VHS nostalgia, memories?

[RCMerchant]

-and it has John Saxon! 

[Chainsawmidget]

I miss the old VHS rental places.  Going in, not knowing anything about a movie other than what the cover art and back of the box showed, and just wandering until you found something that caught your attention. 

Then of course there were also the horror sections which I was too young to rent from back in the day, but just looking at some of those covers and having to guess what they were about could give me chills.  Pinhead and and the Phantasm series hold a special place in my hearts just for that reason. 

And of course, the boxes had actual ART on the covers.  They had to.  Something needed to catch your attention (and photoshop hadn't been invented yet so they couldn't just plasted the main characters heads floating over the background then.) 

VHS's were also big and had some weight to them, making them feel like they had more substance than DVDS nowadays do. 

[Scott123]

I miss the old VHS rental places.  Going in, not knowing anything about a movie other than what the cover art and back of the box showed, and just wandering until you found something that caught your attention. 

Then of course there were also the horror sections which I was too young to rent from back in the day, but just looking at some of those covers and having to guess what they were about could give me chills.  Pinhead and and the Phantasm series hold a special place in my hearts just for that reason. 

And of course, the boxes had actual ART on the covers.  They had to.  Something needed to catch your attention (and photoshop hadn't been invented yet so they couldn't just plasted the main characters heads floating over the background then.) 

VHS's were also big and had some weight to them, making them feel like they had more substance than DVDS nowadays do. 

I do to ... the other day a local record shop was having a sale on VHS movies, 50 cents each. So I had to pick up a few ... I bought Hellfighers, Kelly's Heroes and Gorgo for $1.50. Not bad. I have nothing against DVDs either, but since I have probably 100 tapes or so already and a VCR, I figured "why not?"

[retrorussell]

I liked the giant VHS covers of obscure or direct-to-video horror movies, usually from Wizard Video.
Many of the creepy/gory covers drew my interest and were the sole reason I rented them.  I was always drawn to this cover:

The psycho face and the splatter of blood on the oxygen hose told me I had to see the film within.. and it didn't disappoint!
I remember the video stores would have laserdisc/vhs/beta players for rent, and sometimes game systems.  A place in Vancouver, WA had a Vectrex on display at the video place by my mom's.  I would hear Mine Storm on it while I'd browse the horror section.  I remember seeing the covers to DR. BUTCHER MD, MICROWAVE MASSACRE, THE HAND, NIGHT WARNING and DEADLY EYES quite well.

[Archivist]

The cover for the Australian release of Xtro freaked me out no end.  Even now, it gives me the willies.



Then there was the lesser known prison drama Scrubbers (1983), with similarly high levels of freak-out.



And here's what someone created with the notion of Game of Thrones being released in the 80's on VHS!