Page 1 of Q: Letterbox - How do I eliminate it?

Hi:
I just bought a Philips 711 dvd player and my 1st movie ("The Matrix"). I also rented "Saving Private Ryan".
Why is it that "The Matrix" shows these annoying letterbox black horizontal lines whilst "Saving Private Ryan" fills the whole of my 32" 16/9 screen nicely? Is this inherent to the movie or can it be disabled?
Sorry for my ignorance but I`m new to the matter and appreciate all the help I can get.
Cheers,

Movies come in different formats of widescreen - some 16:9 and some 2.35:1 (or indeed other formats, 1.66:1 etc)

Hence some will still have the letterbox formatting even on a 16:9 TV set.

Turn the lights down then they`re never annoying :P

if you go to www.dvdweb.co.uk there is the best explanation of dvd movie ratio`s you can find under information/whats anamophic ? section.

Aiwa 370 ROCKS !!!

Yammy A5 BOOMS !!!

shaun

You might still be able to get rid of the black lines.

It depends on the type of TV you have? I have a 28" Sony Widescreen. Some DVD`s still put the black borders above and below, but you can goto the picture setup (on the TV), and click through various aspect ratio`s. It can "stretch" the image to fit, although some films look weird as the people`s heads are long! But it DOES get rid of the borders!

I`d check your TV manual (if you`ve still got it!) as I`m sure you`d have that option, as it sounds like you`ve got a decent TV being 32"!

Good luck!

Thanks all for your responses.
I`ve got a Panasonic 32PK1F... It has an `auto` function to maximise the image on screen. However, it didn`t stretch the picture on "The Matrix"... I guess I`ll have to live with it.
Thanks anyway...

if you dont like the lines ..then stay away from 235:1, thats the best you can do.

Max

I have a 32PK20 which must have similar aspect ratios modes which you can cycle through. To eliminate the black bars in Matrix you can use zoom. But you will loose some of the pictures at the two edges.