[Thursday Nostalgia] My Very First Video Store Haul

Adorning the shelves of many film enthusiasts are titles acquired from a video store closeout sale. Some may be old favourites that they were glad to have. Others just may be something they took a chance on during the last few days of the sale, and it only cost a few bucks!

Closeout sales were usually patterned the same way, either in the heyday of video rentals, or during the recent spate of store closures in the city. Video store owners would sell off their movies by staggering the prices over several weeks. With each coming week, the prices would drop slightly, until the final seven days, when the remainder of stock could be had just for a few bucks each. Usually, the scavengers came out then, trying to find the gold that others overlooked. Back in the VHS era, it was common for videos to sell for fifty dollars in the first week, even if they were ex-rentals, as it was still expensive to buy videotapes new. So if prestige titles had no problem selling for fifty, you could just imagine the table scraps that remained for five!

I began attending closeout sales in those pre-DVD years, during my "swinging Bohemian" days. Rarely did I buy VHS pre-records back then, unless they were reasonably cheap, or unless I knew that I'd watch them again and again. (The first pre-record I ever purchased was Night Of The Living Dead on the Interglobal label, at our local K-Mart. This remains one of the titles I've watched the most, so that was a no-brainer.) Still, the treasure hunter inside me could never resist checking out these sales, even when I was a student on a budget. I'd usually wait until the final week, to see what was still available for five bucks. But you quickly learned how these "final weeks" worked. There seemed to be an unwritten law: the majority of stuff left over for the last seven days would be an entire wall of Canadian films, and a section of Henry Jaglom movies. 

The first closeout sale I ever attended was Budget Videos, formerly on Toronto's St. Nicholas Street. The ad you see in this article was published in the August 24, 1995 issue of Now Magazine. One presumes this store was a big deal, to warrant purchasing a half-page advertisement, for a liquidation that went for about six weeks. Still, I waited until mid-September to peek into the sale. This was when I had just started doing my college field placement at the CFC. One afternoon after work, I popped by when everything was down to $7.95 a tape. Even then, there was a lot of empty shelf space. And there was still one more, final week to go after this, when all remaining stock was a measly $4.95!!!

My intent that afternoon was to merely scope out what was left, and maybe hide a few boxes, in the hopes that they would still be there the following week. However, I did pick up the Republic two-tape set of the complete serial, Daredevils Of The Red Circle, surmising that it would be gone before then. That day, I also hemmed and hawed about picking up the Claudia Jennings classic, Group Marriage, and foolishly decided to take my chances and leave it for next week. Another unwritten law, as sure as the "Canadian films-Henry Jaglom movies" clause: there will always be "one that gets away". I knew I'd regret leaving it. Just to save three bucks? I could have forgone another chicken patty. But, we can't buy everything.

As expected, when I popped in after work the following Monday, when  "$4.95 week" had begun, the store was a feeding frenzy! No Surprise #2: Group Marriage was gone. By then, all the remaining stock was squeezed into one or two aisles. Most of my half hour there was spent on my knees, ducking people fastidiously grabbing unknown boxes from the shelves. At the end of the aisle, there were a few of those big Videohound reference books provided by the store. So if a customer scanned a video box, and wasn't sure if the movie "was for them", they could find a review for it. I remember one guy with round glasses, a blue trenchcoat and a well-guarded stack of titles, thumbing through these books to see what he had. I don't think he put anything back. 

That afternoon, I left with some old favourites for five bucks a pop: Key Video's edition of the spaghetti western A Minute To Pray, A Second To Die; Rob Nilsson's independent film Signal 7, a tremendous influence on making my own movies (and sadly appeared in every video closeout's "final week"); and the New Zealand horror film Strange Behaviour, which impressed me upon viewing it years ago on (pause- sigh) WGRZ's all-night show, The Cat's Pajamas. This haul included some previously unseen titles that I had rolled the dice on: Railroaded (Anthony Mann's supercool B-noir) and Tracks (you guessed it- a Henry Jaglom movie).

Sometimes the stuff in our collections matter more for what they represent than for what they are. Even today, when I look at these video boxes, I don't think of them as film noir, horror, "that Henry Jaglom movie", etc. Instead I think of them as "Budget Video" movies- as a whole. I also think of them as a group because all but the serial were viewed under the same conditions in the following months: late at night, when I had the apartment to myself. Watching movies is generally a lonely vocation. That isolation especially crept in from these misunderstood orphans whose subtle, understated qualities were manifest in the dead of night. By default, I also associate them with that crucial point in my life, as they were viewed during the final semester of school. As I sat alone in that lazy boy, across from my little 13 inch colour TV, I knew soon I would make a bittersweet departure from that groovy bohemian apartment into an uncertain future. Much like the video store these movies came from, it was the end of an era.

That Henry Jaglom movie.

Long Goodbyes

Would a Greg Woods blog post exist without some sort of apology?

It would figure that my first post of 2019 appears two-thirds of the way into the "new year". Recently, a friend emailed inquiring what was going on with this blog, so it's re-assuring that someone still supports ESR, even years after its last public appearance has faded from memory. Preferably, personal matters are discussed online only in the context of the work itself, and that warrants inclusion here, if to contextualize the long absence from this space, and for that matter, where I see it heading.

Last fall, my dad passed away after battling ALS for more than a year. He tried to live independently for as long as he could until April, 2018, when it became apparent that he would have to go to a nursing home. I had spent that spring and summer cleaning out his place, auctioning off his stuff, taking care of his bills and things like that. Alas, his health decreased in the ensuing months, and he passed away peacefully on November 20. Even though we knew the prognosis, I figured (perhaps naively) that he still had more time left.  I felt there was still time left for us to talk.

While he passed before this disease robbed him of any more functionality, I regret not being able to ask him more questions; I'm sorry I couldn't tell him more. I wish that my goodbye to him on November 19 wasn't so feeble. I don't even know if he was conscious enough to have heard me. And even then, I didn't consider that he would pass the next day. He had rebounded before, and to my mind, he could do so again. Alas, time waits for no one.

This spring we held an informal, secular gathering with family, while we interred his ashes with his siblings, and read a couple of elegies. He didn't even want this much to honour him by, but I felt there should be an indication that he was here, and that he did make a difference. Even so, because I kind of went against his wishes, even for benevolent reasons, I still question if I made the right choice. The passing of a loved one also forces us to look inward. We reminisce about our times spent together, but we also ponder our own purpose on this earth. What kind of legacy am I leaving behind? What marker will say that I was here? Ultimately, under such grim circumstances, we're reminded of how much a fragile gift that life is, and that we must take advantage of it as much as we can.

During the past few months, we have made attempts to get "back to normal" and enjoy life again. It's been hard to get into the writing headspace again, but I'm trying. I still have great plans to rejuvenate ESR (plus launch one or two other projects I'm sure you'll dig) in the near future. So, if you've supported us in any way through the years, or if you just happened to discover these words for the first time, we thank you, and we hope that the best is yet to come.

Part of our "getting back to normal" is also in reviving this regular column. Screen Captures will expound on cinematic themes or topics of the moment, plus continue to serve as a living document of the local film scene that exists on the fringes. This week's column continues its autumnal theme of saying goodbye, and acceptance that all good things must pass.

2 For 1 Movies

It comes with a heavy heart to announce that after over 30 years in business, 2 For 1 Movies, one of Toronto's last surviving video stores, is closing its doors. Located next door to the Humber Cinema at Bloor and Jane, this store served as "my local" for years in terms of renting videos. In its heyday, it was open from noon to midnight, seven days a week. As per its namesake, you could get two non-new releases for the price of one: two movies, two days, four bucks.

During the video store boom, there also existed other independent stores across the street and a few blocks above, plus a Blockbuster just two doors west of them. Amidst great adversity, 2 For 1 outlasted all of them (which shut down over a decade ago), and even some of the city's better known independent shops that have called it a day.

In the past few years, we've seen the closures of Suspect Video and Culture, Queen Video, The Film Buff, Movie Art Decor, and several others. It was re-assuring to see that these guys were still around, and that half of their inventory still consisted of VHS! The bleached poster of Doc Hollywood on its door signified its Precinct 13-like oasis in the midst of changing times. In recent years however, their business hours sharply decreased, since it was run by two men of retirement age. I won't pretend to fall on my sword in false allegiance, as my visits at 2 For 1 have been fewer and farther between over the years, and not just because of shortened operating hours.

The news of their closure comes with little surprise, as they were the only business still open on that north side strip of Bloor St. The second-to-last remaining business, Humber Cinema, abruptly closed this summer. After many years of back and forth, it appears that this chunk of land is now being appropriated for, you guessed it, more overpriced condos.

During the summer, before the news of 2 For 1's closure became known, I had visited the store for the first time in ages. It was saddening to see the disrepair of the store's interior. Paint was peeling, and the musty wall-to-wall carpet was dotted with the foam that absorbs water. Small wonder that these gentlemen sit outside during the four and a half hours that the shop is open for business.

As their final days loom, they've been selling off their entire inventory. This weekend I joined the handful of likeminded collectors who picked through the dust-covered VHS cases, especially looking for rarities that never made the transition to DVD or BluRay. Some of the armful of treasures I brought home were nostalgic choices, "for old times' sake": titles I had rented, which were reviewed in ESR. I had to pick up the Trylon VHS release of The Glory Stompers, which was featured in ESR #2, our first Drive-In Issue. Other mementos included two Luis Bunuel films, Nazarin and Illusion Travels By Streetcar, included in my two-part article on the director's "for hire" films in Mexico.

The Cat's Pajamas Signs Off

What is it about our collective psyche that gives importance to anniversaries ending in fives or zeroes? Are those ending in threes or sevens no less worthy? During this back to school season, my interior landscape is forced to remember a "back to school" anniversary ending in a zero: when I first moved to the city to study film at York University.

School started on Monday the 11th, one week after Labour Day. On Tuesday the 5th, I had journeyed up to move in to residence on campus. The next two days were spent exploring the campus and the immediate neighbourhood. On Thursday, first-year film students had a "meet and greet" at the Faculty of Fine Arts building. My mother came up for the day, chauffeured by my cousin and his wife. For whatever reason, I drove back to Birdtown on the Friday, and returned to Toronto on the Sunday just before one day before classes officially began.

Beginning a new life chapter can also be bittersweet. In the previous year, I had returned to high school to upgrade my average and improve my portfolio for admission to film school. Within those ten months, I had gone from zero to hero: making a feature-length video, appearing in two plays (one of which went as far as the Sears Drama Festival's semi-finals), and obtaining a new circle of friends. Alas, in the final four weeks before university, I was going back to zero again, as that world I had created was dissipating, in light of this new phase. I had achieved what I set out to do, but hadn't expected to pay such a price of finality. It took a long time time to accept that and move on.

In that final month before university, there was no big send-off for this boy. That only happens in the movies, right? Alas, this epic ended with a lot of tiny goodbyes. One of them was film related in a way.

One of the most important film educations during high school age was The Cat's Pajamas, an all-night movie show which ran for several years on WGRZ (Buffalo's NBC affiliate). I have, and will continue to memorialize this program numerous times in this blog, such significance does it have to my personal makeup. It was a veritable film school in its (forgive me) eclectic programming of horror, kung fu, classic comedies, and TV movies, to list only a few highlights. Seeing these films in warmed, less than pristine prints, coupled with static, just added to the dreamlike experience that painted such comforting images onto your oxygen-deprived mind that wavered in and out of consciousness. This program was also a surrogate friend to many in those late-night hours. It is sadly fitting that here was another friend saying goodbye, just before I started university.

On that Friday night cited above, where I came back to Birdtown for the weekend prior to classes starting, I had arrived at my mother's house well after she had retired for the evening. The house was quiet and in darkness. I elected to make a bed out of the couch, so as not to make a disturbance up the creaking stairs. Before nodding off, I put the TV on for a bit, lying inches from the screen, with the volume down low, just like I used to do in those renegade days of sneaking on the late late show when I should’ve been asleep. A very weird movie was on. Under these viewing circumstances, it seemed so otherworldly, so larger than life. It was 1966's Chamber Of Horrors, broadcast on The Cat's Pajamas.

Admittedly, I hadn't watched this program much in the past year, since I was so busy. Only now, upon looking at old TV listings of the day, is it apparent that my inattentiveness was because by then WGRZ's late night schedule mostly consisted of infomercials! The only remnant of traditional Cat's PJs programming was a movie on Friday nights. That night felt like a brief visit with an old friend again. I would later learn that Chamber Of Horrors was the penultimate airing. On Friday Sept. 15, The Cat's Pajamas quietly signed off for good after showing the feature-length TV pilot for Search.

Although I've since viewed Chamber Of Horrors in its entirety and with greater clarity, this night's gaze, viewed with an overtired brain and the volume way down, was a surreal experience. It felt like a satellite transmission from an extraterrestrial being. You don't understand the language, but you know what the cadences mean. It was to say: "Thank for you all your love and support over the years. It is time for us for leave. You are moving on and so must we. Take and use what you've learned from us. Think of us now and again."

Chamber Of Horrors. Add some fuzzy, static filter from your iPhone to achieve woozy "late night movie" effect.

+++

And on this note, we'll leave with some notifications of a couple upcoming events. Apparently there is some big film festival going on right now. But for us mortals who can't afford the $109.75 to breathe the same air as Brad Pitt, here are a couple of interesting options.

Paul Bartel's Shelf Life
Paul Bartel's final feature as a director, 1993's Shelf Life, has never had a proper release. He presented the film in person here in 1995 during an engagement at the long-gone Euclid cinema. Since then, the film has been rarely seen. This Saturday, the Royal is presenting a screening with its cast in attendance! This black comedy, of a 60s nuclear family that spends years in a bomb shelter, is not to be missed. Sat. Sept. 7 at 8 PM.  For further information, and tickets, visit here.

It's Alive! Classic Horror and Sci-Fi Art from the Kirk Hammett Collection
Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett's collection of sci-fi and horror memorabilia is on display at the ROM until January 5, 2020. But why wait? That $41.75 TIFF gala will be an eight dollar DVD before Christmas. Check out this amazing exhibit today! For further information, visit here!

Thanks for reading. More cinematic goodness next week!

The Analog Enthusiast Part Three:Twisted Brain

My reader(s?) may have surmised that I have run out of ideas for my irregular series of Analog Enthusiast posts since the last installment was in August, but that isn't so! We're just getting started! If anything, the VHS tape is on its way to becoming "the new vinyl". Back in the 90's, during the CD boom, many music collectors would often say "I have that on vinyl"-- out of nostalgia or maybe even some kind of status. And in the glut of DVD and BluRay, so too do people like myself utter: "Oh, I have that on VHS." Where even so the videotape is now replaced by a technologically superior format, the conceit is the same: to have some affection for an obsolete device possibly because it speaks to a simpler and more youthful time. And as such, we're all full of stories about how the video tape has played a part in our lives as a consumer, or as a collector.

As I mentioned in my piece on Interglobal Video in the "VHS RIP" issue of ESR, I unconditionally buy any title with an Interglobal logo. (For a better and more detailed explanation as to why I do, best to read the issue.) Yet, one movie released by Interglobal has eluded me for years-- until now. I speak of no other than the horror schlock title Twisted Brain.

This delightfully bad flick has a special resonance for me, because my cousin John (whom I mentioned in my very first Analog Enthusiast post) had told me about this movie for years, because in the 1970's, Global television used to show it constantly at night. He and his friends would get together (in varying degrees of sobriety) and watch... plus poke fun at it. This piece of cult adulation had made me curious for a long time based on his loving anecdotes about it. One afternoon in 1987, I was strolling through Woolworth's on my lunch hour (during when I was a delivery driver for a flower shop), and lo and behold: there was a copy of Twisted Brain for ten bucks! Why, what was a person to do, other than to call John right away and tell him about it?

Well, even though it was 12:30 in the afternoon, I had unknowingly gotten him out of bed when I called, as I hadn't realized he had just worked the night shift at the hotel. Nonetheless, he later told me that he went to Woolworth's in short order to pick it up. In fact, I had joked that one could see the burn marks from tire treads all over the mean streets of Simcoe as he hurriedly drove his car downtown.

I should mention that John does not buy movies--- but he bought a copy of Twisted Brain. That alone should give some testament to the power of this film. And remember, this was back in a day when the act of buying movies was rare, as people would just rent films instead. The retail prices for pre-recorded VHS tapes were prohibitively expensive in the 1980's-- the only wallet-friendly videos one could buy would be from cheap public domain labels. Interglobal perhaps was the grandfather of all of these companies. As far as I know, it was the first to make an unprecedented move to stock movies for sale in department stores. Soon, companies like Star Classics and Goodtimes jumped on the bandwagon to likewise have films for sale in K-Mart. And to be sure, despite that you were getting a pre-recorded tape for the (then) steal price of ten bones, you weren't getting Criterion transfers. Twenty years on, a lot of these cheap tapes, transfered from already well-worn public domain prints, are barely watchable with their generation loss, persistent tracking problems and washed out colour. But in all fairness, many of Interglobal's titles are still actually pretty good... considering.

Their copy of Twisted Brain however looks like it was rescued from the bowels of Hell, and it is all the better for it. This film (also known as Horror High) is a sordid tale of a high-school nerd that is played to the nth degree. Vernon Potts (played by former child star Pat Cardi, of And Now Miguel and Let's Kill Uncle) is the archetypal wallflower with greasy hair, horned-rimmed glasses, pen holder, and socially displaced from all except his science teacher and his pet guinea pig, Mr. Mumbles. However, Vernon soon develops a potion which turns him into a monster so he can get revenge on all the jocks and teachers who picked on him.

This movie was shot in 16mm (and as such, looks like a step above a home movie), then picked up by Crown International for distribution. Despite that there are lots of outrageous killings (including the scene where a janitor gets tossed in a vat of acid, causing John and his friends to yell out "Janitor in a drum!" -coining a popular cleaning solution of the time), I think the tawdry nature of the film also has an appeal to people like myself who have developed a soft spot for the movie. Perhaps because of the home movie feel to it, viewers may relate to it more, as it is a movie they could have made, and the locations are so generic, yet familiar, that they could easily be fragments of our childhood. And unless one was on the football team, there is likely a bit of Vernon in all of the viewers. Despite the novelty of football players like Joe Greene cast as police officers, and the hokey gore and violence, one has to hand it to the people for playing this movie straight. The excellent character actor Austin Stoker (of Assault on Precinct 13 and Battle for the Planet of the Apes) geniunely lends some class as the detective investigating all the murders around school.

A few years back, Rhino acquired some Crown titles to put out a couple of boxed sets with the "Horrible Horror" banner-- this flick was among those picked. I haven't seen that DVD set, but apparently it was authored for DVD from a VHS source, but I would imagine that it didn't come from Interglobal. This bizarre narrative (including an overlong scene with Vernon's parents on vacation-- this is the only time you see them in the film) is given a further otherworldly feeling with all the blotchy blues and reds that a public domain tape can offer, and it looks like this was recorded from television with the commercials taken out (there are even old-school squiggly video breaks where the edits likely occured). The threadbare presentation of this tape actually compliments that of this film.

After 30 years, the legacy of Twisted Brain lives on, thanks to those who became enchanted by this grimy flick from television or video. In the interim, Pat Cardi has spent a lot of time on message boards sounding off about what a thief Crown International is, and likewise hinting that a remastered version of this movie will happen soon. Personally, I'm not sure I want one. This is a rare film whose luster is from its very grimy nature. Interglobal could've cared less I'm sure, but they've enhanced that feeling even more.

Hey kids, here's a neat poster for the movie.

Tales of an Analog Enthusiast Volume Two... kinda

This weekend I had rented a car, as on the Sunday it was Decoration Day in my hometown, where people decorate the stones of their deceased loved ones. We were celebrating our anniversary on the Sunday, therefore I opted to go pay my respects on the Saturday instead. This trip had ulterior motives too, as along the way I would make a pit stop at any Cash Converters, hock shop or thrift store I could find along the way, all in the name of finding cheapo video tapes.

Ah, my faithful reader, you're probably thinking, "Didn't he get his fill at Sam's?" Well yes, but specifically today's hunt was for some place that would be selling VHS tapes en masse for really cheap, as when ESR publishes the "VHS RIP" issue next month, it is my intention to package the magazine with party favours-- a mystery VHS tape. Even so as the day crept on, and my number one duty for the day would be further pushed back, I never took the time to inquire at a couple of places that were selling VHS's off at a buck each if they would do a wholesale deal. (But all is not lost, I still found some Interglobal titles for my own collection.)

In addition, it was my hope to snap some pictures of drive-ins for my website "See You At the Drive-In". When my father and I travelled to London last month to see about his treatments, I could swear we passed a drive-in on Highway 53, and I attempted to find it on the drive down to Simcoe. Well before I knew it I was in Woodstock, and being in a blinding rainstorm didn't help, so I decided to stop screwing around and go pay my respects proper.

I arrived in Simcoe at 4:30 in the afternoon, affording me enough time to purchase two armloads of artificial floral arrangements for the cemetery. It was weirdly fitting that the sun came out at the precise moment I was picking out the decorations. In the past four years, for whatever personal reasons I've gone back to Simcoe, I've managed to squeak in these moments where I drive by old haunts, always intrigued by the notion of how things have changed since I left them. In some cases, it is a melancholy experience, in in others it is strangely comforting as I briefly encounter the ghosts of my past.

This night, I decided to detour to Tillsonburg on the way back... for two reasons. First, in the hamlet of Courtland just on the east side, there used to be the Skylark Drive-In, which closed in 1992. I hadn't visited either of these towns since then, thus I was curious to see if there were still any remnants of the drive-in, and a resounding "nope" there. Now proudly sits a lumber store where the screen under the stars used to be (at least it's not a fricken condo). So much for today's photo ops. Anyway, in a few more minutes I was in downtown Tillsonburg trying to find pieces of me from 15 years ago.

Back in 1992, I had a second job on weekends working at the convenience store up the street from my house (my mother worked full-time there on weekdays), and in addition, once a week at about 6 AM, I would drive to Tillsonburg to the wholesale store where shopowners would customarily buy canned goods, soda and other such things, to stock up on provisions for the store. You may remember in my first volume of "Analog Enthusiast", discussing people who travelled the county circuit, filling convenience stores with their inventories of movies, as in those days mom and pop variety stores could seldom afford such overhead. Like Ronnie, previously celebrated in Volume One, my boss Steph was another who travelled the circuit with crates of movies to replenish variety stores with video rentals. But in addition to that, he owned two convenience stores of his own. Besides the one in Simcoe that my mother and I worked at, he also had a store in Tillsonburg- and would frequently work shifts there as he also lived in that town. When I ventured to Tillsonburg, I would often stop off at Steph's store to drop off a few supplies. Since Steph was a distributor of movie rentals, most of his store was filled to the brim with movie boxes, much more than the two shelves of films in Simcoe's store. And usually, in addition to dropping off supplies, I would shoot the breeze with him for a few minutes, as he sure knew hell of a lot about film. In fact, I was doing a little video project at that time, and Steph allowed me to do a quick shoot in his store, as I needed a shot of myself looking at movies in a video store.

Yet coming back into Tillsonburg that Saturday night reminded me of another ghost in the past that I hadn't thought of in a long time... part of the summer of 1990 was spent in Tillsonburg selling Filter Queen vacuums! This memory was perhaps enforced by the sights of the same kind of Sad Sacks I used to attempt to sell vacuum cleaners to 17 years ago standing in front of the Tim Horton's staring out at the empty street looking for something, anything. This image is further given melancholy by the pervasive 60's crooners that populated the bandwidth of the town's AM Radio station, whose musical melodies gave imagery of a dreamland far, far away from the people that I would attempt to sell a vacuum to.

AM Radio figures a lot in my recollections of Tillsonburg, as those weekly jaunts at the crack of dawn were also filled with golden oldies blaring in my car. In fact one piece of mental cinema that remains lodged in my memory, is driving by this retro truck-stop diner on a lonely southern stretch of the highway, as the pink horizon broke in the background, while Joni Mitchell's "Coyote" played in the car. In fact, I tried to find that restaurant Saturday night, but it too may be gone now-- it's been 15 years.

But also, I had spent some time trying to find that little side street that Steph had his store, and after much trial and error, I found it, and the effect was not unlike Paul Newman in The Color of Money visiting this loft full of junk where a pool hall had once been 25 years previously. In truth, I still expected the store to be functional, and, I'll admit it, I had half expected Steph to still be there. Who knows? Maybe he would have sold me some old VHS tapes. But instead, the store had been turned into a residence, yet they still kept the design of the buildling intact (although with all the aluminum siding and the slanted roof, I believe it had been a residence prior to being a store).

Visiting my relatives at cemetery can be a sometimes overwhelming experience, especially when I visit the site shared by my mother and my oldest brother. And I suppose my brother would laugh at the irony, that after the whole day, the thing that would eventually choke me up was a Hollies CD I bought in a hock shop for three bucks! This greatest hits collection also had the AM staple "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother", which strikes me with more resonance because shortly after my brother passed away, a public service announcement using this song was frequently shown on television. And so, after playing this CD in my car all day, and pulling in back in front of my house in Toronto, at the end of the night, it was then that everything hit me, now that my mind had managed to stop for a while. And hearing this song for the nth time while I was parked, seeing my reflection in the car window while looking up at the moon, is when the day finally caught up with me, and I wept right at the wheel. As much as it is somewhat cleansing for me to visit old haunts and seeing that the ghosts of my memories still dance there, it is also an overwhelming one. Yes, it is a painful process sometimes to relive pieces of time that cannot be replicated, with people no longer among the living, but I do not consider the past to be dead. It still dances on in my soul.

I Found Drive-In for a buck ninety-nine... (or, One's Bittersweet Victories as We Lose Yet Another Cultural Icon)

On June 30, Canada's institution, Sam the Record Man, closed its flagship store in downtown Toronto. The announcement of its closure was met with sorrow, yet likely not with much surprise, as the franchise truly never recovered from going bankrupt in 2001, which prompted Sam's to close all but a handful of stores across Canada. In the ensuing years, its main store on Yonge St. seldom had the customer traffic it used to have even ten short years ago. There's a multitude of reasons why this landmark closed -downloads being one of the culprits- and surely you will find more appropriate pieces than this one to explain just how much Sam's shaped our record industry, with its promotion of Canadian artists, and the great finds one would always have among its dusty shelves. (Even though they received competition from HMV or Sunrise Records within the one-block radius, rounding out what I called "The Unholy Three", Sam's still got my money 90% of the time, for price and selection).

Slowly, over the final few weeks, their inventory dwindled, as any merchandise they couldn't return would only fit the first floor of the three-floor building. And then in the last couple of weeks, suddenly, in the two big rooms on the first floor, were rows upon rows of VHS tapes! These hundreds, perhaps thousands, of titles all harkened from when Sam's video department (Sam The Video Man) used to rent movies. I had thought they sold off these tapes years ago, yet to the delight of myself and untold amounts of collectors, here they were up for grabs at $1.99 a pop.



It is said that VHS is dead. Yet one would be reminded of the contrary upon viewing the fervor in which these colourful eccentrics (myself included) were filling up their shopping baskets with these dusty hardshell cases. Yet, one could ask, what were they buying? What were they holding on to? In other words, are these consumers acquiring more than just old movies on a dated format? Or are these grandiose souvenirs?

This city becomes even more gentrified like any other metropolis, with its unique landmarks being replaced by brand names (I shudder to think of Sam's turning into a Starbucks, or some other corporate regime, but expect it will). It doesn't matter if its Haight Ashbury, 42nd Street, or even Yorkville... seeing distinctive cornerstones of pop culture being plowed over in favour of The Gap or condos for Yuppie scum is to also witness a part of our personal history and identity disappearing. Do you think people will lament when a Walmart closes? Sure, you may say that Sam's was a corporation too, but it spoke to people. It wasn't about social cliquism or cultural snobbery. It tapped into our collective pop culture... it was about sharing, and discovery.

Thus, it is somewhat fitting that in the twilight days of Sam's, I got that feeling of discovery one last time... and how. While no doubt a lot of bargain hunters or record connoisseurs went looking for obscure albums for bargain basement prices, my time spent was at the racks hawking these old VHS tapes.


So if you, dear reader, are asking The Burning Question: "Gee, how many VHS movies did you get?", the answer will not be supplied here. Nor will I divulge how many times I kept going back to, um, help clean out their inventory. Instead, to extrapolate on my point above, that of the titles I amassed, as far as I know, 71.5% have NOT been released on DVD.

After my first visit to the racks, I left with Monte Hellman's Flight to Fury, Robert Altman's Brewster McCloud, and... be still my heart.... Drive-In, the much worhsipped 1976 cult comedy. Now officially crowning myself king of the geeks with that score, I revisited the shelves to acquire such gems as Billy the Kid Vs. Dracula (sigh), Hillbillys in a Haunted House, the biker epic J.C., the early 60s independent film Strangers in the City, the hippie-dippie epic Thumb Tripping (which I've been seeking for 20 years), skads of indie titles from Facets, and many more that still haven't been transferred over to DVD. Who can say if some of these ever will? With the way companies merge and no-one can tell who owns what anymore, and how DVD releases always get halted due to music rights, it's no wonder VHS has been collectible now just the way vinyl was when it became clear that not everything was out on CD.

Coming away with all of these discoveries was a joyous event that any collector could understand, yet one must also pause for the circumstances under which we obtain such gems. In other words we're digging out of the mountain before it collapses, and sadly, it is at the end of an era where people like myself find some treasures like this. Yet, should the milestone of Sam's end any other way? Foraging through all of this stuff is to be reminded of what it meant to shop at Sam the Record Man all along: "Hey, look what I found!"

Thanks for the memories, Sam.

VHS Wonderland

SWow, my first post. Hmm... wonder how many blogspots start with that?

Well, anyhow, in my upcoming plan to redo ESR's website, I thought it might also be fun to have this blog in conjunction with the regular site. In addition to discussing my pursuits in the publication, I also plan on writing about my interests in film, writing, underground culture, and so on.

Tonight, on the way home I stopped off at Honest Ed's (AGAIN!) for their 99 cent video sale. Among some goodies, my big picks were the road movie PAYDAY (1973), which I've been trying to find for 20 years, and the collage movie DYNAMITE CHICKEN (1971), which features such diverse pop culture figures as Richard Pryor, Leonard Cohen and Yoko Ono. For a buck each! Unbelievable.

Then I went next door to Suspect to see if they had the original Japanese version of GODZILLA without Raymond Burr. They did not, but while I was flipping through the "G" section, I found a copy of GLEN AND RANDA! It's the old Zen principle, "don't look for it, you'll find it". This hippie-dippie Jim McBride post-apoc fantasy has been another elusive title on my list (of course my list is 30 pages long, but forget that), so I rented that.

Queen Video was selling a VHS copy of THE PROJECTIONIST for three bucks. The young lady at the counter told me that they sold off all their Rodney Dangerfield movies after he died! He still don't get no respect. I taped this off Bravo, but it's good to have an SP mode copy not off-air.

Today we did more work on prep for the opening sequence for the pilot that Simon and I are doing. Finally, I'm getting all psyched up about the shoot, which extends over three nights next week. I've been in a psychic slump lately... the past few months in fact. This year has blurred by so fast- the fall is my favourite time of year, and I've barely absorbed the fact that it's here!

Tomorrow is the fall edition of the Small Press Fair. I'm finally starting to get excited about it. For some reason, it only happens the night before. For my feelings about being at trade shows such as these, I suppose it's only fair I reserve those for tomorrow's blog.