Early-Generation iPad Video Playback

Black Hole

May contain traces of nut
I have a friend with an old iPad (to which I have infrequent access), and I used it to video an event she was participating in. However, I'm used to being able to pinch-zoom video on playback, so it didn't occur to me that I needed to pinch-zoom on record - and this old iPad doesn't pinch-zoom video playback.

Okay, I thought, we'll import the video (actually 35 videos of about 1 minute each) to my iPad Pro and I'll crop them in iMovie and export. We copied them across using AirDrop in batches, I quickly loaded each into iMovie and cropped it to the action then exported to my camera roll, and finally AirDropped them back (one by one - batches appeared to be working but the files disappeared at the receiving end!). The whole job took about half an hour - but it was all wasted.

When cropping, I did not account for the old iPad recording video at 16:9 and my iPad Pro displaying it at 16:9 (letterbox) and cropping to 16:9... but the old iPad displays on its 4:3 screen with 16:9 material zoomed to the centre portion (losing the sides). Thus my crop results in some of the action being off-screen.

I used to have an iPad3, but I can't remember what was what on that, and I'm not sure which generation this one is. It seems ridiculous that video gets recorded that you can never see the full width of. Yes, I did try clicking and pinching to see if I could get the video to fit the width instead of the height.

My appeal is: does anyone here still have an older iPad and recognise these characteristics? If so, is there any trick I can pass on to fit-width instead of me having to re-crop and re-export (don't know when) with a guard area each side (and pretty well have to guess how wide they should be)?

An alternative video player app is a possibility, but one I would rather push down the preferences.

Update: by "remote control", I have determined that the iPad in question is MD785B/A running iOS7. No, madam is not inclined to update!
 
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