Funny, I was watching Young Frankenstein the other night, and in the extras Mel Brooks mentions they never would have made the film had they been forced to use color. It was a deal breaker. Seeing color stills of Peter Boyle in makeup is very strange. It was designed to photograph best in black and white.

I have no issue with colorization today so long as the original is included in equal quality. (This wasn't always the case.) The colorized versions of the early Harryhausen films, (with creative input from the master himself) were watchable, but it doesn't look like any of the color processes used in the 50's either. Other old movies do not have the benefit of a living artist to supervise the process of course.

Black and white cinematography had it's own separate Academy Award category until the mid 1960's, IIRC.

In any case, feel free to start a thread on BW vs. color elsewhere, as this is getting off track. :)