Was 'Full Metal Jacket' shot in 4:3? (2 Viewers)

[Thomas_Berg]

i bought one for myself online and got one for Christmas and both are in 4:3. i cant seem to find a widescreen version...was it shot in the 1.33:1 aspect?

 

[RobR]

It's in the correct aspect ratio. Full Metal Jacket, The Shining, and Eyes Wide Shut were matted to 1.85:1 when shown in theaters. There is not a widescreen version available.

 

[John J Nelson]

Kubrick liked the 4:3 ratio, and regarded theatrical matting to 1.85:1 as a necessary compromise. So relax, you're seeing the film as the great man intended
-- J.

 

[Jeff]

I stated the same thing John did and got beaten up pretty bad on this forum for doing so. Seems a lot of people think that 1.85:1 is the way they should be on DVD. I disagree.

Jeff

 

[Mattias_ka]

RobR, If you have seen them in theaters in 1.85:1 you have seen them in WRONG OAR. They should be between 1.37:1-1.55:1, a soft matt. The dvd and ld versions are correct.

Even before the Swedish dvd of Eyes wide shut there is a text that said that Kubrick wanted the movie to be in 1.33:1.

 

[RobR]

RobR, If you have seen them in theaters in 1.85:1 you have seen them in WRONG OAR. They should be between 1.37:1-1.55:1, a soft matt. The dvd and ld versions are correct.

Even before the Swedish dvd of Eyes wide shut there is a text that said that Kubrick wanted the movie to be in 1.33:1.

Huh? I believe Kubrick shot it in 1.33:1 with the knowledge that it would be matted to 1.85:1 theaterically in the United States and released on DVD in 1.33:1. Just because they were shown in 1.37:1-1.55:1 in theaters in Sweden (from what it sounds like in your post) doesn't mean Americans saw Full Metal Jacket, The Shining, and Eyes Wide Shut in the incorrect OAR.

Kubrick wanted the movie to be in 1.33:1 for release on DVD, but he didn't enforce that restriction for viewing in theaters, so I'm not sure if the term original aspect ratio applies here.

 

[Jonathan Perregaux]

In the matted theatrical presentation of The Shining you would not have seen the helicopter blades in the opening shots because they would have been cropped. The film was indeed shot with the intention of it being shown in a scope-like format, but apart from a couple oddities the filmed material looks equally good in standard.
Example of a soft matte (taken from http://www.cs.tut.fi/~leopold/Ld/FilmToVideo/index.html

Here it seems that we really lose picture information with the letterbox version: There is clearly more information on the top and bottom of the screen in the open matted version. Unfortunately this extraneous information is also the problem of opening the mattes. The areas now opened for the viewer can't have important new information compared to the letterboxed release, because the director was only looking at the widescreen area shots when he was making the movie. There also may be some unwanted information present in the opened matte like in my example picture: a microphone at the top of the picture and a Coke-bottle at the bottom of the Enchanted Sea. These days, though, this is not such a problem anymore, because when making the video master, the picture may be zoomed into in critical scenes where unwanted things are shown.
For economical reasons, special effects are usually shot or calculated only for the widescreen part of the movie (typically around 2:1), so in scenes with special effects a full-screen version of an open matte movie is panned & scanned just like an anamorphic or hard-matted movie. This can clearly be seen in Terminator 2 or the Back to the Future movies.

 

[Thomas_Berg]

thanks guys...now to see if i can return the unopened one!

 

[Rich Malloy]

Thomas, a lotta folks make their own mattes (to cover up the black bars which tend to shine a bit more distractingly gray than black). If you make yourself a set, you can be your own projectionist and 'soft-matte' it down to your favorite dimensions!

(I don't recommend this for the Kubrick films, and especially for Eyes Wide Shut, but I've heard some say they much prefer a matted Shining.)

 

[Ken_McAlinden]

In the matted theatrical presentation of The Shining you would not have seen the helicopter blades in the opening shots because they would have been cropped.

This is simply not true. The helicopter shadow is matted out, but the whirring blades are still visible at the top of the frame during the establishing shots of the overlook when matted to 1.85:1.

Regards,

 

[Ken Seeber]

The film was indeed shot with the intention of it being shown in a scope-like format, but apart from a couple oddities the filmed material looks equally good in standard.

This also is inacurate. "Scope" is a generic term for anamorphic widescreen presentations, or at the very least the wider theatrical formats, such as 2.35:1. "The Shining" was presented theatrically in the U.S. at 1.85:1, not anything approaching what could be called scope.

 

[Jonathan Perregaux]

My bad! I definitely slipped up on my terminology. I should have said "Academy Flat" (1.85:1). You're absolutely right that "Anamorphic Scope" (2.35:1) is not what The Shining was meant to be matted to (thank God).
And those helicopter blades are damned annoying at any aspect ratio.

 

[Jack Briggs]

And thus this thread draws to a close.

Remember, the term used for what Mr. Kubrick did in framing his post-2001 works is "shoot to protect." It was rational framing chosen by an artist living in a world of pan-and-scan video.

 

[RobR]

Good think it happened after 2001: A Space Odyssey was released as I can't imagine it being in anything other than the original aspect ratio. 2001 would be ruined in 1.33:1.

 

[Ted Lee]

boy, i totally scared myself for a second. i just picked this up and saw the opening scene and almost pooped when i didn't see the black bars! :b

[edit] but then i wonder why the packaging says "standard version: this film has been modified....it has been formatted to fit your screen" ?

 

[Anders Englund]

but then i wonder why the packaging says "standard version: this film has been modified....it has been formatted to fit your screen" ?

Technically, it has been modified From it's theatrical presentation.
--Anders

 

[Juan C]

Yes, Anders, that's why I prefer to have a home presentation as close to the theatrical presentation as possible.
When I watch The Shining or Full Metal Jacket, I prefer to watch them in their OTAR. When I had a 4:3 TV, I used carboard mattes. Now that I have a projector, I zoom the picture. It's 1.77:1, not 1.85:1, but accurate enough.

 

[Richard Kim]

Technically, it has been modified From it's theatrical presentation.

But on the Shining packaging, it says that it's presented in the aspect ratio that Kubrick intended.
I had both versions of FMJ, and in the later version, the credit screen listing all the actors fills the entire 4:3 screen, whereas the old version had more space on the top and bottom, to accomidate a 1.85:1 presentation. That's probably why it has the "modifed for your screen" disclaimer" They modified the credits.

 

[Ted Lee]

thx for the clarification guys! i can now relax and enjoy my most excellent movie!

 

[Patrick McCart]

Quote:

Indeed, but the way 2001 would be adapted for 1.33:1 is totally different from how any of his other 35mm films would be adapted for 1.33:1. Lolita, Dr. Strangelove, A Clockwork Orange, and Barry Lyndon were shot with 1.66:1 hard-matted cameras. (Strangelove was shot with a combination of both unmatted and hard-matted cameras) Those films are presented "full film area" rather than pan & scan.