comedy. The three-color process reached an early peak with the ravishingly photographed Warner Bros. production The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), starring Errol Flynn. Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), director Vincente Minnelli's first Technicolor feature, set the standard for the striking use of the process in the Golden Age of MGM musicals. Minnelli expanded the palette of the Technicolor cameras, daring to override the protests of 'color consultant' Natalie Kalmus (the first wife of Dr. Kalmus) with such scenes as a Christmas party where Judy Garland wears a gown of bright red and Lucille Bremer is dressed in bright green."