Be Kind, Rewind: Retro Thoughts of Video Stores Gone By

            This is a strange blog post seeing how it’s about nothing topical or controversial. It’d be really easy to write blog posts about Trump but that’d be throwing think piece into a sea of thousands. At this point, it’s a constant fact that each day brings some kind of new talking point and face palm moment. Still, I’d rather write about something less depressing in the hopes of taking your mind off of the struggles we face in our day to day lives. No Russia talk or first 100 days conversation here, just stoking the fires of retro video store memories. Take a break from hateful social media bullshit and come down memory lane with me to the local video store; where all the random films you could think of were under one roof and yet that copy of The Goonies was always checked out.

            I’ve had thoughts of the old Video Showroom days ever since one weekend after a few drinks I decided it was a perfect night for whiskey and The Monster Squad. You can’t go wrong with good bourbon paired with a classic film from 1987. Straight away the first place to go is Netflix and surprisingly, no Monster Squad. Never the less, Hulu would surely have it with the extensive collection of films. Hulu let me down and it was up to Amazon Prime to help pick up the slack. Striking out three for three on the streaming services that get my cable money now these days, this was a kick in the ass. With every new way of watching endless film and television comes a new wave of frustration when technology lets us down and doesn’t offer the one thing we want among the millions of options. With the simplicity of “push a button and get a thing” comes the extra disappointment when the Monster Squads of our past can’t be found with that extra click.

            Our local video store had everything a weird horror loving cinephile could ever love and with that came the one two punch of my introduction into the fandom that shapes what I watch to this day. Nothing beats the old art of the VHS box; colorful, creative and captivating in ways that the generic DVD covers of this time can’t seem to capture. Walking into the store to see the rows and rows of new films mixed with hundreds of classics wowed the shy introverted child who grew up to write this for you today. Those days of browsing film after film in ways that can’t be duplicated by simply scrolling. Flicking my controller stick without any real thought doesn’t make films pop out like scanning over a front cover to read a blurb on the back while checking out photos. Don’t care for that one? Pick up the next film and keep reading. 

     Even the little things such as pulling a tag off of a box or grabbing the case made the experience more special than firing up Netflix on a boring day. These rituals make for so much more pay off then going through the same motions one would to check Facebook or boot up Pandora. I’ll check out the lone remaining Family Video in town when I can, but the real passion will always be in that store from the past and the kid who grew up roaming the isles to find the next late night creature feature.