This issue may have been beaten to death, but if not, I wanted to rant and inform. My wife went to our local Blockbuster (Little Rock, AR) yesterday to rent Catch Me If You Can on DVD. She knows that I am a hardcore widescreen snob, and would almost rather not see a movie than watch it in fullscreen. At any rate, after finding Catch Me, all they had on the shelf was fullscreen versions. She went up to the counter, and asked the clerk if they had any widescreen versions of Catch Me. Fortunately, he didn't have a clue, so the clerk went to get his manager. The manager informed my wife that Blockbuster corporate had said they will only be offering DVDs in fullscreen from now on. Seeing she was slightly miffed, the manager told my wife that he himself had spoken up against this boneheaded decsion (there must be hope!), and was told corporate was actually waiting to see how many customers complained. My wife said she was complaining, and to also put in a complaint from her husband as well. Of course, after hearing this story, my reaction was all our movie rental money will now be going to Hollywood Video down the road.

I don't mean to get the whole WS/FS debate started, but it just disappoints me that Blockbuster seems to be catering to J6P with an inferior presentation. If Blockbuster is truly a company that respects and wants to present the best product it can, FS, IMHO, is not the ideal format. However, I recognize they have to make money first, and if 9 out of 10 customers don't like "those black bars", they have to cater to those people. Please share your thoughts.

I thought I just read a thread about a week ago that said just the opposite. The article stated that Blockbuster would be stocking widescreen editions of all non-family titles. I guess that CMIYC could qualify as a family title but I thought this one would be in widescreen.

I would never rent a movie I liked. I will blind-buy anything that even remotely interests me. If I am desperately choking on a purchase, I guess I could deal with a fullscreen rental to see if the movie is up to par. If so, then I would add the WS version to my collection.

My BBusters have CMIFC in wisescreen, so it may be an individual store decision. Is yours franchise owned?

Actually, my situation is just the opposite. I went into BB for the first time in a while last night, and was shocked to see OAR versions of all the latest dual releases. Even Harry Potter was OAR! This is surprising, because this particular store started out fullscreen, then went OAR, then back to fullscreen, and now this latest swing back to OAR. I don't think even they know what they are doing at this point.

SILLY WABBIT, SEARCH IS YOUR FRIEND!!!

http://www.dvdtalk.com/forum/showthr...hreadid=290831