The Shape of Cinema: A Guide to Film Formats and Aspect Ratios
How the frame defines what we see
When Akira Kurosawa shot Seven Samurai in 1954, he framed every composition within a nearly square frame—1.33:1, the Academy ratio that had defined cinema for decades. The cramped interiors, the rain-soaked final battle, the faces of desperate farmers—all contained within that upright frame.
A few years later, David Lean shot Lawrence of Arabia in Ultra Panavision 70—a sweeping 2.76:1 aspect ratio that stretched across the screen like the Arabian desert itself. The format wasn't just a technical choice. It was the film's meaning made visible.
The shape of the frame is never neutral. It determines what a director can show, what a cinematographer can compose, what an audience can see. From the near-square Academy ratio to the ultra-widescreen spectacle of 70mm, the physical dimensions of cinema have shaped how stories are told and experienced for over a century.
This is your guide to understanding the formats and ratios that define essential cinema—and why they matter.
The Foundation: Understanding Aspect Ratio
Aspect ratio is the relationship between width and height in a film frame, expressed as a mathematical ratio. A 1.85:1 aspect ratio means the image is 1.85 times wider than it is tall. A 2.39:1 ratio means the width is 2.39 times the height.
But these numbers represent more than mathematics. They represent choices about composition, about what fits in the frame, about whether the image emphasizes vertical or horizontal space. A square-ish 1.33:1 frame naturally captures the human figure standing upright. A ultra-wide 2.76:1 frame demands landscape, demands scope, demands spectacle.
The Original Standard: 1.33:1 (Academy Ratio)
When Thomas Edison and William Dickson standardized 35mm film in 1892, they created a frame four perforations high. The de facto ratio was 1.33:1—nearly square, with just slightly more width than height.
With the arrival of synchronized sound in 1929, dimensions expanded slightly to accommodate the optical soundtrack strip, creating 1.37:1. Both measurements were folded into what became officially known as the Academy ratio, standardized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1932.
This was the aspect ratio for cinema for over sixty years. From the silent era through the early 1950s, virtually every film you've seen from that period—Citizen Kane, Casablanca, The Third Man, Tokyo Story—was composed within that upright frame.
In the Criterion Collection:
Seven Samurai (1954) - 1.33:1/1.37:1
Bicycle Thieves (1948) - 1.37:1
Rashomon (1950) - 1.37:1
The 400 Blows (1959) - 1.37:1
The Academy ratio's verticality made it ideal for capturing the human figure in full, for intimate interiors, for faces. Watch Kurosawa use it in Seven Samurai—the way he can frame multiple characters at different depths within cramped rooms, how he can show a samurai from head to toe in a single shot, how the rain falls through the entire vertical space of the frame in the final battle.
The Widescreen Revolution: 1.85:1 and 2.35:1
By the early 1950s, television was stealing cinema's audience. Studios needed something TV couldn't offer. The answer: make the screen bigger. Wider. More spectacular.
The widescreen wars began.
Multiple competing formats emerged almost simultaneously. CinemaScope, developed by 20th Century Fox in 1953, used anamorphic lenses to squeeze a wide image onto standard 35mm film, then unsqueeze it during projection to create a 2.35:1 ratio (later standardized to 2.39:1). Paramount countered with VistaVision. Todd-AO offered 70mm spectacle. Cinerama used three synchronized projectors to create an immersive 2.59:1 curved screen experience.
Eventually, two aspect ratios emerged as American cinema standards:
1.85:1 - The "flat" or "spherical" widescreen format. Wider than Academy but not dramatically so. It became the standard for most theatrical films in the United States.
2.35:1 / 2.39:1 - The anamorphic widescreen format, often still called "scope" even though CinemaScope itself hasn't been used since 1967. This ultra-wide format became synonymous with epic spectacle.
In Europe, 1.66:1 became the dominant flat widescreen standard—not quite as wide as American 1.85:1, but still a significant departure from the Academy ratio.
In the Criterion Collection:
The Red Shoes (1948) - 1.37:1, but later Tales of Hoffmann (1951) used early widescreen
The Hidden Fortress (1958) - 2.35:1 (Kurosawa's first widescreen film)
Lawrence of Arabia (1962) - 2.20:1 (Super Panavision 70)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) - 2.20:1 (Super Panavision 70)
Do the Right Thing (1989) - 1.85:1
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) - 2.39:1
The choice between 1.85:1 and 2.39:1 isn't arbitrary. Directors choose based on what they're trying to show. Wes Anderson often shoots in 2.39:1 (or wider variants) because he can fit more visual information horizontally—multiple characters, layered compositions, symmetrical frames filled with details. Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing uses 1.85:1 because the Bedford-Stuyvesant block doesn't need epic scope—it needs intimate, claustrophobic tension.
Ultra Widescreen: 2.76:1 and Beyond
Some filmmakers pushed even wider. Ultra Panavision 70, using 65mm film with a 1.25x anamorphic squeeze, created a massive 2.76:1 aspect ratio. Only a handful of films used it between 1957 and 1966: Ben-Hur (1959), How the West Was Won (1962), It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963).
The format died out—too expensive, too difficult, requiring specialized equipment most theaters didn't have.
But it never entirely disappeared. In 2015, Quentin Tarantino resurrected Ultra Panavision 70 for The Hateful Eight, forcing theaters to install 70mm projectors or show a compromised digital version. The decision wasn't nostalgia. It was artistic intent. Tarantino wanted that ultra-wide frame for his claustrophobic chamber piece—the contradiction between the expansive format and the single-location story creates tension the film needs.
Film Gauge: The Physical Medium
Aspect ratio tells you the shape of the frame. Film gauge tells you the physical size of the film strip running through the camera and projector. The wider the gauge, the more information captured, the higher the resolution, the better the image quality.
8mm and Super 8mm: Home Movies
Introduced by Kodak in 1932, 8mm film was designed for amateur filmmakers and home movies. At only 8 millimeters wide, it was cheap and accessible but low resolution. Super 8, introduced in 1965, improved the format slightly with a larger frame size.
These formats rarely appear in professional cinema, though some experimental filmmakers and avant-garde artists have used them deliberately for their distinctive grainy, home-movie aesthetic.
16mm: The Guerrilla Format
First released by Kodak in 1923, 16mm was created as a more affordable, safer (less flammable) alternative to 35mm. Initially considered amateur or "sub-standard," 16mm evolved into a professional format beloved by documentary filmmakers, television producers, and independent filmmakers who needed mobility and economy.
The cameras were smaller, lighter, easier to use. The film stock cost less. You could shoot in locations impossible with bulky 35mm equipment. Documentary pioneers embraced it. Television news crews used it. Avant-garde filmmakers loved its flexibility.
By the 1960s and 70s, 16mm had developed to rival 35mm quality. And critically, it had acquired an aesthetic—a slightly grainier, more immediate, more "real" look that communicated authenticity, rawness, documentary truth.
Films shot on 16mm:
Pi (1998) - Darren Aronofsky
The Wrestler (2008) - Darren Aronofsky
Black Swan (2010) - Darren Aronofsky
Carol (2015) - Todd Haynes
Moonrise Kingdom (2012) - Wes Anderson
The Florida Project (2017) - Sean Baker
Super 16mm, introduced in the 1970s, used a larger frame size (1.66:1 native aspect ratio) and could be blown up to 35mm for theatrical distribution with minimal quality loss. It became the format of choice for independent filmmakers who wanted theatrical distribution but couldn't afford 35mm production costs.
Anderson shot Moonrise Kingdom on Super 16 to give his 1960s period piece an authentic vintage quality. The format choice wasn't about limitation—it was about achieving a specific emotional texture impossible with digital or 35mm.
35mm: The Standard
For over a century, 35mm has been the film format. It's 35 millimeters wide (hence the name), with four perforations on each side of the frame. Nearly every film you've ever seen in a theater was either shot on 35mm or blown up to 35mm for distribution.
The standard 35mm frame is the Academy aperture: 22mm × 16mm, creating that 1.37:1 aspect ratio. But 35mm proved remarkably versatile. With different camera gates and matting, the same 35mm film could produce different aspect ratios:
Academy aperture (full frame): 1.37:1
US theatrical standard: 1.85:1 (matted during projection)
European standard: 1.66:1 (matted during projection)
Anamorphic (CinemaScope/Panavision): 2.39:1 (using anamorphic lenses)
The majority of films in the Criterion Collection were shot on 35mm. From Kurosawa to Bergman, from Fellini to Scorsese, 35mm was the universal language of cinema.
70mm: Epic Spectacle
70mm film is nearly twice the width of 35mm. The camera actually shoots on 65mm negative, and the extra 5mm width on 70mm prints accommodates multiple magnetic soundtracks for superior audio.
The frame size is massive compared to 35mm—creating extraordinarily high resolution, exceptional clarity, and a sense of immersion no other analog format could match. The grain structure is incredibly tight. The detail is breathtaking. A proper 70mm projection can reveal textures and details invisible in any other format.
But 70mm came with costs. The cameras were huge and heavy. The film stock was exponentially more expensive. Processing was costly. Distribution prints weighed twice as much as 35mm. Theaters needed specialized projection equipment. Most crucially, only a handful of "roadshow" theaters could exhibit 70mm films, meaning limited release windows.
70mm was reserved for spectacle. Epics. Biblical dramas. Science fiction. Films that justified the expense by delivering an experience impossible at home, impossible in any other format.
Famous 70mm productions:
Oklahoma! (1955) - the last full-length feature filmed entirely in 70mm for decades
Ben-Hur (1959) - Ultra Panavision 70
Lawrence of Arabia (1962) - Super Panavision 70
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) - Super Panavision 70
Baraka (1992) - entirely shot on 65mm
The Master (2012) - Paul Thomas Anderson (first major 70mm feature since 1996)
Dunkirk (2017) - Christopher Nolan (mixed 70mm and IMAX)
In the Criterion Collection:
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) - Shot entirely on 65mm
Baraka (1992) - Shot entirely on 65mm
When you watch 2001: A Space Odyssey or Lawrence of Arabia in a proper 70mm presentation, you're seeing these films as they were meant to exist—vast, immersive, overwhelming. The format isn't decoration. It's meaning. Kubrick chose 70mm for 2001 because space is vast, infinite, incomprehensible. That ultra-wide frame, that extraordinary resolution—it puts you there.
IMAX 70mm: The Largest Frame
Standard 70mm runs vertically through the camera. IMAX 70mm runs horizontally, using fifteen perforations per frame instead of five. The result is the largest film frame ever used in cinema—nearly ten times the size of standard 35mm.
The aspect ratio is typically 1.43:1 for true IMAX theaters with the full vertical screen, or 1.90:1 for digital IMAX. Christopher Nolan has been the format's most prominent advocate in the 21st century, shooting sequences in The Dark Knight, Interstellar, Dunkirk, Tenet, and Oppenheimer with IMAX cameras.
The Modern Return: Why Filmmakers Still Choose Film
By 2013, over 90% of theaters worldwide had converted to digital projection. Major studios stopped making 35mm prints by 2014. Digital cameras grow cheaper and more convenient every year. Film should be dead.
It isn't.
A significant contingent of directors—Christopher Nolan, Quentin Tarantino, Paul Thomas Anderson, Greta Gerwig, Wes Anderson, Kelly Reichardt—insist on shooting film. They argue digital captures information differently, renders motion differently, handles light differently. They claim film has a "tangibility," a material quality that digital lacks.
More practically: film forces discipline. You can't shoot endless takes when every foot of 70mm costs a fortune. You can't fix everything in post when the image is locked on celluloid. Film demands precision, demands intention, demands that you know exactly what you're capturing before you press the button.
And aesthetically, film still offers something digital struggles to replicate. The grain structure. The color rendering. The way highlights roll off. The organic quality of an image captured by light on chemical emulsion rather than pixels on a sensor.
Boutique film labs continue processing and developing. Companies like Kodak maintain film stock production. Specialty theaters—the Alamo Drafthouse, the New Beverly, Prince Charles Cinema in London—maintain film projection capabilities. Criterion continues restoring films from original camera negatives, preserving them on 4K and 2K masters, but recognizing that the original analog source contains information no digital scan fully captures.
Film didn't die. It became a choice. An artistic decision. A statement.
Aspect Ratio as Artistic Choice
Today, filmmakers have more aspect ratio options than ever. Streaming platforms like Netflix and Amazon leave the decision entirely to directors. Some choose ratios that barely existed historically. Others deliberately return to formats long abandoned.
1:1 (Square): Xavier Dolan shot Mommy (2014) in a perfect square. The constriction mirrors the characters' emotional claustrophobia.
1.33:1 / 1.37:1 (Academy Ratio): Wes Anderson used Academy ratio for the 1930s sequences in The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), matching the aspect ratio to the period. Kelly Reichardt shot First Cow (2019) in Academy ratio to create intimacy. Robert Eggers used it for The Lighthouse (2019) to evoke early cinema and create a claustrophobic, vertical frame.
1.66:1: European directors like Aki Kaurismäki continue using this distinctly European ratio, maintaining a connection to that regional cinema tradition.
2.0:1 and 2.1:1: These compromise ratios, falling between flat and scope, have become popular for streaming content that needs to work on multiple screens.
The aspect ratio you choose isn't just about the screen you're showing on. It's about the story you're telling, the world you're building, the feeling you want to create.
Why It Matters
When Criterion releases a film, they preserve the original aspect ratio. They don't crop. They don't "open up" matted films. They don't pan-and-scan. Black bars appear on your screen because the film was never meant to fill your 16:9 television.
This isn't a limitation. It's integrity.
Kurosawa composed Seven Samurai for 1.33:1. Every frame, every composition, every visual decision assumed that upright rectangle. Cropping it to widescreen would destroy his compositions, eliminate visual information he intended you to see, fundamentally alter the film's meaning.
David Lean shot Lawrence of Arabia for 2.20:1. The desert demanded horizontal vastness. The frame needed to contain emptiness, distance, isolation. Showing it in Academy ratio would eliminate the very quality that makes the film breathtaking.
The frame isn't neutral. It's meaning. It's intention. It's what the filmmaker chose.
When you understand aspect ratios and film formats, you understand the choices directors made, the limitations they worked within, the aesthetic decisions that shape everything you see. You stop seeing black bars as a problem and start seeing them as the frame—the deliberate boundary the filmmaker drew around their vision.
Cinema is shaped by its medium. Understanding that medium means understanding cinema itself.
Further Reading and ResourcesAmerican Society of Cinematographers - Technical articles on aspect ratios and film formats
In70mm.com - Database and information on 70mm presentations and theaters
The Criterion Collection - Technical specifications for every release, preserving original aspect ratios and providing restoration details
Film Forever - Information on film stock, preservation, and the continuing relevance of analog cinema
