Nightmare on Elm St. 2 is not truly widescreen?

[Y3K]

I was watching Nightmare on Elm St. 2 and realized that the widescreen version has been cropped off the top and bottom to make it widescreen. The version that I was watching has both the fullscreen and widescreen. So I did some test to see if I was seeing things, but I guess not. Anyone noticed this??

It is the same for Nightmare on Elm Street 1. Am I seeing things??

[Karate Media]

Two possibilities here that I can think of:

1) A number of "widescreen" movies are shot w/ standard lenses and then cropped in the editing process to be a 16x9 size for theatres (that is, it's shot square, and then cropped into a rectangle). I believe two advantages of this are not having to deal with "widescreen" lenses and having room to hide things like boom mics, etc. When it goes to TV, they can just go back to the original footage, which is already 4x3, if there are no extra "bits and pieces" showing above or below the action (like boom mics).

Or

2) Wes Craven, et. al. re playing tricks on us and just cropping the toop and bottom off of the 4x3 fullscreen version and calling it "Widescreen." If so, that would be f'in hilarious...

[Y3K]

I have a feeling that they played tricks on us and calling it Anamorphic Widescreen!! I'm not sure if it's me that saw this...did anyone noticed this??

[Karate Media]

I just checked a bunch of reviews online (including a horror website) and they all rave about the widescreen transfer, and no one (not even the horror fans, who tend to get real pissed if you mess with their classics) mentioned the widescreen version being a "trick." I'm still inclined to think that the 4:3 version was a transfer of the full "soft matte" shots. Soft Matting is much better explained here:
http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/video-format4.htm

Excerpt:

"Soft Matting
A filmmaker using this method simply exposes the entire area of the film but composes his picture with only the middle part of the picture in mind. The camera may show only the middle part of the film to the director and cinematographer, or it may have an outline on the entire image that indicates the borders of the desired aspect ratio. When a soft-matted film is projected, the projectionist has to mask it correctly so that only the middle part of the picture appears on the screen. If you go to a lot of movies, you've probably spotted a boom microphone creeping into a shot or seen a movie where people's heads are cut off or there appears to be too much empty space at the top of each shot. These things happen when a projectionist doesn't properly mask a soft-matted film."



Of course, I could be completely wrong!

Anyway, I'm just waiting for Freddy vs Jason to come out on August 15th!

[energy80s]

Another film where "soft matting" is used is Battlestar Galactica. As this was originally destined for TV, it was shot in full frame mode, but the current DVD transfer is a 16:9 matte of the 4:3 original.

[defense]

Anyway, I'm just waiting for Freddy vs Jason to come out on August 15th!

I'm waiting for that too! This movie was supposed to come out YEARS AGO. I'm probably not gonna be as interested as I was back then, but I have a feeling this movie is gonna be a real good comedy! lol....We all know Freddy's gonna rip the UGLY off of Jason's ass....and that's gonna take a lot of work!

There's probably gonna be a ton of different settings/environments.....and Freddy's gonna rip Jason apart in all of them...unless there's one where Freddy's gets caught up at Crystal Lake.....lol.....but then i'm sure he'll lure Jason's crazy ass back to the boiler room...and it's gonna be slicin' and dicin' all OVER then! hahahaaa.....It's gonna be funny...I can't wait!

[Karate Media]

Hey defense

They've got the Quicktime trailer up now at www.freddyvsjason.com

[defense]

thanks for that Trailer, it looks good! Hey, did I actually hear what I thought I heard? I thought I heard Jason say the word "DIE." It was after Freddy started to say something....if I heard right...then that's the first time Jason would of ever of said a word in any movie....did you hear the same?

[Karate Media]

Not to my ears...do you remember what Freddy was saying before you heard Jason talk? That would be an interesting twist...

[defense]

i'm gonna have to check the link again. It almost sounded like "JASON" was finishing a sentence that Freddy started. Maybe it was Freddy's full sentence. Either way, I will be anxious to see this movie. The trailer looks much more enticing then the "HULK."

Even though they are two different movies, both are a long time in coming and I agree with the vast majority that the computer animated HULK looks phony as hell. I just saw a commercial on my T.V and the special affects appear excellent, but the Hulk looks too fake.

P.S. By the way, Friday the 13th part 3 was on TNN tonight.

[mysticgohan17]

...shot w/ standard lenses and then cropped in the editing process to be a 16x9 size for theatres (that is, it's shot square, and then cropped into a rectangle).

theres an example of Terminator 2 somewhere that uses this technique. James Cameron shoots alot of his flicks like this and he watches them in his home theatre in full screen to get the whole picture. (its funny...for 4 years I thought it was the other way around)