A default TV setting makes movies look cheap. Here’s how to turn it off
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(NEXSTAR) – Do you trust the manufacturer to set your TV up well? You shouldn’t, film buffs say.
Newer HD TVs have a default setting that can make watching sports or other live TV look nice and smooth. It’s called “motion smoothing” or “motion interpolation,” and it smooths out fast-moving images, eliminating blur.
But cinephiles say it makes movies shot on film look worse. Because movies are often shot at lower frame rates than your new TV is designed to deliver, the TV adds in extra frames to smooth everything out.
The result is so offensive to those with an eye for cinema, that Tom Cruise and “Mission Impossible” filmmaker Christopher McQuarries, that they made a PSA begging people to turn it off.
“Without a side-by-side comparison, many people can’t quite put a finger on why the movie they’re watching looks strange,” McQuarrie said.
The motion smoothing creates a “soap opera effect” when watching movies, Cruise said in the video. “The unfortunate side effect is that it makes most movies look like they were shot on high-speed video rather than film,” the actor said.
If you’d like to see the latest blockbuster the way filmmakers intended, you may have to turn this default setting off. The way to do that is different on every TV, but you’ll want to navigate through the settings until you find something having to do with “motion” or “smoothing,” and turn it off. It’s called “action smoothing” on Amazon Fire and Roku TVs, “TruMotion” on LGs and “Motionflow” on Sony. (The easiest way to find instructions for your specific TV model is to google the brand name and “turn off motion smoothing.”)
There have been improvements since Cruise and McQuarrie first released their PSA. Certain TVs manufactured since 2020, now have a “filmmaker” mode you can enable, Variety reports.
You’ll have to play around with your TV settings to find what works for you and what you watch most. Some TVs have multiple modes you can toggle between – like a “cinema” setting for movies and a “sports” setting for when you want to watch the game.
