Just why is widescreen not accepted in the U.S.? (1 Viewer)

[Chris Brown]

I prefer widescreen 100%.

Size isn't a factor as I watch all my movies on a computer screen that is only 19" (Granted it's only a small bedroom, but...}

Anyways. My dad prefers "Fullscreen" simply because it makes the image larger and takes advantage of our bigscreen. While I disagree, I understand. You still don't see me watching Fullscreen or P&S movies though. I just wish the channels on Digital Cable were widescreen, *Sigh*

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Grinnell,

Let me point out to you that this forum,
by nature, is totally in favor of OAR.

This is supported by the forum's Mission
Statement.

I would strongly advise that you don't
continue to challenge the membership on their
position here.

Thank You.

 

[Patrick Larkin]

Thomas --

Of course there is information cropped and/or added from many films. My statement was intended to be simplified so I wouldn't have to type 3 paragraphs as you did to correct me.

 

[Lars Vermundsberget]

Grinnell wrote:

"Now what about dubbing the language in foreign films, why isn't there support for the concept that only the original language can perserve the film's art."


There is.




"A point was made that a preference for full screen is 'illogical'. Even if that is true, so what. A preference can be just a matter of taste: I prefer red wine to white wine, Macintosh are the only apples I like. No amount of "education" is going to get me to like other apples."


About "education": All the time lots of people are educated to understand and prefer OAR over "full-screen". I have yet to hear about anyone whose "education" made them switch from an understanding of OAR to a preference of MAR.

 

[Nick_Gray]

I prefer red wine to white wine

Wrong analogy. A more accurrate analogy would be "I prefer wine run through a Brita Filter to wine out of the bottle."
Would you listen to music with a sub only? Didn't think so.
Let's keep it apples to apples, huh?

 

[Jan Strnad]

I have an extensive set of "sampler" tunes from various eras. The idea is that you can license the entire tune for a fee to use in films, ads, etc. The end of each tune fades out prematurely.
Although there's some great music on these CDs, I can't stand to listen to them as entertainment because they are "cropped."
Same with movies. I can't stand chopping off the sides or making awkward pans from side to side. And when two people are talking, often the reaction to the dialogue is more important than the dialogue itself, and if you can't see that reaction (because the pan is concentrated on the speaker) you lose out.
I can appreciate the value of filling one's screen. It's nice when the screen is filled. But it's more important to see the whole picture and not a cropped version.
Grinnell, you don't know what you're missing.
Jan

 

[Grinnell]

I apologize for the "I have another life" wording, I did not mean to imply that others don't have a life.


After thinking about this I think there is a real point to be made about the height of the image, the size of characters and the viewing distance. For a fixed 10' viewing distance (WAF) a 36 inch screen height provides in my opinion a more theater like presentation than a 27 inch letterbox height. I haven't done the math, but for a particular screen height in a movie theater the wide screen height is equivalent to sitting many rows behind what a full screen height position would be. So I think it comes down to the question of where you are most comfortable sitting in the theater.

I am not so bold as to try to convert the wide screen advocates on this forum. I am pointing out that other viewpoints are not necessarily the result of ignorance and can be a legitimate preference.

I accept the strong advice of the owner of the forum and will in the future try to restrain myself.

 

[Jan Strnad]

I think that sometimes we do ourselves a disservice by trying to stifle viewpoints like Grinnell's on the grounds that this is a pro-OAR forum. People are not forced to read any thread, and if the p&s-vs.-widescreen debate annoys or bores someone, they can skip it.
On the other hand, having someone like Grinnell speak his mind shows us how rocky the road ahead is for letterbox evangelists. It helps us sharpen our debating skills and gives us valuable insight into the mind of the "enemy."
Let's face it: Letterboxing makes for a smaller image vertically, and it doesn't fill the TV screen that nearly all Americans have. Those are two big negative factors, easily seen by anyone viewing a letterboxed movie.
It takes a side-by-side comparison to show people what they're missing when they watch a P&S movie, and you still have the problem that the letterboxed image is smaller vertically.
It's also hard to demonstrate the dramatic advantage of letterboxing with still images or clips taken out of context. (What I mean is, there is an emotional impact to seeing the entire image over the course of the movie, vs. a lessened drama that comes from poorer storytelling caused by cropping and manipulating the images.) It's logistically impossible to demonstrate this difference.
It does seem that some people grasp the difference immediately and intuitively. They can sense that "something is missing" or "it feels awkward" when they watch a P&S movie. Other people are totally conditioned to seeing movies on TV this way.
Some people are mistaken and believe that the black bars are covering something up. They can be educated.
For others, the bigger picture and filled-up screen will always be more important than the "esoteric" advantages of letterboxing. They won't "get it" until they buy a widescreen TV, and then they still won't get it, they'll just know that widescreen movies fill their screen and give a bigger picture than "narrow" movies.
Jan

 

[Grinnell]

Thank you Jan Strnad,
you understand why I have tried to stick my head in the lions mouth around here just trying to help
I finally did the math, if I replace my 61 inch 4:3 set with a 72 inch 16:9 set I'll have the 3 foot high image I like and be able to watch all of the wide screen presentations. Unfortunately, the price currently would be about double what I paid, so it won't be anytime soon.

 

[stephen abbot]

And just to be a pain in the but, .... but if you take p&s then you get a mono feed for the audio, sorry no other option for p&s if you cut one you cut the other, sorry take it or lump it, no buts about it!
Now where are all those old pre hifi VHS's gone, sounds like I might be able to dump some
Cheers
Stephen

 

[Damin J Toell]

I finally did the math, if I replace my 61 inch 4:3 set with a 72 inch 16:9 set I'll have the 3 foot high image I like and be able to watch all of the wide screen presentations.

I've seen this argument made before, and I still don't get it. Why do movies have to fit within what you decide to be your ideal viewing height, at the expense of the movie itself? Are you watching the movie, or your equipment? This seems to me like deciding that the optimal length of a book to fit in your hands is 250 pages, so any book longer than that will simply have any pages after 250 ripped out (or have pages ripped out here and there to bring down the total page count to 250). It seems to me that people should be watching films to actually watch films, not force them to fit some predetermined logistics that compromise that which is supposedly being viewed in the first place. While it may simply be a "personal preference" to do the latter, it seems no more defensible to me than the aforementioned book example.

DJ

 

[stephen abbot]

This seems to me like deciding that the optimal length of a book to fit in your hands is 250 pages, so any book longer than that will simply have any pages after 250 ripped out (or have pages ripped out here and there to bring down the total page count to 250).

EXACTLY, just because you give a chap a canvas to do a painting for you, and he only covers a portion of the canvas with paint, is it correct that you return it to him and insist that he covers the entire canvas with paint?.


And while we are are handing out mono audio with our p&s pics I suggest strongly that we remove the chroma as well, can't have cut up pics served with mono sound and colour can we!

 

[Lars Vermundsberget]

Anyone who is in doubt, ask yourself these questions: Do you use your TV screen as a means to watch movies - or do you use movies to watch your screen? The answer might say something about where you put your priorities...

 

[Thomas Newton]

I finally did the math, if I replace my 61 inch 4:3 set with a 72 inch 16:9 set I'll have the 3 foot high image I like and be able to watch all of the wide screen presentations. Unfortunately, the price currently would be about double what I paid, so it won't be anytime soon.

If you're deciding what kind of TV (4:3 or 16:9) to buy to watch widescreen movies (pick an AR), there's another approach: buy a 4:3 TV, but "size it up".

A 4:3 set gives you 12 units of height for each 16 of width. Screen height is 60% of the diagonal measurement.

A 16:9 set gives you 9 units of height for each 16 of width. Screen height is 49% of the diagonal measurement.

In this case, desired 16:9 display area is 3 feet (36 inches), which means that if you went to buy a 4:3 TV set, you would look for one with a height of 48 inches, width of 64 inches, and diagonal of 80 inches.

An equivalent 16:9 TV (for purposes of displaying 16:9 films in OAR) would have a height of 36 inches, width of 64 inches, and diagonal of 73.4 inches.

Since 4:3 TV sets are considerably cheaper than 16:9 ones (at least where direct-view sets are concerned -- at this size you're usually talking about projection TVs), it might be economical to buy the oversized 4:3 set even if most of your viewing will be of OAR widescreen films.

2:35 films will be letterboxed on either TV, but will have the same display area.

For TV material and Academy-Ratio movies, the 4:3 set will display the larger picture (4 feet high, rather than 3 feet high.)

 

[Colin Sims]

Why widescreen is not accepted in the US?
History has shown that just because something is better isn't a good enough reason for Americans to choose it.
Can anyone say the metric system, PAL?
Col (dodging the flames)

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Can anyone say the metric system, PAL?

While the metric system makes more sense, I prefer NTSC because it allows the preservation of the original soundtrack, and the ability to restore playback of films to 24 fps through progressive scan.

 

[John_Berger]

Unlike your comparisons, the AR of a film is a fact. A given film has a given set AR, and it's simply not debatable and it's certainly not a matter of taste. It isn't chocolate vs. vanilla, it's right vs. wrong; a film is either viewed in it's proper AR or it isn't. Preferring wrongness, therefore, isn't a tenable position.

Hear hear!!
We need a "hands clapping" smily animation for statements like this.

 

[John_Berger]

As for logical arguements for wide screen, while they are pursuasive to the believers, since this is a matter of taste or preference, they cannot pursuade people who have different tastes.

While they cannot be persuaded, it most certainly is not a matter of preference. It is the intentional mutilation of someone else's work. You are demanding that someone else change what he has done to suit your tastes.
In that case, I demand that you repaint your house and your car into a color scheme of my choice - how about fuscia and mauve, or maybe peuce? In fact, I'll pay you the $20 that you can then use to pay for your pan-and-scan DVDs. Your house and your car are yours - the deeds and titles are in your name. They are YOUR property.
"I just paid you $20 for the privilege of seeing your house! That should give me the right to see your house in a manner that suits my tastes!"
Yet I will guarantee that you will completely refuse to change your house and car colors to suit my "tastes". Why? Well, of course, because the house and car are yours, not mine! How dare I tell you what to do with your house and car!
I am the one who has to see them when I drive down your street, which means that I can do one of two things: (A) drive down a different street or (B) just get used to it.
Why is it okay for you to refuse my demands that you change your property to suit my tastes, yet filmmakers are just expected to allow you to change their property to suit your tastes?
This is one of the blatant double-standards in the "It's a matter of taste" argument.

 

[Inspector Hammer!]

Lars, John,
you da man, er um, MEN!
Lars,
your post touches on a belief that a freind and I have believed in for quite some time, and that is I rule what my monitor displays, IT does not rule me.
A HT monitor of ANY size or shape, 4x3 or 16x9, is merely a display device used for delivering whatever AR a given film was shot in, period. It's a piece of equipment who's only job requirment is to show me films in their OAR's.
I don't care if my screen was ROUND, i'm still going to watch my films in their proper AR's on it AND I'LL LIKE IT!

 

[John_Berger]

I don't care if my screen was ROUND

Hey, if anything, that would be great for the shower scene in Porky's. I can't imagine that it would be good anywhere else, but that's okay!