Some Blue Ray movies have black bars on the top and bottom Why ?

[JimM]

I have a week old blue ray player(Phillips) and a new 1080p HD TV (Phillips).Some newly released blue ray movies have black bars on the top and bottom.NO settings on the TV or the BD player will correct this.Shouldn't this be corrected automatically when both are set to auto picture

 

[jon]

This is part of the video itself, and not a problem with the hardware. The reasoning is that your TV doesn't have the same dimensions as the original film, so the bars make the video smaller, using the full width to show the whole shot.

Often, with DVDs as well, you can select a full-frame video that makes use of Pan&Scan or another technology that was used to modify the video before placing it on the disc.

In addition, some TVs can "see" this black area and accommodate by stretching the video vertically to fill the screen. With this, everything will appear stretched and look odd. I find it's best to eithe renjoy the full screen with the black bars, or to watch an alternative full-frame version, although you do miss out on a lot of the film.

 

[octogen]

you can do nothing to alter it these films were meant to show on Wide screen cinema screens. The
bars are there for that reason.

 

[DougDoug_]

When filming a movie, the director decides what "aspect ratio" he/she will use. If they choose 16:9 (for every 16 inches long for every 9 inches tall), then it will fit your TV with no bars. However, if they use a ratio that is longer, like 2:1 (18:9), then you end up with horizontal bars. If they use a ratio that is taller, like 4:3 (or 16:12), then you end up with vertical bars along the sides.