The Magic of 'Magic Movies'

Time for video store nostalgia...

Streaming is the kind of convenience that chokes you. It’s like a giant supermarket with a thousand brands of jam and you can’t choose one because you’re overwhelmed. There have been psychology studies that show the more options a consumer has, the more likely they’re going to say ‘fuck it’ and not buy jam because they can’t choose.

I spend more time flipping through the apps on my Roku trying to find the perfect movie than I do actually watching movies. Endless doomscrolling of ‘Recommended For You’ and ‘Newly Added’ and mostly the dreaded ‘Shit We Made That Does Not Appeal To You But We Need To Shovel It Down Your Throat.’

The video store, however, that was a different experience. I will write about video stores very, very much on this blog. Something has to balance out the drug stories.

I have recurring dreams about video stores, and sometimes about finding them at flea markets or thrift stores. I’ve hit the hand brake on my collecting, but VHS is a passion for me. My collection dominates my shelves nearly as much as my book and vinyl. I have huge boxes and milk crates of them that there’s simply not enough room for them all to fit on the shelves. Eventually, I realized it was time to only purchase one if it seemed special or rare.

The video rental store was a different experience than streaming. You had to pick out a movie and make a serious commitment to watch it and return it on time, lest you face the punishing late fees, as well as pay a membership fee on top of it all.

With streaming, you’re generally dropping about $10 a month for a thousand movies that are mostly garbage. In the rental days, you’d spend at least as much or more for your membership, $5 a movie, and if you didn’t slip it into the drop box on time, boy oh boy you got fucked. Rental copies of videos were more expensive because of the licensing, so if you lost it, that’s $200 for ‘Robocop’ you gotta cough up.

It’s pretty well known that Blockbuster annihilated the rental industry and sank their own ship in the process. We’ll talk about that later, I’ve got stories about them. But the mom and pop shops was where it was at. I’ve got stories about plenty of them as well.

Today, we’re talking about Magic Movies. It was the first video store I ever remember visiting, and my family frequented it. The store was in a strip mall in Midwest City and owned by an interracial couple who were always so warm and kind. We’d usually spend as much time talking to them at the counter as we did wandering the aisles.

As a kid, our Friday night tradition was to go to the Mazzios Pizza next door to Magic Movies. My parents would give us a few quarters to play the arcade games while we waited for the pizza. There was a Terminator 2 pinball machine where you’d launch the ball by pulling a trigger on a shotgun. I’d never even seen the movie, my parents didn’t allow us to watch violent movies, growing up Jehovah’s Witness and all, but it was fun as shit.

The pizza arrives, we’d scarf down slices of pepperoni and chug our free refills of Dr Pepper from those giant red plastic cups, but all the while anticipating the next move: MAGIC MOVIES.

We’d walk over, hear the bell jingle as the glass door opened, and be confronted with a strange wonderland. Posters wallpapered the room, which was small but to my size seemed massive. Some were for new flicks, others that were so old to be sunfaded. There were always posters that scared the shit out of me, especially ‘The Kindred.’

We were given the option to rent ONE THING and my parents would choose their own. I had two siblings, so it was a democratic process. Sometimes, maybe if it was payday, we could each pick out our own, but regardless it was a comittment.

Sometimes, we’d opt to rent a GameBoy cartridge instead, but usually went for a tape. Walking the aisles of wire racks stacked with empty VHS boxes, staring at the lurid cover art of films we weren’t allowed to see. They had a system where each box had a plastic holder glued to them, and if it was in stock there was a yellow tab with a number written on it. You’d take the tab to the counter when you checked out and viola, you’ve got a movie this weekend.

There would only be one or two copies of each movie, so if whatever you wanted was checked out, you’d have to move on down the aisles until you found something you wanted to watch. And if it sucked? Well, you’d still probably watch it two or three times before returning it. Videos were expensive to buy back then, so our home collection was meagre. We had cable, and there would occasionally be free HBO or Disney Channel trials, and we’d tape them and label what movies were on them. Most of our library consisted of bootlegs.

Eventually, the Magic faded away as the chain stores started moving in. That same strip mall ended up getting a Video Update next door, which was actually a pretty great rental place that I have memories about, but we’ll save those for late.

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