Last Blockbuster doco a love letter and eulogy to video stores
The Last Blockbuster (E, 86 mins) Directed by Taylor Morden Reviewed by ★★★1⁄2
It was a weekly ritual for a generation of Kiwis. A visit to the local video store to browse the aisles for the latest releases, cult classics or transgressive titles talked about in hushed tones.
Movies like Ghoulies, House, The Toxic Avenger and Eliminators – tales that bypassed cinemas – caught the imagination of 80s teens. As the home entertainment business grew, franchises and multi-national companies began to dominate, including the Americanowned Blockbuster.
They were notable for their pristine stores, countless copies of the big flicks, long opening hours and the absence of anything considered ‘‘adult’’.
But whereas, in the early noughties, there was a video store in virtually every suburb, now you’ll be lucky to find one in a major New Zealand city (innovative and independently owned businesses like Wellington’s Aro and Christchurch’s Alice’s are two of far too few).
And it’s that rise and fall that Taylor Morden’s love letter and eulogy to the purveyors of home entertainment via physical media successfully captures.
At once a celebration of video store aesthetics, atmosphere and culture, it is also an investigation into what went so terribly wrong.
Obviously streaming services were a massive contributor to changing people’s viewing habits, but as Morden discovers, in the case of Blockbuster, it was a lot more complicated. Multimedia owners who decided to milk the cash cow without innovating or future-proofing, a series of business model blunders, and annoying a man named Reed Hastings (he allegedly started Netflix after accruing US$40 worth of late fees on Apollo 13) all played their part.
Morden has gathered famous video store fans like film-maker Kevin Smith (whose first movie Clerks revolved around one), actors Adam Brody and Jamie Kennedy (who before he played a video store worker in Scream, was a Blockbuster ambassador alongside comedian Jim Gaffigan) and Savage Garden singer Darren Hayes. Smith reveals how the first title he rented was the ‘‘horrifying transgression of cinema’’ Bloodsucking Freaks, and Scarface was an early title for Kennedy.
There’s also a cameo from famed Blockbuster opponent Lloyd Kaufman, still outraged that it wouldn’t stock his company Troma’s cult movies like
Kabukiman or Surf Nazis Must Die, because of their edgy content.
It’s one of a number of short sections or segues within the documentary winningly brought to life in intriguing ways. There are meetings re-enacted by sock puppets and the clever use of animation and film clips to illustrate various points.
However, the real star of the show is the owner of the eponymous final Blockbuster standing. Since the demise of the Alaskan trio made famous by John Oliver’s 2018 attempts to save them by buying Russell Crowe’s jockstrap and memorabilia for them to display, and a Perth outpost losing its battle the following year, Bend, Oregon, has been the only place where the distinctive blue-and-gold signage still hangs above an open sign.
How Sandi Harding – a selfproclaimed ‘‘Blockbuster-mom’’ because she’s hired just about every teen from the city’s population of almost 90,000 – has kept her business operating is remarkable. Essentially unable to upgrade her database, she has a pile of PCs from other Blockbuster stores that she ‘‘Frankensteins’’ parts from. New DVDs and BluRays are acquired from the local Walmart or Target, and in-store snacks are the result of regular shopping trips.
So why Bend? Harding and other locals put it down to it being part Twin Peaks, part Gravity Falls – a place where locals stay loyal to companies (a Radio Shack was still operating less than two years ago).
As Last Blockbuster shows, before the current pandemic (which they’ve been able to operate through, thanks to a kerbside pickup option Harding introduced) it had become a global tourist attraction, helped by its scarcity value and a homage to the chain in Marvel’s Captain Marvel.
An excellent way to introduce those under-20 to what the video store experience was like (including the joy of arguing over what movie to choose), in the end you’re left feeling a sense of sadness and anger at the loss of these film archives and ‘‘living libraries’’.
‘‘To me, Blockbuster was a name like McDonald’s, I never thought it was going to go away,’’ Smith laments. ‘‘I watched an entertainment business build and die in my lifetime.’’