mactheknife

Since nobody else seemed to have a list of these "craptacular" releases, I am starting one. I need to know which movies were released on DVD but NOT in the original aspect ratio. Here is the list so far:

MOVIES:
Lord of War Special Edition
The Recruit
Childs Play
Austin Powers (open matte)
Creep, Lions Gate
Moustapha Akkad's The Message
84 Charing Cross Road
Star 80
Death Becomes Her
Timecop
Lionheart
Secret of Nimh
Pumpkinhead
Sudden Death
Little Monsters (1989)
Moonstruck
Master of Disguise
Good Boy!
The Hills Have Eyes Part 2
Hellraiser III
Ace Ventura Pet Detective
Running on Empty (1988)
Grumpy Old Men
Grumpier Old Men
Joe's Apartment
Fearless
Sorcerer
A Midnight Clear
The Shadow (open matte)
Sour Grapes
The Wraith

Please help fill this list out so we can avoid these releases. Maybe the studios will pull their heads out and fix these releases for HD, or DVD if we are lucky.

dvd-4-life

Childs Play

hermes10

Creep, Lion's Gate. Released in every other region as 2.35, and in R1 as 1.78, "DVD ratio."

typecase

Moustapha Akkad's The Message has the original 2.35:1 aspect ratio reduced to 1.78:1 on the recent special edition. It's not a big film, but one of the few the Halloween producer directed and likely the last revisit the film will get which sucks.

marty888

84 CHARING CROSS ROAD
STAR 80
MOONSTRUCK
FALLING DOWN
DEATH BECOMES HER

(The first three on the list I've picked up in OAR versions from other regions.)

Maxflier

Timecop
Lionheart

milo bloom

Austin Powers had it's mattes opened up for home video, apparently at the director's behest (which is really odd since that first DVD was a two sided with a 4x3 version on the other side, and you'd think it wasn't neccesary). Though I may be a big OAR advocate, the occasional instances like this I usually let slide.


Also, The Secret of Nimh is fullscreen. I actually once had a dream I found a widescreen copy in a store once, now I can't help myself from checking every copy I find in stores for the aspect ratio.

Eric D.

Edit: Also do you want to include television shows that are not in OAR or just keep this list strictly to movies? Because I have a buncj of those.

Off the top of my head...
Sudden Death
Little Monsters (1989)
Moonstruck
Master of Disguise
Good Boy!
The Hills Have Eyes Part 2
Hellraiser III
Ace Ventura Pet Detective
Running on Empty (1988)
Grumpy Old Men
Grumpier Old Men
Joe's Apartment
Fearless
Sorcerer - Although I remember hearing Friedkin wanted it this way.
Oh, and I'm not even going to touch the Kubrick stuff.

MartinBlank

Pumpkinhead

And as mentioned above, the one I'm most steamed about, Ace Venture: Pet Detective!

Drexl

Do you realize there are hundreds of them?

FinkPish

A Midnight Clear

ScissorPuppy

" FALLING DOWN "

I could have swore my copy was a flipper with both full and widescreen transfers.

You can add THE SHADOW to the list, although it's open matted.

mactheknife

Drexl,

In another thread it was mentioned that there were only a handful. So knowing that there might be hundreds is surprising, but it doesn't change my desire to see a list.

I am more concerned with releases that claim to be widescreen but are acutally a modified aspect ratio made to APPEAR to be the complete picture. Like the recent Lord of War release. Movies that only have a "foolscreen" release don't bother me as much because they are marked fullscreen. I will never in my life buy another fullscreen movie. But it is much harder to remember what aspect ratio a movie was released in during the theatrical presentation, so I can verify that it is the same on the DVD release. That is just annoyingly deceptive of the studios to claim something is widescreen when it is actually a cropped presentation made to look like widescreen.

Eric D.

Falling Down is a flipper w/ both wide and full. It's a shitty transfer, but it's widescreen.

mactheknife

I took out Falling Down. A shitty widescreen transfer is better than none at all.

DeanoBKN

Sour Grapes
The Wraith

PatrickMcCart

Austin Powers at 2:1 allows roughly 12% more image to be visible on the top and bottom. One of the perks of Super-35, actually.

ScissorPuppy

Anchor Bay's release of The Evil Dead is cropped to create 1.85:1 from a 1.33:1 print. Although I think Sam Rami approved this, not sure why.

fryinpan1

DVDaf.com lists these with "reformatted" in the title:

http://www.dvdaficionado.com/dvds.ht...rg=1&x=35&y=13

Barbarian Invasions, The (Reformatted 1.78:1 Frame)
Lord of War (Reformatted 1.78:1 Frame)
Me Without You (Edited) (Reformatted 1.85:1 Frame)
Once Upon a Time in Mexico (Reformatted 1.78:1 Frame)
Recruit, The (Reformatted 1.78:1 Frame)

Linko

Frantic
The Witches

joltman

I think it'd be nice to also include if there are any any non-R1 releases that do have them in their OAR
Anyway, adding to the list:
True Stories
Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey
White Fang (1991)
Chopping Maul
Waxwork/Waxwork 2 (same DVD)

dx23

There was a similar thread several weeks ago:

http://forum.dvdtalk.com/showthread....ht=full+screen

GOS

The Glenn Miller Story (1953) cropped from 1.33:1 to 1.85:1
It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (1963) cropped from 2.76:1 to 2.35:1

Smithers

City Lights is supposed to be 1.20:1 but is 1.33:1 on dvd

jgido759

Honeymoon In Vegas
My Blue Heaven
Snow Dogs
Twins
Kindergarden Cop