Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2014 March 19

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March 19

First widescreen film in color

What was the first widescreen film in color? Song of the Flame doesn't count, because part of that film was in black and white, and part of the film was also non-widescreen. Ac05number1 (talk) 00:43, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Lawrence of Arabia (1962) was both, but I doubt if it was the first. It had a 2.20:1 aspect ratio on 70 mm prints. How do you define "wide-screen" ? StuRat (talk) 01:04, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

I would define wide-screen as any film that has an aspect ratio greater than the academy aspect ratio. Ac05number1 (talk) 01:20, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

"The first practical demonstration of a "panoramic movie" was made by a Frenchman; Raoul Grimoin Sanson with his "Cineorama"; ... This system eventually became a feature of the Paris Exposition of 1900; ... the developed film was hand-coloured ..." [1]  —71.20.250.51 (talk) 03:01, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

I don't really think hand-colored counts... Ac05number1 (talk) 03:42, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Can you be more specific on what you do want? Widescreen and colour both have a few variations that matter. Technicolor, modern color, Kodachrome... Mingmingla (talk) 04:40, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Ok, it has to be filmed in color. Hand-colored doesn't count, because the film was still shot in black and white. Ac05number1 (talk) 04:54, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

The Book of Firsts by Patrick Robertson (1974, ISBN 0-517-51577-6) talks about the first wide-screen films but does not distinguish color from black-and-white. It says that the first ever was a 15-minute film of a boxing match in 1897 (at 2:1 on 70 mm film), while the first wide-screen feature was Fox Movietone Follies of 1929, which it says was shown on a 28x14 foot screen. Its IMDB technical-specs page shows an 1929 aspect ratio of 2.15:1 for the 70 mm version, but the IMDB and other sources agree that only part of the movie is in color, so it doesn't qualify. Robertson goes on to list several other wide-screen formats introduced around 1930—Vitascope, Magnafilm, Spoor Berrgren—but does not name any specific movies. It was only a fad then, as most cinemas did not have wide screens and the Great Depression was starting. Leonard Maltin's annual movie guidebook says (on the page where it lists widescreen formats) that the Academy ratio was used by virtually all films until 1953.

So I downloaded the IMDB's raw data files for color information and technical specifications, and massaged the data by hand to look for films that had a date before 1953, were listed as color and not also as black-and-white, and had an aspect ratio shown that was wider than 1.37:1. Because this process was manual and because there are variations in the data formats and for other reasons I would not consider my results conclusive. I found several false hits where the aspect ratio clearly did not refer to the original release of the movie but to a later re-release or TV transfer. But I think I found an answer—if you consider the term "film" to include shorts. In 1926 there was an 8-minute widescreen color silent film called Niagara Falls.

But if the question is restricted to feature-length productions, the first all-color one in wide-screen would be the demonstration film This Is Cinerama from 1952. And if you want to exclude that as well and limit it to fiction features, the answer seems to be The Robe (1953). My data search found more than 40 all-color wide-screen movies that year, and I haven't checked the release dates of all of them. But sources agree that The Robe was the first movie in CinemaScope, and according to Wikipedia, it was "the first widescreen movie in more than two decades". It was in color and its IMDB technical-specs page shows an aspect ratio of 2.55:1 for the original anamorphic version. --50.100.193.30 (talk) 09:12, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Good sleuthing, 50.100. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 19:36, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Slight issue to mention. While "The Robe" is discussed as one of the first wide screen feature films..."How to Marry a Millionaire" was filmed at the same time...but was released on November 16, of 1953, while the robe was released on December 4 of that same year. Our article has the wrong date by the way.--Mark Miller (talk) 22:34, 20 March 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, Jack. Sources that disagree with Mark (and in a minor way with each other) include:

• Leonard Maltin's Classic Movie Guide, which identifies both The Robe and How to Marry a Millionaire as CinemaScope but says that The Robe is "famed as [the] first movie in CinemaScope";
• The IMDB's release-dates pages for The Robe, which shows a premiere on September 16 (same date as Wikipedia) and for How to Marry a Millionaire, which shows a November 4 premiere in Los Angeles with national release the next day (the date Wikipedia has);
• TCM's overview pages for The Robe, which shows openings in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles on September 16, 23, and 24 respectively, and for How to Marry a Millionaire, which shows openings in Los Angeles and New York on November 4 and 10 respectively.

--50.100.193.30 (talk) 00:31, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

I downloaded the first part of This is Cinerama, including the prologue, and put it on YouTube, because I wasn't able to hear it prior to me putting it on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULBdcC9jSGQ

So I saw the black and white prologue to it, which now brings me to my next question: If the prologue is in B&W, is it correct to say that This is Cinerama is a part color/part B&W film, or is it correct to say that This is Cinerama is an all-color film and pretend the prologue doesn't exist, since it's just a prologue? Ac05number1 (talk) 02:28, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

Hmm. When doing the "sleuthing" earlier, I thought I'd come across a source that said it was only the US release of This is Cinerama that included the prologue, but I can't find any such thing now. If it was always present (or was always present in the original release), then I agree that there's at least a good case that the movie doesn't meet the original poster's requirements. --50.100.193.30 (talk) 03:56, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

An odd thing...the date of release for the Robe on IMDB said that it was December the other day...now it says that date is for France today...but still on the main page for the film. Since we know that IMDB is user generated content, I am not going to trust that dating.--Mark Miller (talk) 04:58, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

I was able to find a book source that states that "The Robe was released on September 16, 1953 in New York and was the first Cinemascope film released in the US. [2]--Mark Miller (talk) 05:05, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

By way of additional confirmation, the New York Times here reproduces its original review of The Robe, giving the original date of publication (the day after the premiere) as September 17, 1953. --50.100.193.30 (talk) 19:49, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

nursery rhyme

I have an old family rhyme and want to know if it has ever been published — Preceding unsigned comment added by Melodydevee (talk • contribs) 18:13, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

A start might be to type the first line into Google and see if anything comes up. Alansplodge (talk) 18:23, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

I'd go with the most distinctive line instead of the first. For example, in:

Once upon a time,
An aardvark ate a lime,...

You'd do a lot better searching for the second line. StuRat (talk) 20:25, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Likewise telling us would help, too. Mingmingla (talk) 18:56, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Is this the rhyme about a family from Nantucket?  —71.20.250.51 (talk) 20:51, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Telling us would actually be a bad idea, because posting stuff here technically gets rid of your claim to copyright over something. Ian.thomson (talk) 21:32, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Fine. Post it somewhere else, and then link to it here. Mingmingla (talk) 00:24, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

How many lines and/or words are in the poem? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:12, 19 March 2014 (UTC)