Physical Media Lives

A never-ending parade of dorks (almost uniformly chubby white dudes) sitting in front of their massive movie collections ALL REPEATING THE SAME THINGS. Seriously, they all say "it's about nostalgia, it's about holding something in your hands, it's about streaming services taking away movies, it's about censorship!" OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

There was maybe 30 minutes of content stretched out into 2 hours 10 minutes and there were so many insufferable people droning on and on to their selfie cams that it made me want to puke at times.

So if you want to watch a bunch of youtubers bragging about their "almost always horror movie collections" for WAY TOO LONG, then watch this and feel better about whatever bad choices you may have made in your life to not end up surrounded by tens of thousands of dollars worth of physical media.

You'd think someone interested in the art of filmmaking or film history or the evolution of a director or even an actor might have been interviewed. But no, it's just an endless parade of man-child dolts (and one woman or two) blathering on about how they've turned their houses into mini-Blockbusters filled floor-to-ceiling with gory D-grade horror movies. I'm a collector, too, and am appalled at the black eye this "documentary" gives us. Really, if any of these guys ever got off their duffs (or had the intelligence), they should have been proctologists since they relish cinematic excrement so highly.

I saw this film as Movie Hoarders. It is a collection of interviews with people who have large collections of movies on various formats (VHS, DVD, Blu-ray, UHD, and even Laser Disc).

I am a guy who loves movies. I love owning movies. I have owned a lot of movies over the years. I have even bought movies because of the bells and whistles they were presented with. I should have enjoyed this film, yet I quickly became bored.

The first issue is that most of those interviewed seem to have similar tastes. Most of them (all but two males in their thirties or forties) love horror movies judging from their attire and the possessions they tend to show the camera.

I love horror movies too, but it would have been nice to interview a few collectors of a different sort. How about someone who name checks Eureka and Criterion and Kino labels instead of the constant Arrow, Severin, Shout, and Vinegar Syndrome? The subjects not into horror seem to be into about everything. One subject collects Laser Discs. I don't think it matters what the film is, only that the film is on Laser Disc. Another guy brags he has 6,000 movies. Okay, why? Is he just collecting to collect, so he can brag that he has 6,000 movies and we don't?

This brings me to another criticism. For a film about people who supposedly love movies, there isn't much movie talk. Occasionally, a subject will pull something from his or her shelf to show the audience, but not all that much. There was nothing in this documentary that made me envious. How about having the subjects show their favorite pieces of their collection and explain why? This film should have sent me down E-bay's rabbit hole trying to get some of the gems. It did not.

In addition, the film takes a nostalgic look back at the VHS days, one that is just not accurate. One of the complaints of streaming is censorship. As someone who grew up during the home video boom, I can attest there was just as much censorship in the VHS days. Tapes were often put out in "rated" and "unrated" versions. Those Italian horror films some of the subjects love so much were released heavily edited and rather indifferently panned and scanned. Furthermore, the much touted, by some of the subjects, Blockbuster Video went along with the censorship, avoiding unrated cuts and even banning Article 99 and The Last Temptation of Christ from its stores. None of this history is addressed in Movie Hoarders.

This documentary seems less made than assembled from zoom sessions with the director's friends. I am not sure who the film is for. The people interviewed in it will get a kick out of watching themselves, but there is nothing new here. There is certainly nothing here worth 129 minutes of one's time.

Many interesting collectors are keeping these visual memories alive. As a minimal collector myself I can appreciate this content.

I have been collecting older game consoles, Laserdisc players CED Videodisc, VHS and in the future Beta. Having a Plex sever to share with my family and friends via VHS movies from 1982 with trailers and scenes after the ending to the Plex server has been a conversation piece bringing people closer through nostalgia.

From vintage and retro media formats to physical games, the infrastructure translates across countries, genders, cultures.

Those who create and share this piece of history, thank you.

This was a long 2 hours and 10 minutes. It gets real redundant. Really, only a handful of subjects are discussed. AND I don't think there's a conflicting opinion in this entire thing. Some people are interesting, some not. Some people are clearly not hoarders. It appeared Cinema Sickness had the largest collection, then again, he was the one guy walking around. Most people were sitting in front of a case or two.

I was really hoping people would get to showcase their collections more. Lots of horror collectors. I would be curious to see what kind of stuff they collect (a couple people get to pull out a few things). There was one guy who had a large horror collection, and had them divided by subject matter! That was fun to see. This movie needed more of that kind of stuff.

Way too much focus on VHS, they spent what seemed like 45 minutes on "nostalgia" (today's buzzword that I detest), another 45 on how much streaming sucks, the good old days of Blockbuster, how you have to be able to physically hold a movie in your hands, and that boutique labels are keeping media alive. I think that about covers it.

The people appearing in this movie were obviously given only a handful of subjects to discuss. Collecting a large number of movies was not one of them. Movie Hoarders was formerly titled Physical Media Lives (as it's listed on imdb), which is more accurate.