Channels Showing Full Widescreen Films
mattyb
Posts: 1,185 Forum Member
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Do you think any other channels other than the Sky channels and Channel 4 will eventually show movies in their full aspect ratio?
I've noticed Five have shown the odd few, BBC HD do it and tonight Watch are showing Stargate in full widescreen.
Is it down to cost that few channels show them or is it the networks believe the viewers want 16:9 cropped programmes?
I've noticed Five have shown the odd few, BBC HD do it and tonight Watch are showing Stargate in full widescreen.
Is it down to cost that few channels show them or is it the networks believe the viewers want 16:9 cropped programmes?
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I prefer to see the whole film, with the lights down you hardly notice the black bars.
Whilst those opinions are widely held, the broadcasters will generally shy away from showing films in their correct aspect ratio I'm afraid.
At least with the 'correct' ratio transmitted, you get to see the whole of the image as the director planned it. Cropping distorts the composition of the picture, with some actors and objects in the wrong places.
I trust thats a bit of humour, Film Four also shows some films in the original aspect ratio, and oddly enough Movies For Men has been known to even if the actual print quality is sh*te
Distributors should be obliged to provide a good quality print (or tape) in original aspect ratio and the broadcasters should be obliged to show it in that state. No cropping (east-west or north-south) allowed, no stretching.
If a few other manufacturers joined in it should get more common and everyone would be happy.
Full screen and correct ratio, 16:9 can be stretched or shown with black bars, 4:3 can only be stretched as far as 16:9 though, it would look ridiculous stretched to 21:9.
It's a bit chicken and egg situation but it's what happened when 16:9 screens were first introduced.
ITV1 showed a film in its original aspect ratio last night; I could hardly believe my eyes!
Try looking up the reason for them then. Start with this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspect_ratio_(image)
Also, every TV aimed at a living room setting is widescreen now. Only some small kitchen-destined TVs are 4:3.
Did they? Which one was that and who died at ITV to make that happen? I've never seen them do that before.
Then crop if yourself with the digibox settings. If you '4:3 crop' a 2.35:1 film, you get the 16:9 equivalent. Yes, it's a centre crop, but then you don't really care what you watch, do you?
I love my films, but that TV is too big for my room, and 4:3 stuff would look a bit lost in the middle
Which films have Five shown in 2.35:1? I don't know of any. They're the most clueless out of all the broadcasters.
BBC1 and 2 have shown a few films properly over the past couple of years including Dances with Wolves, Blade Runner Director's Cut, The Peacemaker and Syriana. Tends to be when they show a film for the first time though, so they've not done what C4 (and its variants) have done by going out of their way to obtaining new prints for almost all of them.
They'd do well to do so, though, as what a lot of people don't realise is that so many of the prints shown today are really piss-poor. The Sound of Music looked like it had been left out in the sun for a month, last time it was on, and the 4:3 prints of the Indiana Jones trilogies on BBC1 were the height of embarrassment! They looked older than the films themselves!
What are you on about I nor anyone else needs the Aspect button on my remote for films, sky and channel4 broadcast them properly just like Blu-ray and HDDVD.
I believe it was Hannibal Rising. STV recently broadcast it in the correct aspect ratio too.
Thanks. I've set up a reminder on Digiguide to have a look when it turns up on ITV2 at some point.
Oddly, I saw BBC3 show a Pirates of the Carribean film in 2.35:1 recently, but when I looked another time it was in 16:9. Could've been a different one I guess but I thought it was the same at first. I've only seen clips of them and they all look a bit the same.
BBC HD always show the Pirate's films in 2.35:1.
I know they do this a lot with films. They showed the Indy films in 2.35:1 while BBC1 got 4:3.