DTS/DD on Pan-and-Scan DVD? Why bother? (1 Viewer)

[Glenn Overholt]

No, P&S is about telling the director to f*** off! All the time he spent composing and making sure that he got on the screen what he intended means nothing to a P&S fan.

Let's face it. A P&S fan just doesn't have any respect.

Glenn

 

[Kevin M]

I very much prefer OAR but . To deny people of P&S is just as bad as denying us of OAR IMO.

 

[MarkHastings]

Ok, so in the case of 'open matte', that would be like an extra thick piece of steak that won't cook properly because it's TOO thick. A perfect piece of steak has to be just the right size to cook up properly.

 

[Thomas T]

As one who believes that films on DVD should reflect their original theatrical incarnation, how about this imaginary scenario for two separate discs?

1. Jaws P&S, DD 5.1 Stereo Surround.

and

2. Jaws OAR: 2.35, DD Mono.

What do you want to bet that many HTF'ers would be screaming at the stupidity of including a DD 5.1 track on a P&S disc but not on the OAR disc when in fact the first disc is a an aberration of both sight and sound and the disc 2 an accurate presentation of the original theatrical experience.

 

[Jesse Skeen]

Well, I bet some people with 5.1 setups want sound coming from ALL their speakers all the time, so why not just put 5.1 tracks on P&S versions with the same sound coming out of all the speakers?

 

[MarkHastings]

Let's try a different approach...High quality tires on a shitty car? Why bother?



or
A DTS DVD seen through S-Video or composite hookups? Why bother?

or
A flat panel monitor on a Widows 2000 machine? Why bother?

EDIT: Yes, the above is sarcasm.

 

[Scott Merryfield]

The director could make specific P&S comments, such as:

"There was something very interesting going on in the left half of the frame, but you can't see it because it's been chopped off in the video transfer"

"We spent a lot of time setting up the proper composition for this shot, but you can't see it because it's lost in this pan & scan transfer"

I love the comments regarding Ernie Hudson on Ghostbusters finally not being cut out of certain scenes as had been the case on the TV versions for all those years.

 

[Chuck Mullen]

What is an "audiocasette"?

 

[Jonathan Carter]

This forum is becoming so sickeningly elitist lately it's unbelievable. Why can't you people just come to grips with the fact that some people don't like widescreen even if they do understand the difference. You aren't a better person for liking widescreen and you may not even know as much about movies. And please, let's not start talking about how P&S is disrespectful of a director, that's crap. They got paid to do their film, it belongs to the studio, they can distribute it however they want to.

You can't run around making stripped discs for P&S (especially since we who buy the widescreen versions would end up paying more for ours) nor should you even want to. It's about personal preference.

I guess non-DTS releases should all be p&S because any idiot knows DTS is superior to DD, english dubbed foreign films, etc. should all be banned or cost more also to educate the foolish who would dare not share your views on film.

I understand the forum's mission statement and totally agree with it, but nowhere in it do I see anything saying we should look down on and insult those who don't share our ideals and lately there are a lot of threads doing just that.

 

[MarkHastings]

Not to mention, the Fullframe market is a BIG market and you wouldn't want to piss that market away.

I may not like this approach, but I understand it. As much as I'd love to see the FF viewers go away, I realize that without their support, DVD would go the way of LD and not be as popular (and as cheap) as it is today.

As much as the pro-FF market hurts the pro-WS market, getting rid of the FF (or non-OAR) DVD's would hurt the WS market even more so.

The best bet is conversion via education. The battle won't be won by destroying and/or frustrating them.

 

[Glenn Overholt]

I just can't agree to that. Anyone buying FF is getting screwed. The studios KNOW that when they get a WS set, they'll be buying all of their movies all over again. I just hope that all of them don't find out at the same time.

I can't call J6P stupid. If he/she/they insists on filling their TV screens up, fine. That's their business and none of mine (unless I'nm forced to watch a movie at their house).

All of the studios should have all of their releases done in OAR only, and have a short on the disk showing exactly what is done to get a WS movie to FF, and that FF sets are all going bye-bye.

Any studio that does this is going to get more long time customers when they realize that OAR is the only way to go. If someone wants to buy a movie but passes on it because it is only available in it's OAR, they'll be thinking about saving their money up to buy a WS set.

It has beeen said here often that - I won't buy it unless it has an OAR version available. What would you do if the Star Wars OT only came out in FF this year! Pissed? Would you still pass it up? That was a cheap shot but think about it for a minute.

If you love the film that much, (going back to J6P), he would buy it in it's OAR even with a 4:3 set, but I think it would be stupid for the studios to drop their FF versions UNLESS they inform everyone that FF is just plain WRONG, period.

What gets me too is that they are (both FF and OAR versions) the same price. Let's get off of the TV stand here for a minute. The studio pays to get the movies made into FF, and the OAR buyers help to pay for it.

At the least the studios should make the FF versions priced higher. Just one buck would be enough (supposedly to help defray the cost), but they have to make sure that the extra price was reflected down to the retail level. Why should we pay for the FF versions?

Glenn

 

[DaveF]

Or perhaps they should charge extra for anamorphically encoded widescreen movies. Why should full-framers pay extra for the widescreen versions?

The full-frame version is going to be made anyway for distribution to airlines and network TV. I'd also wager that the cost of producing the full-frame version is negligible compared to the costs of multiple soundtrackes, special features, marketing, etc.

Buy OAR. Watch OAR. Advocate OAR to friends. But get away from the silliness of suggesting full-frame versions should have fewer features, higher prices, etc.

 

[Jonathan Carter]

Well by that logic, big budget movies should cost more to go see because the studio is paying more to produce it. That isn't the way it works though because stuff that's catered 1 crowd is partially financed by other movies another crowd wants to see. Huge blockbusters help defray the cost of small indie films and mega popular pop music generates $$ studios can use to sign smaller unknown artists to their label.

It all comes down to choice. If we can demand that FF is taken off the market because we don't agree with it even though a lot of people know what they are buying and don't care then when will it end. I'd like for Adam Sandler & Ben Stiller movies to quit being made because I hate them and when they come out, they run smaller movies right out of the theater to free up screens. Guess what though, some people like them and that's just how it is. I hate Brittney Spears but her crappy album sales help pay for the production of music I like while keeping the cost of that music low.

Don't like it, don't buy it. It's your choice. The very few MAR only sacrifices we have to make in order to get tons of releases that are OAR is there and it isn't going anywhere. You can't please everyone and there is absolutly no reason to shaft half of the viewing public just to please the other half. We are in a golden age of DVD releases here with movies and TV shows being restored and released that most thought would never see the light of day, and yet some people still get bent out of shape about releases that are MAR only even though are few and far between. I just don't understand it.

 

[MikeAlletto]

About the same amount of respect some people here show for other people just because they want their screen filled.

 

[MichaelPe]

Whoa... I think that some people are missing the point of my original post. Never have I accused P&S consumers to be inferior in any way to those who purchase OAR. My point was simply to debate the profitability of releasing P&S films with multichannel audio tracks.

In the long run, I believe that P&S will be phased out. Television manufacturers will eventually phase out 4:3 sets. Whichever format we'll be using at that point (DVD or HD-DVD), I don't know. In order to make the transition for existing P&S consumers more "appealing", I am suggesting that studios release widescreen DVDs with additional technical/extra features.

As I've mentioned before, an uneducated consumer today has two choices for a given movie: Widescreen and Fullscreen. Both of these formats are being marketed as different flavors of the same film, priced equally. Some studios aren't making an effort to present OAR as the "smarter" choice. There is nothing elitist in my argument... I'm simply stating that studios are treating this issue with indifference. By offering some features on the widescreen version *only*, then studios are implicitly telling consumers which format has a better "value".

I don't see this costing studios anything more than they're already spending. A die-hard P&S consumer will continue to buy fullscreen, and will most likely not care about the absence of certain features. In the event that this consumer, one day, decides to upgrade to a better format, then the studios will make another sale.

So, from a financial point of view, wouldn't it be more profitable for studios to adopt such a release strategy?

Again, I'll reiterate that I do not care about how P&S DVDs are released. It doesn't affect me, but I'm simply debating whether studios are doing the right thing by releasing widescreen and fullscreen DVDs with identical features.

 

[Jonathan Carter]

Believe it or not there are people out there who enjoy watching TV and movies without all of our fancy equipment and have no plans to ever upgrade it. This extends to their TV. I know people who still watch movies on a 13-19" non-flat, mono sound, tv and just don't care. But guess what, they still love their movies and can discuss them just as intellegetly as anyone on this forum. Shot composition is important to a film, but it pales in comparion to the storyline, dialog, plot pacing, acting, and overall directing. All of those things still come through just fine on a 4:3 set and a P&S DVD.

 

[Jonathan Carter]

-broke up the post because it was absurdly long-



They are only a "Smart consumer" by your narrow view of the term. A lot of the consumers are aware of the differences but still want P&S. They are just as intelligent as you, they just have different tastes or demands from a movie.


I'm sure I'm beating a dead horse now though so that should be the end of my rant (unless someone pulls me back in ). Hopefully no one I disagreed with took offence from my statements because none was intended, I just like a heated discussion and it comes through in my posts sometimes.

 

[MichaelPe]

Jonathan,

I appreciate the fact that you're playing the devil's advocate here because this is making the discussion a lot more interesting. Ultimately, I think that the main point we disagree on is that I believe that Pan-and-Scan exists only to accomodate those who are unwilling to watch films the way they were intended to be watched.

Well, then I guess that we differ on our definitions of "smart". I forget who the author of this quote is, but here is something that I completely agree with:

"A true intellectual is one who, regardless of intelligence or education, will readily give up his opinion on a matter when presented with a greater truth."

Cheers!

 

[Jonathan Dagmar]

Home Theatre Forum supports widescreen and or original aspect ratio. If people come on here espousing the virtues of pan and scam, fool screen, or anything else that walks all over a piece of art, then they have it coming.

 

[Jonathan Carter]

Knew I couldn't stay away...



It is screwing them because the most important aspect of a DVD is for people to decide on their own. There are movies I don't care for that I own simply because the extras had stuff I was interested in knowing about (technical documentarys, etc...) and there are DVDs I own less for the greatness of the film and more for the score of sound mix. The major majority of DVDs I own though are for actual film. And guess what, I liked movies before I had a choice of P&S vs. widescreen and if they quit producing dvds with the film in it's OAR format, I would still buy them.

I love the film, not the shot composition. Yes, very it's important, but as I stated earlier, it's not as imporatant as all the other aspects of the film to me because I've loved movies when I've seen them in a P&S format so obviously I can enjoy them even when they are butchered by being P&Sed.