DR What is a “video store” located in Bondi Junction- Sydney- Australia. It has been renting videos since August 1981 and still open for business today. Neal Crisford, the current owner, joined the business in February 1983 and oversaw the growth of his business from 2000 video titles to 40,000 videos. Neal estimates that he has rented over 2 million titles in the past 31 years.As DVDs came in he sold off the equivalent title on VHS to make room in the shop which at the height of the VHS era was literally busting at the seams. Today the VHS collection still numbers close to 20,000 but doesn’t see many visitors these days only the occasional collector or enthusiast. What is to become of this amazing collection in the future is unknown hopefully someone will buy the collection intact and preserve it but more likely it will be sold off in pieces and be gone for good.
Its a shame that VHS has been disregarded in the modern era in much the same way as nitrate films from the silent era were junked and lost forever. By 1949, 22,000 films had been made over half are lost never to be seen again. Neal tells me he had VHS films on the shelf that don’t even exist on IMBD and many VHS titles has never been released on DVD so they may never be seen again once these last VHS copies are destroyed or put in a warehouse somewhere to slowly rot away.
Time marches on I guess but Neal and I have decided to make a documentary about the VHS era starting with him and DR What but we will talk to other video store owners, collectors and most importantly film makers from the era who went “straight to video” and ask them what VHS meant to them and their careers.
Watch this space!