You see more of the ship sinking. You see more of the grand staircase. You see the ocean spray above the characters' heads. It is a completely different visual experience—and for many, a superior one. Here is the modern conflict. Studios hate releasing Open Matte versions because they break the "framing." A director framed that close-up to put the actor’s eye exactly one third of the way down the screen. If you open the matte, suddenly the actor is in the middle of nowhere.
Suddenly, in The Matrix , you see the wires holding Keanu Reeves. In Harry Potter , you see the stunt pads on the Quidditch pitch. You see crew members who forgot to duck. Ask any film nerd about their "White Whale," and they will mention the Titanic Fullscreen VHS. open matte
But , when a 4K Blu-ray is mastered, sometimes the studio is lazy. They take the Open Matte digital intermediate (the master file before the bars were added) and just slap black bars on it. You see more of the ship sinking
Watching Pacific Rim in Open Matte is a religious experience. The Jaegers (giant robots) actually look taller than the skyscrapers because you can see the scale from ground to sky. Sometimes, Open Matte ruins the magic. You see the boom mic. You see the edge of the set. The composition looks sloppy. It is a completely different visual experience—and for
We’ve all been there.
For decades, when a 2.39:1 widescreen movie aired on 4:3 TVs, studios did "Pan & Scan"—they cut the sides off. But for some cheap TV broadcasts or foreign DVD releases, they did the opposite: they just opened the matte .