GonbeFAN said:

At least these movies are still perfectly watchable in widescreen, though I'd prefer more picture any day.

They're watchable in widescreen because that's what open matte is all about.

The choice was made to shoot in 4:3, but construct each shot to fit within a 1.85:1 frame. This eliminates the need to pan&scan home releases, but still makes a widescreen theatrical release possible. It's genius.

I prefer to watch open matte movies in full frame because I prefer to watch movies on CRTs and most CRTs are 4:3.

In fact, I'm going to go watch Evil Dead II in full frame (open matte) right now!