# Am I the only one who doesn't give a damn if my DVDs are "widescreen" or not? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 7, 2003, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601 "2003-05-07T05:33:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Achernar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e274bd/32.png) [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 12:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/21 "2003-05-07T12:23:51Z")
I also always prefer widescreen, but I think the name is misleading. It should be called shortscreen. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/22 "2003-05-07T12:25:14Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by UnuMondo \* > \*\*There comes a time when service providers must stop providing services to people with outdated technology. You won’t find many companies explaining how they can be contacted by telegram, for example. The Linux distribution I had supports only broadband users, as it’s time to start phasing dial-up out. \*\* There comes a time, but it ain’t now. Telegram is one thing; it’s been outdated for a very long time (but it does still exist). Phasing out non-widescreen TVs or dial-up is just stupid (like when Apple released computers without floppy disks because “someone has to be the first to do it”). Which Linux distribution was this? Lots of people don’t have access to anything but dial-up, and even more don’t even have access to that yet. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/23 "2003-05-07T13:19:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by SolGrundy \* > **What he said. Unless you’re talking weird Cinemascope-style stuff, where the image is 6 inches high on a 24-inch TV screen, I’ve got no problems watching widescreen movies on my TV. And I have a big problem with watching pan’n’scan, all for one reason. It’s not because of the purity of the director’s vision, or even because the letterbox makes stuff seem more “epic” (which it does), it’s because of Yojimbo.** Yojimbo, nothing. For me, it was because of **Playtime**. **Playtime** is Jacques Tati’s masterpiece and maybe the greatest of all comedies. It was shot in 70mm widescreen and Tati used _all_ of the screen (there are several scenes where about five running gags were going simultaneously, and you can spot them all). When I saw it on video it was pan and scanned. Absolutely horrible. The worst was a sequence where two families in adjacent apartments were watching TV. The rooms were set up so the families faced each other and you could see both from outside. They were shown reacting to the TV as though they were reacting to each other. Quite funny in the original. Pan and scan showed only one family, which made the entire scene meaningless: people watching TV. ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/24 "2003-05-07T13:21:22Z")
A couple of my favorite examples of pan ‘n’ scan messing up a scene: **Die Hard** - Policeman Al Powell arrives at the tower and is walking through the lobby, taking a look around. In the fullscreen version, he’s just walking, then says, “Aw, the hell with this,” and leaves. In the widescreen version, we get to see that, just around the next corner, there’s a man with a big ol’ gun waiting for him to turn the corner. Basically, in the fullscreen version, you don’t get to know just how close he came to getting his head blown off. **Alien 3** - the alien has Ripley pinned up against the wall, and it hisses at her, lowering its double-jaw. In widescreen, this scene is great; Ripley is cowering, the alien is menacing, very nice. In fullscreen, the scene has to cut back and forth several times, so you get to see either what the alien’s doing, or Ripley’s scared face, but not both at the same time. ---
**Author:** ![MeanJoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanjoe/32/5693_2.png) [@MeanJoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanJoe)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/25 "2003-05-07T14:15:18Z")
> [@](#): > > requires a screen close to 30 inches, near as I can tell. My GOD man, they don’t make 'em that big do they? :rolleyes: MeanJoe - Owner of a Panny widescreen HDTV & prog.scan DVD players and very much in favor of Pan-n-Scan DVDs being shot into space. ---
**Author:** ![Zap\_Rowsdower](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/3da27b/32.png) [@Zap\_Rowsdower](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zap_Rowsdower)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/26 "2003-05-07T14:43:19Z")
**Empire Strikes Back** In the scene where Vader is chasing Han Solo into the astroid field and he is talking with the other Star destroyer captains. The one on the far left raises his hands and ducks then his holograph blinks out. Sure it is not crucial to the plot but it is a neat scene, and with pan-n-scan you don’t get to see it. That is one of those little touches that make repeated viewings of movies more enjoyable. ---
**Author:** ![StGermain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stgermain/32/2868_2.png) [@StGermain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StGermain)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/27 "2003-05-07T14:45:44Z")
My TV is only 24", but I only buy widescreen. It takes maybe five minutes to get engrossed in a movie enough that you forget about the black bars. And if the movie doesn’t draw me in enough to make the bars invisible, it probably isn’t a movie I’ll really enjoy. StG ---
**Author:** ![bernse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@bernse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bernse)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/28 "2003-05-07T15:20:46Z")
I have a 27" TV and only buy widescreen as well. In 5 years or so, won’t only “widescreen” TVs be available? If so, will the “fullscreen” movies now have bars on the side when viewed on new TVs? ---
**Author:** ![darksight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3da27b/32.png) [@darksight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/darksight)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/29 "2003-05-07T15:27:25Z")
All movies and TV shows should be in Wide screen. And in DTS 5.1 surround. Any thing less. Is Less. ---
**Author:** ![Mojo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Mojo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mojo)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/30 "2003-05-07T15:34:06Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by bernse \* > \*\*I have a 27" TV and only buy widescreen as well. > > In 5 years or so, won’t only “widescreen” TVs be available? If so, will the “fullscreen” movies now have bars on the side when viewed on new TVs? \*\* Yep, and then we’ll see a whole bunch of “my fancy new TV is sticking #&$\*ing black bars on the sides of my old DVDs” threads where people who bought the pan & scan versions will gripe. ---
**Author:** ![Engywook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/bc8723/32.png) [@Engywook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Engywook)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/31 "2003-05-07T15:46:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by darksight \* > \*\*All movies and TV shows should be in Wide screen. > > And in DTS 5.1 surround. > > Any thing less. > > Is Less. \*\* Damned straight. So when are HBO, Cinemax, Showtime, Pay Per View, and all those other panners and scanners gonna get the message??? ---
**Author:** ![chorizo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@chorizo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chorizo)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/32 "2003-05-07T15:51:59Z")
I have a 19" screen, cheap-ass DVD player, and no surround sound. I have never and will never watch a pan-and-scan DVD. I live in a small town with only one video store (rhymes with “cockthruster”) and don’t think I could justify the $20 a month for Netflix so I don’t have a lot of options. My local video store usually has most things in widescreen, but there are some releases that they only have in fullscreen. I accidently rented a fullscreen version once and went back to exchange it, which confused the clerk - he said they usually get people bringing them back cause they don’ t like “them funny black bars” on the screen. I think that people who don’t notice the difference or don’t care are the same people that cause our local video store to have 60 copies of “Maid in Manhattan” and only one copy of “Spirited Away”. They’re the people who keep Britney Spears and Nickelback and Jennifer Lopez popular - to them its just disposable entertainment, something to fill up their time that dosen’t make them have to think too hard. It’s not art, it’s not something to be watched again and analyzed, to be discussed or examined or critiqued. They don’t know or care who directed the movie. They’ll see it once and forget about it. If I’m going to watch or listen to something, I want it to be worthwhile and interesting and creative and beautiful. Seeing the whole film the way that it was intended is part of that. I watch many more movies now on DVD than I ever did on VHS, simply because my only video store never carried widescreen VHS tapes. ---
**Author:** ![Dreaming\_of\_Maria\_Callas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f14d63/32.png) [@Dreaming\_of\_Maria\_Callas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dreaming_of_Maria_Callas)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/33 "2003-05-07T16:14:01Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Priceguy \* > **There comes a time, but it ain’t now. Telegram is one thing; it’s been outdated for a very long time (but it does still exist). Phasing out non-widescreen TVs or dial-up is just stupid (like when Apple released computers without floppy disks because “someone has to be the first to do it”).** The lack of a floppy drive wasn’t much of a problem because the appearance of the iMac coincided with the advent of relatively inexpensive keychain USB drives. > [@](#): > > **Which Linux distribution was this?** [Gentoo Linux](http://www.gentoo.org) > [@](#): > > \*\*Lots of people don’t have access to anything but dial-up, and even more don’t even have access to that yet. \*\* Most metropolitan areas offer broadband by now, in some markets it’s hardly more expensive than dialup. It’s a user’s own fault if he doesn’t want to enter the 21st (in some areas 20th) century. UnuMondo ---
**Author:** ![MrMyth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e19b73/32.png) [@MrMyth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrMyth)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/34 "2003-05-07T16:15:31Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by refusal \* > \*\*Isn’t it more important to be able to see the detail in the centre of a frame than to see what’s happening on the edges? Not always, but mostly. With a good TV, this isn’t an issue, but not all of us have expensive big TVs. > > If you don’t have a widescreen TV, with a widescreen DVD you could be watching an image with only 300 lines of horizontal resolution. Especially if it’s TV rather than DVD, you will lose a lot of detail. And how is it closer to the director’s vision to see a tiny blurry picture rather than a bigger one? \*\* Nope, sorry. Anamorphic squeeze is becoming a standard feature. I bought a cheapie Philips 25-incher for the bedroom that has it. So not only do you not lose horizontal resolution, but you actually make the space between scanlines smaller, thereby reducing the ‘screen door’ effect. On a standard-def TV, its awesome. Makes a Tv look more like a computer monitor. On an HDTV it can be like looking out a window on certain DVD’s (Attack of the Clones, FoTR Extended Edition). ---
**Author:** ![chorizo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@chorizo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chorizo)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/35 "2003-05-07T16:27:14Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by UnuMondo \* > **[Gentoo Linux](http://www.gentoo.org)** Not to hijack here, but it’s incorrect to say that Gentoo dosen’t support non-broadband users - it’s just that since the whole thing is installed from source packages downloaded individually, dial-up would be prohibitivly slow. But you could do it. I built my Gentoo system by bringing my laptop to a broadband connection and doing it there. I also emerged all the ppp related utilities (pppd, wvdial, even the kernel module for my windmodem) and dial-up just fine from my home dialup connection. ---
**Author:** ![DeVena](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dec6dc/32.png) [@DeVena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DeVena)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/36 "2003-05-07T17:01:21Z")
I won’t buy anything but widescreen - everything else is just wasting my money and my time. ---
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/37 "2003-05-07T18:23:52Z")
I’ve noticed while renting movies that pan 'n scan quality varies greatly. The absolute worst is Mandalay Pictures. Every film by them looks like it was scanned by a sloth with an old Atari joystick. Guaranteed to induce headaches and nausea. I now specifically refuse to rent/buy anything from Mandalay that is full screen. ---
**Author:** ![porcupine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ac91a4/32.png) [@porcupine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/porcupine)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/38 "2003-05-07T18:45:02Z")
I despise Pan and Scan, and have for years. The only reason I even keep HBO is for Six Feet Under, not for the movies. I love NetFlix, and I’m so happy I finally bought a DVD player last year. I haven’t upgraded my sound system yet, though, becuase I’m moving soon and I don’t know what my living room will be like. I have a 31" TV, and have had it for about 10 years. Most people I know have decent size TV. For everything except stuff like LOTR, the black bars are barely noticable to me anymore. I like the trend of more and more TV shows showing in widescreen (SFU being one, ER being another). ---
**Author:** ![CyberPundit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/76d3ee/32.png) [@CyberPundit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CyberPundit)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/39 "2003-05-07T18:58:03Z")
I am a moderate in the whole widescreen vs full-screen debate. On the one hand widescreen is more authentic. OTOH having the whole frame is not much good if it’s so small that you can barely make out what’s going on, which is especially the case for 2.35:1. It all depends on the movie and how much use is being made of the full frame. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601/40 "2003-05-07T19:21:46Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by UnuMondo \* > **The lack of a floppy drive wasn’t much of a problem because the appearance of the iMac coincided with the advent of relatively inexpensive keychain USB drives.** Oh great. Or they could just have put a floppy drive in there. Whether or not it was a problem isn’t the issue. There was no floppy drive, and there should have been. > [@](#): > > **[Gentoo Linux](http://www.gentoo.org)** Never heard of it. If it doesn’t support dial-up just to be hip, when Linux is supposed to be all about compatibility with everything that has ever existed ever, I don’t think I want to. > [@](#): > > **Most metropolitan areas offer broadband by now, in some markets it’s hardly more expensive than dialup. It’s a user’s own fault if he doesn’t want to enter the 21st (in some areas 20th) century.** Listen to yourself. What about users not in metropolitan areas? You do know they exist, right? What about users in Pakistan? Why remove basic functionality just to screw them over? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/am-i-the-only-one-who-doesnt-give-a-damn-if-my-dvds-are-widescreen-or-not/173601.md?page=3)