Technical Notes

N/A means information not available to Mr. Toy.

People listed in italics live or once lived on the Monterey Peninsula.

Year indicates the year the movie was released in theaters, not the year of filming.

Film is 35mm unless otherwise noted or listed as n/a.

-B&W means the movie was filmed in black & white.

-Color refers to standard color movie film, usually Eastmancolor. Studio tradenames, if any, for the Eastmancolor process are listed in parenthesis (Warnercolor, DeLuxe, Metrocolor). Older Eastmancolor negatives have been known to fade badly after as little as 10 years.

-Technicolor is listed as a separate process because it uses three black and white negatives filmed through three primary-color filters. When it is printed, the three negatives are combined by passing light through three color filters again to create a color image in the final print. Since black and white film is virtually immune to fading, perfect Technicolor prints can, theoretically, be made indefinitely from the same negatives. The Technicolor process was phased out in the latter half of the 1970s mainly due to its high cost.

Aspect ratio refers to the shape of the picture, specifically the proportions of the width in relation to the height. This can be a confusing subject because a wide variety of film and TV formats have been used over the decades. Since TV screens don't always match movie formats, it is helpful to understand how aspect ratios work so that you can view movies as they were intended to be seen.

Prior to late 1953 most movies were made with an aspect ratio of approximately 1.37 to 1 (usually written 1.37:1) , meaning that the picture was 1.37 times as wide as it was tall. This is almost identical to old style (standard definition) TV screen, which is 1.33:1. In 1953 movie makers and theaters began converting to various widescreen formats, primarily to lure viewers away from their new television sets.

These new formats looked great in the theaters, but created significant problems when they were later presented on television and home video. To fit a standard TV screen they were severely cropped, losing 25-50 percent of the image in the process. Technicians would "pan and scan" the image in futile effort to include as much of the action as possible, but it often left actors completely out of a shot. Modern widescreen TVs generally provide a better fit, but have not completely solved this problem, as you will see below, so many videos are presented in "widescreen" or "letterbox" format to preserve the original cinematic composition. These videos are uncropped, but do not fill your screen vertically.

Here is an explanation of the most common formats and how they may be adapted for TV viewing:

1.33:1 / 1.37:1 - This was the standard up through 1953. Silent films were filmed at 1.33:1. It was changed to 1.37:1 when sound was introduced and the format needed to be modified slightly to accommodate the soundtrack. This ratio was the basis for the old-style standard TV screen, but in the video industry this ratio is expressed in whole numbers as 4:3 even though it is the exact same thing (4 ÷ 3 = 1.33). When viewed on a modern widescreen TV you should see black bars on each side of the screen. If you don't see the bars the image may have been cropped at the top and bottom or, worse, distorted by stretching it to fill the screen. This makes actors look fat and turns circles into ovals.

1.66:1 - This was a common format for foreign films. It was also used in the US in the 1950s under Paramount's trade name VistaVision, an unconventional process which turned the film sideways and created a wider image using the space of two side-by-side standard 35mm frames. This provided higher resolution images comparable to 70mm film. However, few theaters were equipped for running film horizontally so they were also printed on standard vertically run film frames. The moving images were composed so they could be safely cropped vertically in the projector and shown in theaters at 1:85:1 (preferred) or go as wide as 2:1. Films in this format can usually be safely cropped horizontally and shown at 1.33:1. VistaVision was phased out in the late 1950s, but has had a bit of a revival in the third decade of the 21st Century, at least for filming purposes. Incidentally, the last 20th Century movie in VistaVision was 1961's One Eyed Jacks which happens to be on our list of locally-filmed movies.

1.78:1 - This is the standard format for today's high-definition television (HDTV). The video industry uses the term 16:9, but a little math sets it right (16 ÷ 9 = 1.78). This shape is based on a mathematical formula that determined it to be the best compromise for displaying all movie and TV formats with minimal blank space on the screen.

1.85:1 - This has been one of the two most common formats in use since the mid 1950s. It is sometimes called a “flat” (non-anamorphic) format because the image is not compressed as it is with the other most common widescreen format (2.35:1). Instead, the standard 1.33:1 frame is simply masked with black bars at the top and bottom. Often the film is still shot and printed at 1.33:1 and masked in the theater's projector. For TV viewing this format is so close to the modern widescreen TV ratio that any cropping to fit is negligible. However, about 25% of the image is cropped out for viewing on an old-style TV, as was the case for most VHS tapes (which you may still have lying around).

2.2:1 - The common format for 70mm films. The most familiar trade names for this format are Todd-AO and Super Panavision. You lose about 19% of the image when cropped to fill a modern widescreen TV. Letterbox format preserves the full image.

2.35:1 - Introduced in late 1953, this format is known by various trade names such as Cinemascope and Panavision. It's the most common format for major blockbusters and most of the big musicals of the '50s and '60s. The format is often referred to simply as "scope" by folks in the movie industry. It is an "anamorphic" format, so called because the image is actually compressed into a standard 1.33:1 film frame. If you look at the film itself the picture looks like it has been squished from the sides. A special anamorphic lens is used on the projector to stretch the image to its full width. Some early Cinemascope films were shot at 2.55:1, and many in the modern digital era come in at 2.39:1 or 2.4:1. About 25% of the image is lost if it is cropped to fill a widescreen TV, as some broadcast and cable channels are prone to do, while letterbox format preserves the full image.

So how does this apply to your viewing of a given movie? Check the fine print on the back of the DVD or Blu-Ray package. It should give you the aspect ratio of the movie inside. Most discs sold nowadays preserve the original theatrical aspect ratio and say so on the box. But some early DVDs still cropped widescreen movies to fit older TV screens. These were often labeled as "Full-Screen" as opposed to "Widescreen" which many people found confusing.

If you prefer seeing movies in their original shape but you're unsure about a particular presentation look up the title on the Internet Movie Database and scroll down until you reach the technical specs. Then you'll know for sure how it should look. For movies on the local list we've already done that for you.

Just one more thing. If you discover that a film you're watching looks distorted, or you have a "widescreen" DVD or video tape that doesn't fill the width of your screen then your TV may not be set for the correct aspect ratio. There should be a button on the remote that came with your TV to fix that. It may be labeled aspect, size, or ratio or something similar. Cycle through the options until it looks right.

Below is a simple graphic comparing the most common aspect ratios used in the entertainment industry.

Sound is also rather complicated. A variety of formats have evolved over the years, but the capabilities of individual theatres and home video systems varies greatly.

Let's start at the very beginning. A vey good place to start. So-called "silent" films were never really silent. They were intended to be accompanied by live music. In the largest big city theaters this might involve a full orchestra. Small town theaters usually had only a piano, perhaps with a violin player alongside. However, most theaters of the silent era were equipped with a theater organ, which enabled a single musician to have a full range of instruments, including percussion and sound effects, at his fingertips. The better quality videos of silent films feature an organ or orchestral soundtrack composed specially for the film and recorded in stereo. Cheap videos typically insert generic music that is not synchronized with the action.

Experiments in sound actually began as early as 1896 when a presentation was made in Berlin using phonographic discs synchronized with the film. Over the next 30 years a number of short films and newsreels were made with sound, but none had widespread exhibition. Sound finally become commercially successful in 1927 when Warner Bros. introduced a sound on disc system called Vitaphone for the first "talkies." The following year Fox studios offered the first "sound on film" process which they called Movietone. Soon after, Warners abandoned the disc format in favor of sound on film. By the middle of 1930 silent films had been phased out.

Stereo sound first came along in 1935 when the silent film Napoleon (1927) was reissued with a new soundtrack for a special engagement in Paris. Films with stereo sound were produced in the U.S. beginning in 1940. Disney Studios developed the first "surround" stereo in 1941 for Fantasia, but Fantasound, as the system was called, was installed in only a handful of theaters. In the early 1970s Dolby Laboratories developed an economical method of encoding four channels of stereo information onto a standard two-channel stereo soundtrack. Theaters equipped with special decoders could present Dolby Stereo offering right, left, center and surround channels with relative ease. A later version, Dolby SR offered greater sound clarity, less noise, and a wider frequency range.

The next upgrade was digital sound with as many as six channels, and in this arena Dolby Digital has a competitor known as DTS (Digital Theater Systems), which resulted in some crowded real estate on the film. The Dolby Digital soundtrack is located between the sprocket holes on the film. DTS actually revived the sound on disc concept, this time using Compact Discs. Coding located on the outside edge of the film enabled the discs to be perfectly synchronized with the film.

The latest upgrade is Dolby Atmos, which is a blanket term for processing sound in everything from your phone's headphones to high-end theatrical sound systems giving the listener more spatial awareness to the sound. In theaters this includes either ceiling mounted speakers or upward firing speakers that bounce sound off the ceiling to provide vertical positioning of movie sounds for a more immersive experience.

Many "home theater" sound systems are now available at modest cost which duplicate these formats in your living room. The first such systems were known as Dolby Pro-Logic, which is essentially the same as the original four-channel Dolby Stereo, modified slightly to accommodate the limitations of a home system. Dolby Stereo is encoded on most Hi-Fi stereo video tapes, so you can get great surround sound even with the old VHS tapes you may still have. Dolby Stereo, Dolby Digital, and DTS is encoded on most DVD and Blu-ray discs for use with the appropriate home systems. If your sound system doesn't have the full capabilities of the soundtrack, no worries. Surround formats are generally compatible with simpler sound systems (though we have had some challenges with Atmos Blu-. For example, if you have a disc with 5.1 channels of surround sound but you only have a simple two-channel stereo soundbar, you will still get the full range of sound but everything will be coming from the front.

Running time is for the original theatrical release. Some videos (sometimes called the “director's cut”) may contain added scenes that weren't shown in theaters, so some versions may have longer running times than those shown here. Some old movies may have had portions lost to film decay and may run somewhat shorter than the original.

MPAA/MPA ratings are determined by the Motion Picture Association of America which shortened its name in 2019 to the Motion Picture Association. They are intended as guidelines to help parents determine which movies are appropriate for children of various ages. MPAA/MPA ratings were first adopted in November 1968. Movies released prior to that date do not have such ratings. See www.filmratings.com for further information. Note: I am using the initials MPAA and MPA interchangeably in this guide. The shorter version is used only for movies released in 2019 or later.

Technical Notes

To help you understand the Technical Stuff in the individual movie listings.

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