The MGM DVD thing, and why everyone is stupid

Maybe you've heard that a long list of MGM DVDs, supposedly widescreen, are actually chop jobs -- pan 'n' scan transfers cut down to look like real widescreen. It's a good thing I'm here to tell you that's totally stupid.

Pan and scan, for those of you who don't know, is a method of adapting widescreen movies for standard-size TVs. You can't see the whole image at once, so if the important stuff is going on at the left side, we just paaaan over to the left. It's an awful way to watch movies -- I have an old pan and scan Alien VHS that illustrates nicely how awful it is.

So consider this: if your copy of The Princess Bride was really a chop job,

• It wouldn't look nearly as pretty;


• Andre the Giant's head would be cut out of most shots;


• thousands of people would have noticed three years ago; and


• the director's commentary would have been a bit more hostile.

Oh yeah, and: why the hell would MGM go to the trouble of making fake widescreen, when it has real widescreen prints? Duh.

So what's really going on? It turns out the complaint has more to do with the packaging than the DVD transfer.

It seems the packaging on those DVDs claim that widescreen format provides up to 50% more image than standard-format. But some movies are originally shot in a less wide aspect ratio than they intend to be shown theatrically. In other words, sometimes standard format actually shows you more than widescreen -- but it's stuff you weren't supposed to see. Standard format versions of those movies tend to have a lot of boom mikes at the top of the screen.

So in other words, completely frivolous. And no, you don't have to send your DVDs back. So, why do I think everyone is stupid?

Because the things I mentioned should be totally obvious. A widescreen made from a pan and scan would have, what, maybe 40% of the original image? On a close-up you'd just see someone's nose! Come on people! Use your noggins.