I can't believe my eyes. Someone is really complaining that the DVD releases are in the aspect ratio that the director and cinematographer intended? Wow!
All these films have been framed for aspect ratio of 1.66:1 or 1.85:1. It's what the director and cinematographer wanted. It's the aspect ratio that is seen in theaters. It's the correct aspect ratio. Of course, the actual film frame itself has an aspect ratio of about 1.37:1, so there is more information available in the original film frames, but it's not supposed to be seen, and it's been framed out.
Because so many uninformed individuals seem to prefer wrong aspect ratios to black bars on their 82-inch 4:3 TVs it's pretty common to do TV/video versions of these movies by simply opening up the top and the bottom of the frame. This is called open matte. This way there is more picture to be seen, yes, but it's all picture that's not supposed to be seen. There may be visible microphones, visible effects, visible set pieces, that were framed out by the director and the cinematographer.
More explanation about widescreen formats and how they're done, with examples:
http://www.modeemi.fi/~leopold/AV/FilmToVideo/#Vid eoSoftMatte. The page has also a demonstration of how Super35 widescreen/4:3 versions are done, which is worth noting, because it's the process that's widely used nowadays in high-profile productions, such as The Lord of the Rings or The Matrix trilogies.
Remember kids, it's intended to be widescreen, unless it's either very old or by Stanley Kubrick.
