Busy day, so I will make this a quickie.
I was reminded recently of one of the most beautiful pieces of black and white cinematography I know of—the river scene in Charles Laughton's brilliant and chilling "Night of the Hunter." I don't want to ruin the story if you haven't seen the movie, but all you really need to know for a lead-in is that the evil preacher (Robert Mitchum) is relentlessly pursuing the brother and sister, and they escape in a rowboat down the Mississippi River. It's a long clip, but worth watching all the way through so you can catch all the different little animals on the side of the river (not to mention the feeling of utter dread at the appearance of the evil preacher's silhouette).
The weird thing is, this movie flopped at the box office and Laughton never directed again.