Terry Gilliam warns against buying the R1 Tideland DVD

Spotted this on Aint-It-Cool-News (who have it from Film Ick in the United Kingdom).

Well, the title says it all: Terry Gilliam and his cinematographer Nicola Pecorini are very unhappy with ThinkFilm's region 1 DVD of "Tideland".
ThinkFilm changed the aspect ratio from 2.25: 1 to 1.77:1, cropping the image.

ThinkFilm says it was forced to go the 1.77:1 route because they never received the 2.35:1 they requested (the ratio used to show "Tideland" in cinema's). Gilliam claims this is not exactly right as the 2.25:1 he provided is a slightly opened version of the 2.35:1. In other words the image isn't cropped but you get a little bit of extra at the top and bottom. According to Gilliam and Pecorini this made the film look better on small screens and is their preferred aspect ratio for home viewing.

Now ThinkFilm has cropped this image so compared to the cinema you get a bit extra on top and bottom, and lose a chunk from left and right.
A shame, since early news on the ThinkFilm version is that it's a very nice one indeed, with (apart from aspect ratio) good video and sound, and a very nice selection of extra's.

But lets face it: It wouldn't be a Gilliam movie if there wasn't SOME sort of difficulty involved in seeing it. At least the UK region 2 DVD by Revolver does have the Gilliam/Pecorini approved 2.25:1 ratio.

The story as told on AICN (with multiple links to the Film-ick site) :
Todd's review: