Clinging to physical media for movie collecting has become an increasingly difficult prospect in this age of plentiful and convenient video streaming. First and foremost, the very idea of collecting movies for permanent ownership has fallen out of favor with the general public. Even for those of us hardliners who refuse to give up our… Read More First Impressions of a Second 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Player
A couple weeks ago, a local community event space put up a makeshift screen and hosted a viewing of Luc Besson’s 1997 sci-fi epic The Fifth Element in my neighborhood. Although admittedly not, on a technical level, the best cinematic experience I’ve had in my life, and certainly not up to my usual home theater… Read More A Visual History of The Fifth Element (1997) on Home Video
Goodbye, HBO Max. Hello… Max? Seriously, that’s the best name all the corporate marketing geniuses could come up with? The streamer formerly known as HBO Max went through its official rebranding this week, and the transition has been a little bumpy. From unplayable content, to confusing menu categories, to programs with nudity and other adult… Read More Max Growing Pains | HBO Max Rebranding Goes Not Entirely Smoothly
Confession time: As someone who has reviewed movies on home video for more than two decades, I simply cannot stand to watch most DVD or Blu-ray bonus features. The days when I might get excited for a director’s audio commentary or a lengthy making-of documentary about the film I just watched feel like a distant… Read More Remember When DVD and Blu-ray “Special Features” Actually Used to Be Special?
I love movies. Let me start with that lest I sound too negative right off the bat. I’ve been obsessed with movies most of my life and have many fond memories of watching countless films on the big screen. All the time I spent in darkened movie theaters over the years played a critical role… Read More R.I.P. Cinema – Leaving the Theatrical Experience to Nostalgia
When Logitech discontinued its popular line of Harmony universal remotes last year, the company promised that existing products would continue to be supported. That alleged “support” was put to the test for many users last week when Harmony’s integration with Alexa voice control suddenly stopped working without explanation, and the standard array of troubleshooting suggestions… Read More Harmony + Alexa Integration Broken Again – How to Fix It
I’ve been a movie collector for close to thirty years, and have seen the evolution of the home theater hobby across multiple video formats. During that time, I have bought into every new state-of-the-art format as it came along, and regularly upgraded my favorite movies hoping to gain some measurable improvement in quality. As a… Read More From DVD to Blu-ray, 4K, and More – Is “Good Enough” Ever Good Enough?
Hardly all that long ago, all TV series were photographed in a common, standardized aspect ratio designed to fill a television screen. The idea that anything intended for home viewing on a TV might – intentionally – not fit the screen seemed almost inconceivable. Nowadays, however, we’ve experienced an explosion of shows shosiret in widescreen… Read More List of TV Shows with Aspect Ratios Wider Than 16:9
IMAX is neither the first nor the only film format to incorporate the concept of a variable aspect ratio. Filmmakers have toyed with the shape of their projected images at least as far back as Abel Gance’s 1927 silent epic Napoléon. In a separate post, I maintain a list of movies that alternate from a… Read More List of Other Variable Aspect Ratio Movies (Not IMAX)
This post contains a reference list of movies that played in IMAX theaters with either a Variable Aspect Ratio (VAR) or otherwise alternate aspect ratio presentation that differed from their appearance on regular cinema screens, along with details of each title’s availability on home video. As explained in Part 3 of my Philosophy of 2.35:1… Read More List of IMAX Variable Aspect Ratio Movies
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