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Old 01-29-2005, 12:12 AM   #6 of 20
Michael Reuben
Michael Reuben
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Location: New York City, Lehman Bros. was here
Join Date: Feb 1998
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Local Date: 11-22-2008
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Quote:
The opening Columbia logo and the entire screen credits are letterboxed but not anamorphic.
Quote:
It's so strange - as soon as Preminger's credit is done it goes anamorphic.

To be precise: The opening credits, like the entire feature, are indeed "anamorphic" in the sense that the video has been enhanced for 16:9, will play back in the correct proportions on a widescreen TV, and will be wrongly proportioned on a 4:3 screen without downconversion. However, the opening credits have been severely "windowboxed" so that the frame is much smaller than the rest of the feature, although it is still correctly proportioned.

I assume this was done so that none of the Saul Bass title sequence would be obscured by the overscan found on most consumer TVs. I agree that they overdid it on the windowboxing -- the proportions didn't need to be shrunk so substantially -- but I'm not troubled by it.

M.



"Most people never have to face the fact that, at the right time and the right place, they're capable of anything." -- Chinatown

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