Some movies just aren’t avail­able in any other for­mat. I once had a room­mate who had a large col­lec­tion of movies on laserdisc that were either unavail­able on DVD or were oth­er­wise greatly supe­rior to the DVD ver­sions. Among them was The Cheap Detec­tive, writ­ten by Neil Simon and star­ring Peter Falk, Made­line Kahn, Eileen Bren­nan, Stockard Chan­ning, Sid Ceasar, Dom DeLuise, Abe Vigoda, and a half-​​score of oth­ers in a WWII detec­tive spoof. It is one of those come­dies, for which Simon had a pen­chant, that was able to pull off absur­dity with­out devolv­ing into farce. I actu­ally like it bet­ter than its more-​​popular pre­de­ces­sor, Mur­der by Death.

Any­ways, The Cheap Detec­tive was filmed with an aspect ratio of 2.39:1. But it was only ever released on VHS in pan-​​and-​​scan, which chops off over 44% of the pic­ture area. The currently-​​in-​​production DVD avail­able in the US is also a pan-​​and-​​scan copy. The film was only ever released on video in its full width on Laserdisc, in 1995.

Unfor­tu­nately for me, I no longer have that room­mate. So I no longer have that Laserdisc copy of The Cheap Detec­tive.

Allegedly, Ama​zon​.ca sells a hybrid disc with both a pan-​​and-​​scan and a widescreen trans­fer. I don’t know why this is only sold in Canada. As it stands, the 1995 Laserdisc release is the only com­plete copy of the film ever pub­lished in the US home video market.

I was going to buy the Cana­dian disc until I found out that the ship­ping from Canada costs more than the disc itself. I have a birth­day com­ing up here pretty soon, so if any­one is look­ing for an inex­pen­sive (under $20USD) gift that I would really, really appre­ci­ate . . . well, nudge nudge wink wink.