I get a black bar at the top of my screen on Netflix?

I have been watching movies and shows on Netflix on my laptop for a while now. Recently, whenever I try to watch something on my laptop via Netflix, once I hit "play," the screen seems to shift down an inch or two. So there's a black bar at the top of the screen where the gap is, and the bottom is cut off. This not only cuts off a portion of the picture, but it inhibits me from using any of the functions at the bottom like "play/pause" or "full screen," etc. I have Windows 8.1, my laptop is a Lenovo, it's fairly new (I just bought it August 2013). I have already cleared the cookies from my account and uninstalled and re-installed the Microsoft Silverlight Plug-In. Is there anything else I can do?

Side note: We use Netflix on our TV through the Wii, and I can play videos just fine through my Netflix account on the Wii. It's only on my laptop that there seems to be an issue.

Guest

The first bypass I'd suggest since you're using Windows 8.1 is to download Netflix from the Windows store:

http://apps.microsoft.com/webpdp/app/d8d75bb2-c5cd-44f2-8c26-c1d1ae5b13fa

My first thought is that you have some sort of malware on your system and what you're seeing is called an html injection. On a normal webpage you'd probably see an ad, but when you're playing netflix, you're seeing a black bar where it's trying to inject an ad. Try to see if you can disable any browser add-ons, and if that doesn't work, then scan your system for malware.

Blackened

Which browser are you using on the laptop (Chrome, Firefox, etc.)?

Steve