A coffe-table printable review?
So i see other shots in the pan/scan are not distorted like the 2 dog shot. interesting. A pan/scan and vario-squeeze!
marlan , if I may correct you: When you say VistaVision what you really mean is "flat", or Standard Widescreen, movies which are from 1.66 to 1.85 wide. VistaVision is one way to shoot that kind of movie

The best way
MICKEYMOUSE: Well others have aswered most of your questions, so i'll add just a "little" more dethidata

just in case.
I'm asuming you have a true Widescreeen 16:9 display, no?
(Go ahead, measure its faceplate height and width. The faceplate, it should be very near 1.78 wide as tall

)
1. Are you loosing any picture when you are hitting the ZOOM button?
Usually yes. So NO ZOOM!
(Depends on how you've set your DVD player, and the kind of Zoom functions of your Display) (DVD players also have zoom functions but lets skip those for the time being

)
Just to make sure, since you have a Widescreen 16:9 display (no?

) your DVD player's video/display Set-Up should be set to 16:9 or Wide.
NOT to any 4:3/Standard/Letterbox/PanScan setting!
mine says:
TV Display >>
4:3 / PS
4:3 / LB
16:9 WIDE
I have it on 16:9 WIDE. That way the image's full resolution is transmited (and 16:9 coded disc images are sent widescreen to a 16:9 Widescreen display

)
So NO ZOOM!
OK there's TWO exceptions to this rule
1: If you have a widescreen film (Standard Widescreen (1.66-185) or "Scope" type Widescreen (2.00-2.75) that has been released in a 4:3 coded disc, usually refered to "Letterboxed" cus the widescreen image sits inside the 4:3 shape. Since these type of widescreen film discs are not coded (or "enhanced") for 16:9 displays (Cus the studio used an old Laserdisc master (Laserdiscs were made before 16:9 displays were available), or for any reason thought it would be better to make the transfer for the mayority of 4:3 displays users ignoring the new 16:9 display owners

), your widescreen image (be it Standard Widescreen or Scope) will sit like a small rectangle inside you 16:9 display with black empty space on all sides (top and botom, left and right) cus it really IS a rectangle INSIDE a 4:3 "square" INSIDE your 16:9 wide display rectangle!
So to compensdate for the lack of foresight

of the Studio, you must Zoom that small rectangle in the middle TILL It FILLS the Width of your 16:9 screen. If it's a Standart Widescreen (1.66-1.85) movie it will fill your screen (Always remember that since 1.66/1.85 is not a perfect fit for 1.78, depending on ovescan, there might be a slice or two of black

) If it is a Scope Widescreen movie (2.00-2.75) you still will have around a third of empty blackspace above and below but that IS NORMAL cus Scope movies are still wider than your 16:9 Widescreen TV. ok?
Examples of this would be the Widescreen Letterboxed old DVDs of The Lady And The Tramp and The Little Mermaid (and the Widescreen Laserdiscs and Widescreen VHSes) etc.
2: If you have a widescreen film, shot with an Academy sound camera or a Silent camera (the Super-35 process) without a hard matte, transfered to DVD in "open matte" form (in other words showing all the unintended for the screen extraneous vertical image captured by the full aperture hole in the camera

), it will apparently look like any other 4:3 movie sitting squarely on your Widescreen 16:9 display, but it's not! You can use the Zoom function to enlarge the picture and properly widescreen it exactly like it's done in theaters for those films.
Examples of this would be DVDs of The Sword And The Stone, The PowerPuff Girls movie (or at least i think that'a what it was called:-P)
Apart from that, NO ZOOM!
2. Why do some of your widescreen DVDs have the back bars and some don't (i.e. the new edition of Billy Maddison)?
That's been answered in previous posts above but to make a concise summary: cus some are shot in Scope (wider format than your widescreen TV) and some are shot in Standard Widescreen (a format that matches your widescreen TV)
(And same same thing applies to watching Academy (1.375), Silent (1.33), and most TV programs of the 20-th century (1.33): They were shot in a format narrower than your widescreen TV so they will have black bars on the sides)
i hope thats clear.
3. Is there a way where I can set up my DVD player so when I pop it in, I don't see the bars?
Well you can play with different setting of your display's Zoom and Stretch functions, or you DVD players zoom functions, to see if you fill your screen with cropped orr distoreted images from various formats. (For example if you use the ZOOM on the Display watching the new Widescreen Cinemascope Lady And The Tramp disc your screen will be full but Lady and Tramp will look like they haven't eaten meatballs in a long time!!
Is that what you want?
