A surprisingly large number of people just don't understand this, period.
A friend's wife was like this. He tried explaining it to her many, many times, and she'd patiently listen then ask why they couldn't make it so it filled up the whole TV and showed the whole picture. He wanted to tear his hair out.
I hate to sound like an elitist, but quite a few people have absolutely no understanding of geometry at all, so talk of aspect ratios, etc., is like speaking a foreign language to them and will get you nowhere.
Even the sites showing how the sides would have to be chopped off doesn't get through to some people. They seem to think that there's some way it could be done.
As for curtains, I haven't been in a theater that had them for years. In fact, our local theater seems to have 1.85:1 screens and they are in fact letterboxed for 2:35:1 movies. When the screen is gigantic and in a pitch-black room, people don't notice the letterboxing.
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