| creekdipper |
12-08-06 06:00 AM |
[QUOTE=Drexl]
BTW, why wasn't the widescreen version that cheap at Target? I assume they just didn't have it stock.
Actually, Target had different pricing for WS & FS. I went back on Saturday to get a few extra copies of some Harry Potter movies for gifts. The $3.98 displays were gone but found a few copies on the shelves. When we checked out, they rang up at regular price. When I challenged the price, I was informed that the sale price was on "Fullscreen copies only" (I put them back).
Lots of funny comments on this thread. I'll try to be serious, though, and say, "Yes, of course I've bought FS because of price". I used to be a WS only snob & wouldn't touch FS unless it was the only format available (MATEWAN, for example) or it was the OAR. Keep in mind that we have a collection numbering in the thousands including many Criterions, etc. However, I have bought quite a few FS DVDs during store sales & from pawn shops ($3 or less) under 1 or more of the following circumstances: (1) The movie was obviously not a keeper; (2) The movie wasn't very "visual" (romantic comedies have lots of talking heads...in the restaurant scenes, do I really need to see the director's second cousin sitting at the bar in the upper right of the screen?); (3) The movie had mixed reviews & we wanted to "preview" it before investing more in a WS copy. For instance, recently I paid $2 for a perfect FS copy of the much-reviled STEALTH movie. We were shocked to discover that we really enjoyed it...enough to pick up a WS copy later. I knew that I could trade/sell the FS copy for a profit, so it served as a good "screener". Last weekend I bought several FS copies of movies during a video store blowout because they were near-perfect while the widescreen copies were scratched all to pieces. Same deal...we could preview the content and then sell/trade/give away (we have friends & relatives who only watch FS).
By the same token, we watch movies on Cinemax, HBO, & other cable outlets enough though they usually air them in P & S or FS format. If we like it well enough, we'll invest in the WS DVD. Of course, if we know we want it or have already seen it, we'll always choose the WS. My point is that there are some circumstances under which even formerly diehard WS purists may be converted (at least to the point of watching FS). I mean, if you are on vacation & the motel has a pay channel airing a movie you haven't seen (resist the temptation to comment), are you really going to be so anal that you'll create a scene & say "NOOOOOOOO!!! We're not going to watch that!!! It's (gasp) FOOOOOOLLLLSCREEENNNN!!! Arrggggh!!").
And for real heresy, how about this: While FS (or P & S) butchers many older movies filmed in Cinemascope, etc., we have noticed that many recent movies are framed in such a way that the main difference in the majority of the WS scenes is that you see the back of an out-of-focus head to one side of the screen. It's obvious that the directors/editors framed the shots so that certain elements could be cropped without affecting the plot or the visuals in a major way. I'll be honest...I've been disappointed in some WS movies specifically because of this annoying habit...3/4 of the film having the closeups filmed with the actors off to one side and the other side of the screen filled with....filing cabinets, refrigerators, & other exciting generic visuals. It's one thing to see the side-by-side comparison of a movie such as THE GRADUATE & realize that the filmaker's creative vision has been extremely compromised (resulting in a severe loss for the audience) and another to see a movie in which 90% of the scenes feature a couple of people speaking to the each other (and not in a PILLOW TALK way, in which the P&S version cuts out the reaction shots of one party by eliminating 1/2 of the splitscreen phone conversation). Because many movies are shot with this in mind, many modern movies (IMHO) don't suffer inordinately from being viewed in the FS format. So we've stopped cheated ourselves out of some inexpensive, enjoyable entertainment simply because we insisted on FS format. That said, we won't watch Lord of the Rings, King Kong, or other modern epics in FS. It seems that even the Fullscreen Dark Side has its seductive limitations.
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