Patent attributes
A wide viewing angle polarizer having: a polarizing film; and a phase retarder adhesively laminated on at least one surface of the polarizing film through an adhesive layer, the phase retarder being made of a composite phase retarder constituted by a laminate in which a retardation layer B of a cholesteric liquid crystal-oriented solidified layer in a selective reflection wavelength range of not larger than 350 nm is supported by a retardation layer A of a thermoplastic resin exhibiting positive birefringence, the composite phase retarder being formed so that the laminate has Re of not smaller than 10 nm and Rth−Re of not smaller than 50 nm when Re and Rth are defined as Re=(nx−ny)X d and Rth=(nx−nz)X d respectively in which nx and ny are in-plane main refractive indices, nz is a thicknesswise refractive index, and d is a layer thickness. A liquid-crystal display device having: a liquid-crystal cell; and a wide viewing angle polarizer defined above and disposed on at least one surface of the liquid-crystal cell.