After sitting through yet another, among thousands, of screenings of the TCM screed on why Letterboxing films is so vital, TCM then showed (it was a premier for them) a pan and scanned copy of The Chase. It was an old TV print on 1' Ampex with the credits letterboxed but nothing else. What is this a 70s print? First Generation home video?
share I wondered the same thing, max. I caught the beginning where it had the rating and the "Closed Captioned, Letterbox" notice, and then once the credits were over....full screen! I still really enjoyed the movie, but come on TCM!
"Congratulations, Major. It appears that at last you have found yourself a real war." Ben Tyreen
TCM seems to often do this on premieres. I think they given the excuse that often they catch the print they have is bad once it's too late. If they show it again, I'd be suprised to see it pan-and-scan (but who knows when that will happen). I've seen the same thing happen with Wings of Desire, and The Conformist (in The Conformist case, an english dub as opposed to aspect ratio), as well as some others that escape me, and when they next showed it, they were fixed. The fact that The Chase isn't on DVD in letterbox yet, and I'm not sure what the current standing on tv prints are, would explain why this happened (although Wings of Desire was at the time, so I suspect some laziness on their part).
shareThe Chase was on TCM today and it was full panavision 2:35.1 aspect ratio and it looooked Good !!
TCM will Always Play Letterbox IF the studios provide one..
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