The cropping of this film continues to be all over the place…
The trailer on the Japanese DVD has some 2.35:1 shots squeezed into a 1.33:1 frame, while an English trailer on Youtube appears to be entirely widescreen. That English trailer further reveals how much even the French VHS is cropped, although it does also help me correct the French version’s frame distortion.
Changing gears a bit while my VCR is out of commission, I’ve started matching the Youtube version of the film to my own captures. Both versions were by the same distributor, and yet they are cropped a bit different. In some parts of the film, the frame can be expanded by as much as 20%!
It’s just a shame that the quality of the Youtube version is so low… I’m tempted to reach out the person who’d posted it, to ask if they still have that tape and would be willing to sell it to me.