Since the new MBP's don't have adaptors for component or composite, and I find more often than not these are the exact options I have when I want to play a movie off my computer at a friends house, I figured out a trick around this and I thought I would share.
I bought the iPhone composite video out cable from Apple. I've read too much that the cheap ones don't work, so get the Apple branded one. Now I don't want to worry about loading the movie onto my iPhone, and if it's from a computer that I'm not synced to, I can't anyway. I plug my external HDD into the Mac and drop the movie into the Sites folder in the home folder (erase everything else in the Sites folder). Then in Systems Preferences in Sharing enable Web Sharing. It will give you an address that is something like /ip address/~yourname/. Copy this into an email and send it to yourself. Open mail on your iPhone and hit the link from the email and it will pull up an FTP type server list with the video listed. Click it and it will play, and play out to a TV.
Make sure Web Sharing is enabled in the Firewall, and make sure your iPhone and computer are connected to the same wireless router.
Edit: I know this isn't for everyone, I've just found it useful since my neighbor and brother both have new MBP's but don't have the ability to hook them up to their TV's.
I bought the iPhone composite video out cable from Apple. I've read too much that the cheap ones don't work, so get the Apple branded one. Now I don't want to worry about loading the movie onto my iPhone, and if it's from a computer that I'm not synced to, I can't anyway. I plug my external HDD into the Mac and drop the movie into the Sites folder in the home folder (erase everything else in the Sites folder). Then in Systems Preferences in Sharing enable Web Sharing. It will give you an address that is something like /ip address/~yourname/. Copy this into an email and send it to yourself. Open mail on your iPhone and hit the link from the email and it will pull up an FTP type server list with the video listed. Click it and it will play, and play out to a TV.
Make sure Web Sharing is enabled in the Firewall, and make sure your iPhone and computer are connected to the same wireless router.
Edit: I know this isn't for everyone, I've just found it useful since my neighbor and brother both have new MBP's but don't have the ability to hook them up to their TV's.