Why Are Superhero Movies Always Dark?
Superhero movies are always a must watch for me. Be it from the stables of DC or Marvel to any other franchise. In fact once I saw the trailer and it's a superhero movie. I'll definitely put it in my watch list anticipating its release. Then I either download it if it's already on Netflix or I see it at the Cinemas .
But recently these superhero movies tend to bore me with their persistent dark scenes. Already I struggle to see what's on the screen on a normal bright movie with the help of my glasses. This is because my vision appears blurry. Now imagine when the pictures are dark.
I could manage some Marvel movies. I don't think they're really that dark compared to DC movies. Recently DC movies appear darker than before. Like the Batman trilogy by Christopher Nolans had a bit of bright light. But the recent ones like the Batman vs Superman, it was like almost every scene from the movie was dark. This same thing applies with Suicide Squad.
In Wonder Woman, the island scene seemed bright with colourful scenes until they got to Diane's fight scenes in London. They switched back to the dark and dim scenes that make it boring to watch visually.
Makes me wonder why it's so, why so dark?. Why don't they just increase the brightness in these movies? Is it a part of the directing routine for superhero movies? Or is it just the way they wanna keep making gloomy and dark movies for us movie lovers?.
I suspect that there are several reasons. From a film editing perspective, it is usually easier to remove light than to add light. It is easier to remove unwanted elements from dark films.
In the days of technicolor, editors used a labor intense three color process. They were adding color to films and editors liked producing bright colorful films like the 1939 Wizard of Oz.
I understand that filmmakers today are shooting in high resolution digital. The like to apply filters and masks to the film to create a consistent look and feel.
You can play around with saturation and contrast with photo editors like Gimp or Creative Suite. It is easy to get interesting looks and feel to a photo.
BTW: An interesting related theme is why have the story lines behind Super hero movies become so dark? The super hero movies of yesteryear simply had the super hero save the day. Today, the movies tend to have extremely dark themes framed by a dark setting.
I suspect that the answer to the second question has a lot to do with the ideological capture of Hollywood.
!pizza
when I read the title, I thought you were referring to the mood of the story telling being very dark and sinister, rather than lighting technique. But I think the dark story telling does have a lot to do with the lighting, using the darkness to set a more foreboding mood. And yes, superhero films are too dark, as is a lot of science fiction (written and filmed).