Reading Color in Black Narcissus

A shot in Black Narcissus （1947） reflects an interesting aspect of colors on a white nun. In a medium close-up shot， Sister Ruth is framed in the center beside a column on the right. The camera is in front of her while she is staring elsewhere. With side lighting as the only source of lighting， which imitates the pale orange sunset to the right of the column， Sister Ruth’s face is lit brightly in orange while the rest of her body is in shadow in outer-space grey. Her clothing is white， which dominates the frame， but the shadows make it look grey. Because the column covers the background wall， which sunset cannot penetrate， the majority of the background is in black. Even though Sister Ruth is centered， white is not emphasized in this shot， as the pale orange and the grey and black shadow are emphasized in the shot.

Black Narcissus uses three-stripe Technicolor， which more expressively conveys emotions than black and white monochrome cinematography. As Higgins states in “Technology and Aesthetics，” even though the Technicolor technique faced constraints in the 1930s， it developed rapidly in the early 1940s. This film was made in 1947； the colors were more varied， realistic and highly contrasted. These developments in cinematographic aesthetics were products of enhanced Technicolor technology.

Black Narcissus deploys various colors and generates color motifs， which can characterize emotions. For example， the shot above implies a sense of jealousy. In this scene， Sister Ruth finds out that Mr. Dean and Sister Clodagh are talking privately； she is jealous because she is attracted to Mr. Dean and hates Sister Clodagh. The low-key pale yellow lighting emphasizes Sister Ruth’s face by extension her emotions. The contrast between the brightness of the orange light and the greyness the shadow on the white cloth expressively reveals the inner feelings.

Despite advances in Technicolor， we still can ascertain the influence of monochrome cinematographic aesthetics due to the abundance of shadows and contrasts. However， due to Technicolor processing， the representation of colors is subtler. Black Narcissus probably adopts the “silver halftone image printed from green record，” as this film perfectly encapsulates the contrast and shadow illumination （Higgins， 65）.