video store memories.

here's the first real meaty post from the perfect brainstorm, the week-and-a-half-old tumblr blog i'm relocating here.

originally posted on monday, january 23, 2012, this post is about my love of video stores. on sunday, january 29, 2012, less than a week after sharing this passionate ode, my local blockbuster video in glendale, ca closed its doors for rentals and embarked on a 48-day inventory liquidation. enjoy:

my generation is unique (and probably among other reasons) for being the last to see the dawning of the age of the video store, reap the fruits of its prosperity, and witness its crumbling demise. i wonder if future generations will have any appreciation for the tactile beauty of the brick-and-mortar video store, or if it will just seem an insane relic thankfully discontinued, like celebrity corpse viewings and lan parties. i have a deep love of video stores, as their golden age was exactly during my childhood. here's a handful of memories:

- my brother and i always went to two video stores. one was blockbuster video (then a behemoth) and the other was an independent store called video pursuit. we seemed to frequent both indiscriminately. i don't know what my mom's reasons were for ever going to one versus the other. today, video pursuit is long gone. i wonder how long it hung in there before it was driven into oblivion.

- blockbuster video had a phenomenal dedicated kids section. i rented the live action "my pet monster" approximately five hundred thousand times.

- i remember standing at blockbuster video and seeing the big cardboard ad for child's play 2 that had chucky about to cut off a jack-in-the-box's head with the tagline "sorry jack, chucky's back!" it freaked me out, but in kind of a good way. i guess this was the first sign of my future fascination with horror.

- i remember standing at video pursuit wondering why a kid my age was allowed to BE in the movie child's play, but i wasn't allowed to see it. movie ratings never ever made sense to me.

- video pursuit had an adult section blocked off with a black curtain. i'd love to know what kinda fucked up shit people were getting from there while i was in the kids section selecting my disney shorts.

- i remember one time they were playing tiny toon adventures on the tv at blockbuster video and an adult next to me laughed at one of the jokes. it blew my mind that something i liked was also funny to an adult. i know now that that is the true benchmark of quality children's entertainment.

- they used to show full movies on the tv screens at blockbuster video. i remember they were showing teenage mutant ninja turtles (1990) the day we rented it. do they do this anymore? i think they still do, but it's always some fucking computer animated dreamworks movie. and it's just one eye-level screen, instead of the old multiple ceiling-level screens. this is somehow not as good.

- teenage mutant ninja turtles was my life. i watched the cartoon every day and the live action movie became my instant favorite. when we rented it, my parents somehow recorded a copy of it on vhs. the video quality was terrible, but i don't recall that ever bothering me.

- as a child in florida, i would frequently hear about a guy named wayne huizenga, who was the owner of blockbuster video, the miami dolphins, the florida marlins, and the florida panthers. at one point, he opened like an arcade/amusement park known as blockbuster golf & games. i think i went there once. it was okay. for a series of video arcade memories, find a tumblr by someone slightly older than me.

- one time, some rented videotapes were stolen out of my mom's car in the parking lot at k-mart. she ended up having to pay like three figures in fines. videotapes used to cost a lot. today, they are worse than garbage.

- the transition from vhs to dvd was a weird time for video stores. i remember one time, we rented batman (1989) on vhs and superman (1978) on dvd. they felt as if from different worlds.

- it used to be, blockbuster movie rentals cost like 3 or 4 bucks and you could keep them for like 2 or 3 days or something. then i think at one point, possibly to compete with netflix, blockbuster let you keep the movies as long as you wanted, with no late fees. today, you can rent movies for 99¢ and keep them for like a week or something. i'm not really positive about any of these figures, so don't use this tumblr entry as a reference in your essay bibliographies.

- one summer, i was home from college by myself and starved for entertainment. my mom had a thing at our local blockbuster video where you pay $20 a month and you get to have two movies out at any given time. the blockbuster was walking distance, so i took full advantage. i watched so many movies. i remember being really bored by acclaimed documentary "the fog of war." i watched and hated "looney tunes: back in action," whose director, joe dante, had spoken with such disdain about the previous looney tunes movie, "space jam," which i find absolutely delightful. i watched "the butterfly effect" director's cut, theatrical cut, and again with commentary, all in one day (if you haven't seen it, watch the director's cut). but perhaps the best day was when i watched all four alien movies in a row, all for the first time. that was great. this blockbuster video has since been demolished and is now the site of a bank.

i haven't written anything about renting video games. but i'm gonna save that for my next tumbl.