It came from Videoflicks.

Kids, gather around the monitor here for a minute. What’s that, you’ve already been here for 7 hours? Well that’s good. But put your mouses down. Or is it mice? I don’t know. Fuck! JUST GO TO BED!! No, no, come back. Uncle Johnny Creepy wants to talk to you for a second. He wants to talk to you about the olden days. You like movies don’t you Billy? Of course you do. How do you watch your movies? On your laptop, yes. On your HD TV, that’s right too Jenny. And where do you get your movies? From the computer, yes where else? From the grocery store, sad but true Dakota. Well let me tell you where Uncle Johnny got his movies from when he was a little boy. From a magical wondrous place called the video store.

Once upon a time in 1983 my parents bought a Betamax VCR . I was almost 7 years old and it looked like this.

It cost way more than it was worth. (Maybe it was the wood paneling). Back then there weren’t many video stores in Burlington. But the people at the electronics store were kind enough to rent us a movie. It was Superman.

Superman was the first movie I ever watched on a VCR and thanks to the little remote attached to a cord,

I was able to pause the movie at the exact point when baby superman lifted up the car and you could see his wang.

It was like this but full frontal with wang but you still couldn’t really see the wang because of all the squiggly lines when I paused it. Wang.

Not long after we got our Betamax a store called Videoflicks opened right up the street. This was great because the electronic store only had about 4 movies and I think one was a work out tape.



I loved the video store. I used to spend ages looking at all the boxes, trying to pick a movie. And then my dad would get angry and yell at me to, Just pick one! Then I’d pick an R rated movie and he’d tell me no and I’d have to put it back and start all over again. All those boxes on the shelf. Weird movies that I’d never seen and never heard of. Want to see some of my favorites? No? Well too bad! I’m going to show you anyway.

The Party Animal.

This was the box that they had at Videoflicks. That’s Timothy Carhart shrunk down on a leash tied to a woman’s leg partying. Here’s another good box for it.

Bonus: Real naked boob on the back!

I always wanted to see this movie and my parents would never let me rent it. They said it was too mature for me. Turns out they were wrong.



Ok, they were right.



Bustin’ Loose

I liked this box because it had guys wearing masks. When I was a kid I’d watch anything if there were guys in masks in it. My parents wouldn’t let me rent this one either. But once my dad got so tired of waiting for me to pick a movie he just grabbed Brewster’s Millions off the shelf and said, You’re watching this. Let’s go! It was an ok movie, considering it didn’t have any guys in masks in it.



Ghoulies

He’s coming out of the toilet! What’s not to like. That there is comedic gold when you’re 8 years old. The toilet! Ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Deathstalker

I totally rented this based on the box. I wanted to see that big ogre guy. As it turned out he sucked.



In fact the whole movie sucked. Except for the part where the wizard guy turns a dude into a chick.



Chopping Mall

Not only does this movie have a great name but it’s also got a shopping bag full of body parts on the front. This is also a very good example of how the box art never matches the movie. The robots in the movie never had hands like that.



See. Totally different hands. I can’t remember why she wasn’t wearing pants but that’s what you get when you give mall security robots lasers.

Up the Creek

For some reason I was allowed to rent this. (I think I finally broke my dad.)And it was awesome! Up the Creek has got boobs and exploding toilets, Chuck the Wonder Dog and snooty, preppy ivy league jerk-offs. I’ve been trying forever to get it on DVD but I can’t seem to find it. I think it’s because they can’t get the rights to all the music that’s in it. If that’s the case, screw you Cheap Trick!



Ishtar

I used to look at this box for this movie at Bandito video on Fairview all the time. I never wanted to rent it but people said it was the worst movie ever made and for some reason that intrigued me.

Frankenhooker

This box I saw in Jumbo Video when I was a little older. Jumbo video was great. Their horror section was set up like a dungeon and they gave out free popcorn! The other Jumbo video over on Brant St. also had one of those porn sections with the saloon doors. Frankenhooker is one of the greatest movies ever made. It’s about a scientist who accidently cuts his wife’s head off so he decides to make her a new body. He invents super crack and gives to hookers. It’s so powerful that when they smoke it, the hookers explode. The scientist then collects all the best hooker parts to make his wife’s body out of. But when he brings her to life she becomes Frankenhooker and when she has sex with a guy, the guy explodes. Check out the quote from Bill Murry on the box: If you see one movie this year it should be Frankenhooker.



Well, I’m kind of tired now. I think I’m going to lay down and dream of Videoflicks, Bandito video and Jumbo video. Hey, did I ever tell you the story about the Zeedonk at the Appleby mall? They had this petting zoo that came once a year to the Appleby mall and one year they had a zeedonk (part zebra part donkey). Well the zeedonk kept biting kids so they had to take him out of the petting zoo. I guess they didn’t have anywhere else to put him so the put him in the abandoned Jumbo Video store. So you’d be walking past and you’d look in and there were all these racks of old video tapes and then a pile of hay and a zeedonk standing there. It was awesome. Now got to bed!

Hee Haw Go to bed! Hee Haw Go to bed! Hee Haw!