1297 Captain Blood

[Matt]

Hell, I just bought a DVD box set of Tarzan films the other day because it's the only way to get them—they're not on streaming. And I see a lot of younger people (well, people younger than me) on social media buying stacks of used DVDs at places like Half Price Books because you can get them for a few dollars each now. CDs as well, which a lot of people probably thought died off twenty years ago.

And we can't even say that Criterion has abandoned DVD. All of the Janus Contemporaries/Criterion Premieres have had a DVD edition (and no 4K editions, much to the consternation of people on this board and elsewhere). A lot of their recent releases besides Captain Blood—new films or films that have not had US physical media releases yet—also have DVD editions: Killers of the Flower Moon, Él, Shoeshine, Flow, Anora. Criterion surely has plenty of market research telling them what formats are viable for what releases.

[MichaelB]

I still buy quite a few DVDs. Poland has virtually abandoned Blu-ray as a carrier for their own film output, and if a particular title isn’t streaming, DVD is my only viable option.

Fortunately, they usually come with English subtitles and are invariably insanely cheap, so I can import loads even under post-Brexit import restrictions.

[domino harvey]

I’ve been picking up Fox DVDs I previously sold, because there’s no risk of them getting upgraded

[FrauBlucher]

What's the obsession?

How old are you, and are you getting this dvd?

Edit: Some assumptions here (and chuckling) rubbed me the wrong way.

I'm out.

Me, I’m an old fart but I don’t collect DVDs. I only collect Blu-ray’s. The last DVD I bought was the Bergman Eclipse. I don’t see a problem with once in a while Criterion putting out a DVD. Clearly that Captain Blood being an old film is a good reason, also I wonder if there is an agreement with WB that they have to release DVD editions.

On a side note. A bunch of years ago I donated most of my DVDs to a rehab facility for seniors in my neighborhood (ironically across the street from the Film Forum). They gladly accepted them.

Domino, that is probably the smart thing to do as long as Disney controls the Fox catalogue

[omegadirective]

Didn't want to call the link "Beaver Blood"?

I have other ways I entertain myself than with silly puns and in this case a nasty one

No problem, buddy. I'm here to pick up the slack.

[Maltic]

Looking at my Letterboxd log, I watched a DVD just once in 2025 (Tension, the Richard Basehart noir), and twice in 2024 (Eden, the Hansen-Løve raver film, and Going in Style, when the Blank Check podcast did their Martin Brest series).

The last time I bought DVD's on Amazon (other than concerts, operas and such) was back in 2019, and those were older releases at the time. It may have been a decade since I bought a newly released DVD.

Perhaps it is uncinephilic to "exclude" myself from films that don't exist on bluray (or are shown at the rep house), but there's just so much stuff available in better quality nowadays...

When it comes to Criterion, I can definitely see the library argument. I'm not sure how many older, casual collectors will actually seek out this new release for their own DVD collections, though, but what do I know.

[MichaelB]

DVDs aren't even the worst quality that I put up with on a reasonably regular basis.

The other day I watched a YouTube upload of a Czech off-air recording (complete with station ident) of an obscure mid-70s children's film for commentary research, complete with my own AI-transcribed and Google-translated subtitles—which worked surprisingly well; obviously there were howlers galore, but my still just about extant knowledge of Czech papered over them.

[ballmouse]

On the note of DVDs and Blu Rays - I just ordered my first Blu Ray player which should arrive tomorrow. I never felt the need to have one, but I received a malfunctioning Blu Ray player and in my determination to fix it and watch some Blu Rays that I requested in anticipation, I just decided to just order one.

There were plenty of DVDs to watch it was never necessary to watch Blu Ray. And so I can completely follow why folks are still on DVD. But with Criterion even going Blu Ray only (and many other movies too), I wonder if things are finally shifting. That said, nothing lasts forever. It'll shift again.

[Saturnome]

And I see a lot of younger people (well, people younger than me) on social media buying stacks of used DVDs at places like Half Price Books because you can get them for a few dollars each now. CDs as well, which a lot of people probably thought died off twenty years ago.

I'm seeing this a lot. I'm starting to feel old with my expensive records and blu-rays, when the people I know who are younger than me (and the kind who are fed up by social media, streaming and such) are into cheap CDs and DVDs. There's one person I know who is starting to get a big collection of DVDs, they're aware of blu-rays but it isn't a thing worth thinking about to them, they see the blue plastic and just ignore them. I got a Criterion of La Notte they found in a sidewalk library because it was a blu-ray!

[cdnchris]

I've given up selling DVDs online and just use stuff like OfferUp and the number of college kids buying discs has gone up the last couple of years.

[Jonathan S]

I suppose the cash-strapped kids are doing the equivalent of what I did in the late '80s and early '90s; buying cheap secondhand vinyl as older and wealthier collectors "upgraded" onto a new format. I had no particular love of vinyl (and still don't) but besides acquiring recordings I couldn't afford on CDs, I also made a modest living at it, selling LPs to Japanese collectors. I guess it would be difficult to do that with DVDs.

[domino harvey]

Better DVDs than VHSes— has that trend died yet? Imagine bragging about watching Pulp Fiction on a pan and scan tape

[CSM126]

Better DVDs than VHSes— has that trend died yet? Imagine bragging about watching Pulp Fiction on a pan and scan tape

I mean, I still buy the occasional VHS, but only if the film isn’t available on disc at all. So not that often. Are people seriously going back to VHS as a hipster thing now?

[cdnchris]

Yes, for whatever reason. There's a whole VHS subreddit with all sorts of crazy, and a LaserDisc one (though the latter I understand more for collecting purposes, but there are people there that swear by them still).

[Drucker]

Better DVDs than VHSes— has that trend died yet? Imagine bragging about watching Pulp Fiction on a pan and scan tape

I mean, I still buy the occasional VHS, but only if the film isn’t available on disc at all. So not that often. Are people seriously going back to VHS as a hipster thing now?

Definitely. Night Owl Video in Williamsburg opened a few years ago, the first new DVD store in NYC in at least a decade. And they have a whole wall of VHS.

(the store is great and worth supporting otherwise, but yes this does happen!)

[willoneill]

Are people seriously going back to VHS as a hipster thing now?

There's a pool hall that just opened a few months ago near me and one of their items of "decor" is an old 20" tube tv/vcr combo where they play 80s and 90s classics on VHS on a perpetual loop. The kids love it!

[MichaelB]

I still maintain a working VHS recorder for those increasingly rare occasions when I need to work from VHS tapes, but the only ones I've actually bought this side of the millennium changeover have been work-related.

(Sometimes it's the only way of getting hold of a copy of an alternative cut.)

[cdnchris]

Showed my kids Han shooting first through VHS. So yes, there's still value in them.

[FrauBlucher]

This almost makes me wish I kept my VHS tapes, almost

[knives]

There’s a comic store here with a huge VHS section.

Showed my kids Han shooting first through VHS. So yes, there's still value in them.

There was actually a DVD release with it as an unrestored extra feature.