Disney produce wide screen comparison demo!!

[Douglas R]

Just got the 2 disc widescreen Collector's Edition of Disney's Sleeping Beauty from France (it is only issued in the UK in a pan & scan single disc version) and guess what...it includes a 6 minute demonstration of the widescreen version on the top half of the screen and the pan & scan version on the lower half, showing very clearly just how much image is lost in the pan & scan version. So they are doing exactly what many in the HTF have said they should be doing. Presumably this will be included in the Region 1 version when Disney get round to releasing it. There is a large amount of fabulous material on these discs which, believe me, are well worth waiting for.

 

[Rain]

Well, well...small steps in the right direction. This is encouraging.
Hopefully this will not be limited to the R2 release.

 

[Jeff Kleist]

I was on the LD as well. Unfortunately they don't choose a lot of scenes with LOTS of stuff going on in the background

 

[Anne M]

This is wonderful news. And Disney couldn't have chosen a better film to showcase the wonders of widescreen, IMHO.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

I give much kudos to Disney for doing

what the other studios should have done

at least a year ago.

Problem is, with Disney releasing P&S ONLY

titles to the market it kind of makes you

wonder if the horse or the carraige came first.

 

[Frank Anderson]

I have a feeling we probably will not see it here. I hope I am wrong. I wonder what the motivation was to do it?

 

[Lars Vermundsberget]

As Jeff mentioned, this comparison was on the LD box set of the same title about five years ago. The important thing is whether this is going to be made accessible to a larger audience or not...

I sincerely believe that most studios could educate consumers on this matter quite successfully if they wanted to. Since they don't, that leaves two options the way I see it:

1. They ("studios" in general) have not been thoroughly informed about the importance of this issue.

or

2. There is indeed some "hidden agenda" somewhere: They want people to buy P&S DVDs now and rebuy the titles in WS (or maybe 16:9 P&S) later. This probably belongs in another thread, though...

 

[Malcolm R]

That's what I was thinking. If it was on the LD, then it was produced several years ago. Apparently, Disney has CHOSEN not to use it in any mass-market fashion. So praise may be premature.

 

[Matt Pelham]

Speaking of educating the public, I was in Blockbuster the other night and they had a widescreen vs. pan+scan demo playing on their Direct TV kiosk. It was only a couple of minutes long, but they showed a scene in fullscreen immediately followed by the same scene in beautiful widescreen. Then they cut back to the host who said something like "these black bars allow you to see the director's true vision!" It was great.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

It can't be a demo just burried deep inside some hidden extras or documentary.
It needs to be a demo that happens when the disc is inserted...just like their previews that bombard you without you asking.
All in all it's still nice to hear. I do hope the American version has it too...although as others have said this isn't a sign that Disney is taking this on as a new policy or approach, it just happens to be part of the "extras" from the Sleeping Beauty laserdisc.
But we sure can Call and email Disney and let them know we think this is an example of what we're talking about

BTW, has everyone reading this thread contacted Disney and told them you want WS OAR (especially for Muppet treasure Island/Chritmas Carol) and that you think a widescreen "demo" at the beginning of their DVDs is a great way to educate the public?
-dave

 

[Douglas R]

It can't be a demo just burried deep inside some hidden extras or documentary.

True. That is the problem with the demo on the R2 Sleeping Beauty. You have to search for it amongst all the other extras. When I started this thread I didn't realise the demo had originally appeared on the laser disc. No doubt it just happened to be an extra which was easy to transfer to the DVD. In view of this I don't think it heralds any sort of policy decision on Disney's part, especially as here in the UK we have to make do with a pan & scan version - which annoys me intensely.