DVD subjugation of the consumer masses

[peter johnson]

My favorite bad pan & scan moment:
In John Boorman's "Hope and Glory" -- a wonderful movie -- there is an essential scene toward the end of the film wherein the Grandfather, who hasn't been very nice to the boy up to this point, takes the kid's point of view and starts railing against the horrors of modern British education.  In pan & scan -- like they showed on TV -- it looks as if he's just ranting and raving to himself while sitting in his car.  Only in widescreen do you see the headmaster outside the car listening to the Grandfather's rant in sheer disbelief.  It's a great scene, totally ruined by pan & scan.
peter johnson/denny crane

[Neville]

ulthar Wrote:
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> My family (sisters) PREFERS full screen; they find
> the letterbox format of widescreen annoying.  It
> drives me nuts!  (When they buy DVD's for us or
> our children, they get full screen only versions
> as often as not).
>

Let them see some examples at http://www.widescreen.org/ , so they can see what they are missing. I've convinced several friends that way.

About the different DVD releases, I don't care much about extras, except directors commentary tracks. I do get annoyed when I hear of longer cuts available, though.

[LilCerberus]

Neville Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ulthar Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > My family (sisters) PREFERS full screen; they
> find
> > the letterbox format of widescreen annoying.
> It
> > drives me nuts!  (When they buy DVD's for us or
> > our children, they get full screen only
> versions
> > as often as not).
> >
>
> Let them see some examples at
> http://www.widescreen.org/ , so they can see what
> they are missing. I've convinced several friends
> that way.
>
> About the different DVD releases, I don't care
> much about extras, except directors commentary
> tracks. I do get annoyed when I hear of longer
> cuts available, though.


My stepdad, who's in his eighties, hates letterboxing, & really loves that zoom feature on his new dvd player.
He's got one of those big screen TVs from the early '90s, & would just assume see the whole top & bottom of the screen filled up.

[Jim H]

" they took a 4x3 print & cropped the top & bottom of the screen. Trust me, you do miss something."

And I assume it wasn't an open matte 4x3 print, right?  Sometimes movies are filmed at 4x3 with the intention of matting out the top and bottom for theatrical ratios.  Which is why in some full frame versions of movies you can see stuff like boom mics or wiring at the top or bottom, but you can't in the widescreen.  

In any case though, I believe that is what they did with my Evil Dead Book of the Dead edition DVD - took the original 4x3 version (which, to my knowledge, was intended to be 4x3) and matted the top and bottom.  Fortunately, you don't seem to lose much with Evil Dead.

[peter johnson]

Regular 16mm presents itself naturally as a "full-screen" shot on most TVs and can be assumed to be okay for some films shot in that format from the '50's and '60's, as the popularity of the 16mm format came really from WW2 when may GIs were given closed 16mm cameras & told to shoot whatever they saw.  This gave us Russ Meyer & James Wong Howe and others who continued with what they'd been taught in the Army.
I continue to shoot in regular 16mm, and it just about fills a full TV screen with no adjustments.
peter johnson/denny crane

[Flangepart]

ulthar Wrote:
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> Siskell and Ebert did a whole show on this a while
> back, and I remember two of the specific examples
> they used:
>
> (1) The "leg scene" from THE GRADUATE, where Ben
> is talking to Mrs. Robinson in the bedroom while
> she is putting on (or was it taking off?) her
> stocking.  In the Pan and Scan version, all you
> can see is her foot, and the total effect of the
> erotic tension Ben is feeling is lost.  It turns
> one of the most ingenuously framed shots into just
> some dweeb yacking away nervously.
>
> (2) The opening shot in BLADE RUNNER:  In
> widescreen, you get the effect of this enormous
> panorama of huge megalopolis as the flying car
> flies out.  It is a breathtaking shot.  In Pan and
> Scan, you see the flying car center-screen with
> some lighted buildings in the background.  The
> shot that sets the stage for the entire culture
> (and it's problems and issues) is completely
> neutralized.
>
> The ones that really annoy me are the ones that
> have two characters talking side by side and the
> P&S images slides back and forth between them.
> This introduces a LOT of camera movement not
> included by the original direction and editing,
> and generally looks very ham-handed.

YES! Pan & Scan can eat my shorts! The scene in YONGARRY where ya can't see the monster in the back ground, and you have to trust the Kenny...trust the Kenny...when he TELLS you the monster is drinking oil. Okey...its Yongarry, but the point is still made!

[Neon Noodle]

AUGH!

I just knew it.

Saw 2, now available on Director's Cut 2 disc edition.

Told ya, they keep milking us for more every day.....

[Doc Daneeka]

Bought "The Thing" Collector's Edition a few months back, only to find there was another near-identical "Collector's Edition" available, only more user-friendly with about 2 more extras. Now, for a cinephile like me, that is one hell of a dirty trick!

On the subj. of The Thing, does anyone know of a DVD release of The Thing with the opening and closing voiceovers?

[raj]

It's tricks like these that make me wait a while before I pick up a DVD.

[BeyondTheGrave]

raj Wrote:
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> It's tricks like these that make me wait a while
> before I pick up a DVD.


You probably have to wait even longer because of sequels. Everytime a a sequel comes out the old one gets the works.

Also a new Punisher(2004) dvd was put out. Man that movie came out awhile ago.

[Yaddo 42]

There was enough demand for a new DVD release of The Punisher? Scientologists trying to boost Travolta career? A secret cult of Thomas Jane fans/groupies? Evil Dead films, John Carpenter, Tarantino, Disney, Rocky Horror, etc. I can see. But The Punisher?

Then again I'm still kicking myself for not getting the two-disk version of Master and Commander.

Almost anything remotely mainstream that's new to disk I wait to buy, figuring on either an expanded release if it sells well or spawns a sequel, or a markdown when demand falls off. Serenity, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Network etc. I'm still feeling stung by buying the DVD of Once Upon a Time in the West right away and seeing tons of still new copies for half the price I paid. I do need to pick up the Conan collection although I only really care about the first film.

If I had Netflix I'd explore some of the expanded rereleases like the new version of Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels. Not willing to pay that much for a few extras and cut scenes unless it significantly changes the film.

[Just Plain Horse]

I may be repeating what someone else has already said, but-

I think the lesson is to be an informed buyer. I use the internet anytime I find a DVD that's come out so I can find out what's on it- since half the time they don't tell you on the back everything in it. Sometimes there's a good DVD that comes out that's worth waiting for (I can't tell you how long I'd been waiting for Rhino to release the MST3K version of Godzilla vs. Megalon in ANY format)- and it should be grabbed up while its available- but I would encourage all not to buy DVDs impulsively as well, mainly because we all have different tastes and like things in different ways. Since there's no reason to blindly grab whatever is put on retail shelves, why be gullible and manipulated by marketing?

I like the idea of different covers for a DVD -but then I'm no collector who's going to buy half a dozen copies of the same movie for a little artwork.

[Yaddo 42]

The "collectable covers" hustle is part of what p**sed me off and turned me off of comics back in the 90s. I'm sure not going to fall for it with DVDs. LIke the multpile covers of the 10th anniversary edition of "Reservior Dogs", which fill a slot in the $7.50 movie island at Wally World, meanwhile that new 15th anniversary edition is being sold with the matchbook DVD case inside the "collectable" tin.

I'm still reluctant to upgrade certain movies to DVD from VHS unless they are ones I really love or watch a whole lot, and there are few of those. My Name is Nobody, yes. Out of Sight, nope.

[Jack]

That really doesn't bother me - I just don't have any interest in upgrading to a DVD with more features etc.  I just buy it for the movie, and I'll usually watch the special features, but I'm rarely very impressed with them.  Once you've seen 10 "making of" featurettes, you've pretty much seen them all.  I like a good commentary track once in a while, if it's amusing and fun, but I've heard way too much about how this scene was much longer in the first draft of the script, etc.  Just not interested.