Night People

Primitive Release
Unlike other reviewers, I actually purchased this DVD release before writing my negative review.

For those of you who've never seen this, the movie is a taut Cold War yarn set in West Berlin (1954) and deals with a G.I. who's kidnapped by the East Germans as a trade for 2 East Germany regees, now holed up in the West, and how an American Officer (Gregory Peck) sets out to outsmart them. So much for the film which I give 5 stars.

Amazon is not known for completely accurate specs on their DVD product pages. I honestly thought the NTSC was a mistake. Surely a CinemaScope movie would be released in the year 2012 in the Anamorphic format to be screened on a Flat Screen Panel. Most studios by now do show some respect for their old releases. Boy, was I naive! It actually says so on the back of the DVD case in print so tiny I needed my glasses and a huge magnifying glass:4/3 Pan & Scan. In 2012?!

Don't know who at this studio made these dumb decisions, but to...

Cinemascope versus Pan & Scan
I believe this Fox Archive release is in pan and scan. If this is so, forget it and buy the
official Fox release from Spain which is in its original 2.35 Cinemascope ratio, excellent
picture and sound. It is available on Amazon.
If Fox can release a 2.35 version in Spain, why can't they do the same in the U.S?

Popcorn and suspense
This is a good movie, a gem hidden amongst the junk. This is a movie you watch over and over and never seem to get tired of it. The casting is right on the money, and the story is good, it's a keeper.

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