Beauty and the Beast aspect ratio

[Marce82]

Ok, so I havent bought the new dvd/bluray of Beauty and the Beast yet. I still have the old platinum edition, and I could tell when I first got it in '02 that the image was very much cropped.

According to the review on here, the new edition's aspect ratio is 1.78:1, although the movie was animated at 1:66.1, as were all the disney movies at that time.

First question would be, why are they messing around with the aspect ratio of BATB when Aladdin, LK and Pocahontas have all been released w the open matte ratio of 1.66:1????

Also...I stumbled onto some footage of BATB on youtube that was taken from the laserdisc, which WAS the full open matte. Man it pissed me off...

Can anyone out there make some screen comparisons of the laserdisc and the NEW dvd/bluray???

[Sotiris]

Another Beauty & the Beast thread??

[Marce82]

What can I say? Its the kind of movie that can cause obsession

[TheSequelOfDisney]

The 90s animated films were all made in the 1.66:1 aspect ratio, but some of them (Beauty and the Beast and Hunchback come to mind) were theatrically presented in 1.85:1 (which, I believe, is Beauty's aspect ratio on the Platinum DVD). The directors, however, chose which aspect ratio they wanted the audience/viewers to see on Blu-ray/DVD. Ron and John chose a similar aspect ratio (1.77:1, I think) for the Platinum Edition of The Little Mermaid even though the film was created in a 1.66:1 aspect ratio. Similarly, for Beauty, instead of 1.66:1 or 1.85:1, Kirk and Gary chose for the film to be seen at a 1.78:1 ratio of the Diamond Blu-ray release. If the original directors are still alive, I believe they have the final say over things like aspect ratio and the overall restoration of the film (which baffles me how TLM's restoratioin got past since it's one of the lesser of the wonderful restorations). They chose 1.78:1, which I guess how they wanted the film to be seen, and that's what we get.

[Sotiris]

What can I say? Its the kind of movie that can cause obsession

BatB is a good movie but I'm afraid it's becoming more overated than The Lion King.

Anyway, I've found a few threads about Aspect Ratio that you may find useful:


Talk about the BatB DVD Restoration & Aspect Ratio
http://www.dvdizzy.com/forum/viewtopic. ... pect+ratio

OAR for Disney Films
http://www.dvdizzy.com/forum/viewtopic. ... pect+ratio

Aspect Ratio Question
http://www.dvdizzy.com/forum/viewtopic. ... pect+ratio

Intended Aspect Ratio Question
http://www.dvdizzy.com/forum/viewtopic. ... pect+ratio

Standing Up Against the OAR Contoversy
http://www.dvdizzy.com/forum/viewtopic. ... pect+ratio

http://www.ultimatedisney.com/oar.htm

Hope these help

[ajmrowland]

The 90s animated films were all made in the 1.66:1 aspect ratio, but some of them (Beauty and the Beast and Hunchback come to mind) were theatrically presented in 1.85:1 (which, I believe, is Beauty's aspect ratio on the Platinum DVD). The directors, however, chose which aspect ratio they wanted the audience/viewers to see on Blu-ray/DVD. Ron and John chose a similar aspect ratio (1.77:1, I think) for the Platinum Edition of The Little Mermaid even though the film was created in a 1.66:1 aspect ratio. Similarly, for Beauty, instead of 1.66:1 or 1.85:1, Kirk and Gary chose for the film to be seen at a 1.78:1 ratio of the Diamond Blu-ray release. If the original directors are still alive, I believe they have the final say over things like aspect ratio and the overall restoration of the film (which baffles me how TLM's restoratioin got past since it's one of the lesser of the wonderful restorations). They chose 1.78:1, which I guess how they wanted the film to be seen, and that's what we get.

I loved Mermaid's restoration.

[DancingCrab]

I loved Mermaid's restoration.

So did I. In fact, I am holding on to this platinum dvd for dear life, seeing how saturated they are getting with the colors on some of the blu-rays. Not that I have a major problem with some color tweaking when the diamond hits stores, but I really like the look of the last release.

[ajmrowland]

^exactly. Not to mention they did a good enough job for one to be able the canvas texture of the hand-painted backgrounds.

[Marce82]

All good and fun....but no one has poster screen caps from the laserdisc so I can compare... :-(

[KubrickFan]

What you have now is both close to the open matted version, and close to the intended version of the filmmakers. You're not missing anything important, since they focused on the 1.85:1 frame anyway.

[Marce82]

Well, i know this, and I am much happier with this new transfer. Not just case of the ratio itself, but on the platinum we were losing quite a bit on all four sides.

There were two shots that really bothered me about that: one was when Belle approaches the rose in the west wing, and one couldn't see the animation on the trim of the table as it rotated (i clearly remembered this from my VHS). In the new transfer, we don't see ALL of it, but we see plenty.
The other shot was when they are dancing in the ballroom, and her skirt swings past the camera...there are some very nice subtleties to the animation of her skirt after that, and one couldn't see it on the platinum cause the floor was cropped off.

THing is...certain programs and tvs allow you to crop the image to whatever ratio you want...but they cant give me MORE than the dvd provides!

[KubrickFan]

Yeah, mentioning only the aspect ratio doesn't mean anything. I mean, they could crop the 1.33:1 version to 1.85:1, and it would still technically have it's original aspect ratio . But yeah, the new version thankfully isn't as cropped as the old DVD.