can you see the piano wire? i remember one of the original theatrical reviews was very critical of being able to see the piano wire in all the flying scenes.
It wasn't shot in a widescreen format. The film was shot with an aspect ratio of 1.33.1 meaning the film image was 1.33 times as wide as it was tall (another way to denote this is 4x3, meaning 4 units of width for every 3 of height).
I had the same reaction when I bought it on DVD years ago. Then I read that the widescreen formats didn't start until the fifties. Here's interesting info on the different formats and how they came to be. WIDESCREEN-O-RAMA!
i guess i'm just surprised because i do have a DVD copy somewhere that I bought probably in the early 2000's and i thought it was widescreen too... i guess i never noticed that maybe it isnt widescreen after all. weird.