List IW Movies that are in the wrong Aspect Ratio

[Alex Ricciardi]

I wanted to start a thread listing which movies up on IW are in the incorrect Aspect Ratio. I've updated this post with a list of all the movies people throughout the discussion have found:

Dirty Harry (1971)
Dead Ringers (1988)
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)
Pale Rider (1985)
An Evening With Kevin Smith II (2006)
Aguirre: The Wrath of God (1972)
Ben-Hur (1959)
The Searchers (1956)
Electra Glide in Blue
Legend of the Chupacabra (2000)
Alien: Collector's Edition (1979)
The Avengers (1998)
Beverly Hills Ninja (1997)
Clash of the Titans (1981)
Empire Records: Remix! Special Fan Edition (1995)
Enter the Dragon: Special Edition (1973)
The Eye (2002)
Godspell (1973)
Great Expectations (1974)
Hellraiser (1987)
Home Fries (1998)
Jack the Giant Killer (1962)
The Karate Kid (1984) (parts 2 and 3 are correct widescreen ratio)
Little Shepherd (2002)
The Marsh (2006)
The Mean Season (1985)
The Mechanic (1972)
My Giant (1998)
The NeverEnding Story 2: The Next Chapter (1989)
The Next Karate Kid (1989)
Once Upon a Time in China (1991)
Once Upon a Time in China 2 (1992)
Point of No Return (1993)
Police Academy 7: Mission to Moscow (1994)
Red Dawn (1984)
Risky Business (1983)
Sphere (1998)
Stephen King's Cat's Eye (1985)
Strange Brew (1983)
Superman: The Movie (1978)
Superman III (1983)
Superman Doomsday (2007)
U.S. Marshals (1998)
The Marsh (2006)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
2010: The Year We Make Contact (1984)
Ladyhawke (1985)
Little Shop of Horrors (1986)
Mad City (1997)
Logan's Run (1976)
Soylent Green (1973)
Above the Law (1988)
Out for Justice (1991)
Executive Decision (1996)
Jacob's Ladder: Vol. 2: Naomi, Ruth and Boaz [2nd part] (2005)
Curly Sue (1991)
The Mission: Special Edition (1986)
Hell in the Pacific (1968)
Man of the West (1958)
Falling Down (1993)
Southland Tales (2008)
The Terminator


I'll keep adding any titles as I find them, and I'd suggest you do the same. I don't know about you, but the difference between correct and incorrect aspect ratios is the difference between watching and not watching for me. Hopefully we can get this info to Netflix somehow.

[David Haymes]

Legend of the Chupacabra (2000)

This movie on instant watch is playing with Cast/Director Cometary, hope they fix this soon.

[Knaldskalle]

Call customer service and let them know (1-866-716-0414). Or list the movie in... damn, can't find the thread now. I think Adrian had a thread where you could report this kind of bugs with IW. The movie has been converted with the wrong soundtrack, it occasionally happens.

[MachZero]

I'm fairly certain all of the titles I watched that are 4:3 ratio the aspect ratio are not mentioned at all on the movie listing page. I was talking more general about how there are so many titles on netflix that are 4:3 even though, as alex pointed out, movies since the 50s all are filmed in a widescreen ratio. My disapointment is a general one of why on earth don't they have the movies in widescreen. This would be in addition to the blunders of ones that if you had gotten the disc it is in widescreen but the IW version is not. Since I can't remember all of the ones I watched that weren't widescreen I can't confirm if any of them fit the case of the disc version is widescreen and IW is not scenario. I do know I checked about the last half dozen or so ones that were 4:3 and they didn't specify the aspect ratio on the listing pages.

[Alex Ricciardi]

Yeah, they never put the aspect ratio on the Instant Watch page, but they do have the aspect ratio on the DVD page. Supposedly the instant watch stream is supposed to match the DVD, but in many cases it does not.

[MachZero]

I just realized this i dodn't know there were two different movie listing pages one of IW and one for disc. I can look back through my history though the ones that were 4:3 are either expired or will expire on or by jan 1st. Which to me pointing them out would be a moot point unless they renew the titles in the real near future to be on IW again. But I did check the most recent stuff I watched the last few days or so: Hellraiser, Risky Business, My Giant, Home Fries, Strange Brew, and Jack the Giant Killer all expire on or by jan 1st and are on IW as 4:3 but indicate widescreen ratios on the disc listing page. I also noticed several that were 4:3 but the disc listing page only lists 4:3. Taking those as examples of my frustration of discs formatted 4:3 instead of widescreen and leave it to people to use the hardware/software feature of their set-top/or software players to change the movie to 4:3. But anyways if for the sake of detailed listing I can go back as far as possible to hunt down the ones left on IW I've seen to see which ones on IW are 4:3 that shouldn't be.

[Knaldskalle]

all expire on or by jan 1st and are on IW as 4:3 but indicate widescreen ratios on the disc listing page.

I wonder if they're all Starz films... There've been other reports that the quality of the Starz films are poor (fuzzy picture).

[MachZero]

I've watched tons of the Starz play selections and haven't seen one fuzzy. Only time i seen a fuzzy movie on IW was when it defaulted to 500kbps stream rate. My guess is many of the bad reports are people with a slow connection or something else causing the player to default at 500kbps. I always check at the beginning of starting a titles on IW that it is set to the highest possible stream rate. In my case this is 2200. At that rate they look just as good as watching a DVD on my home theater setup. Also I have watched many Starz play titles that were presented in the correct widescreen ratio. And at least one title wasn't a Starz play selection and was 4:3 but listed as widescreen. There doesn't seem to be any logic to it.

[Lawrence Nardi]

I did notice this over the last week, I thought it was a setting on my PC or something, but I guess not. I believe The Shining is a culprit, among others. I will start making notes. It really is a shame. If you are still using a 4:3 aspect display then your tv/pc should be able to zoom in to fill the screen. Why should I be forced to miss out on 30% of the original content? Please Netflix, stream in the OAR!

[Pihk]

I believe The Shining is a culprit

That is incorrect. With the exception of SPARTACUS and 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, Kubrick filmed his films in 1.37 or 1.33:1.

[I'm Not a Turnip]

Finding the correct aspect ratio is not always easy, but I usually trust IMDB over other sources. NF only reports the version of the DVD they have, which may not be the only version available or may not be the ratio in which it was filmed.

To confuse matters, NF shows The Shining DVD is 1.33:1 (4:3), IMDB reports it was filmed at 1.37:1, yet I've found a version of the DVD on Amazon that's reported as 1.85:1. Another oddity: NF shows Guarding Tess is 1.85:1 on the DVD page. The DVD is actually pan/scan but Watch Instantly is 1.85:1.

[Adrian]

Most of the movies in 4:3 ratio are ones where the source material that Netflix has to encode from are in that format (e.g. we have the TV version for some reason). Anyhow, just to let you folks know that someone is watching this thread...

Adrian from Netflix

[Alex Ricciardi]

Thanks very much for the reply, Adrian. Is it helpful to you to have a list of these films?