John Belton

Widescreen Cinema

Harvard University Press, 1992

The history of American widescreen cinema, like the history of American cinema itself, begins with notions of novelty. Indeed, the popular reception of the widescreen revolution looks back to attitudes surrounding the invention of the cinema; both were considered to be short-lived phenomena of minor cultural or aesthetic significance. A new technology designed primarily for short-term amusement, the cinema remained a novelty until its technology no longer supplied the greater part on its amusement value.