When movies came in big awkward blocks...

... called VHS tapes. Nobody bought them. More than a few and you have an unwieldy pile. Siskel and Ebert even assume that viewers are renting when they do this show.

They first discuss how films are formatted to fit the then square TV format. The two methods usually used were either Pan and Scan - which redirected the movie by scanning back and forth across the widescreen image. The other one is just chopping the sides off of the film so that it fits your TV. An example of pan and scan was Silk Stockings where Fred Astaire isn't even in the picture during one number. Also shown is a scene from The Graduate where pan and scan has two people in a conversation who are never in the same frame. A film that chops the sides off was That Touch of Mink where Doris Day has a conversation with Cary Grant's nose.

Next mentioned is bad subtitling with either tiny subtitles or subtitles that wash into the image itself, thus becoming illegible. Seven Samurai was an example where this happens. Examples where subtitles were done correctly and are in a bright colored font against a black band were The Hidden Fortress and Pauline at the Beach.

Next is shown a solution to the problem of fitting films on the TV screen - letterboxing, where a black band is put on the top and bottom of the screen to preserve aspect ratio and thus show the entire image.

Finally there is the problem of video stores only carrying the big hits and no small films or documentaries. For that the following three sources for video rentals are mentioned: Facets Multimedia, Home Film Festival, Movies Unlimited. All of these sent your video via mail. Movies Unlimited is still in business.

So that's what videophiles did when there was only VHS rental, no internet, and display devices were limited to television sets. It's an interesting look back.

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