The single most annoying question when you work at a video store used to be: So whats good right now?
These days the Oscar for most repeated query goes to... So, how much longer are you going to be open?
And as with the former (try Hot Wet American Summer or Four Lions if youre looking for a good comedy) the guys behind the counter at Videomatica have a stock answer for the latter question, variations of which are posed by literally every single customer on an unusually busy Wednesday afternoon.
Oh, were still here for a couple months, Joe Balogh repeats at least 30 times, his tone a pitch-prefect mix of casual and polite.
BJ Summers has a more technical line. Weve ordered new releases until the end of October. After that we dont know.
It gets tiresome, but you cant blame the dwindling clientele for asking, and Summers and Balogh dont. The fact that video stores are hurtling for a place in the history books alongside 8-tracks and home milk delivery is as obvious as the need for a new shop-vac to tackle the stores ancient carpets.
The way internet killed the video store has been well documented throughout North America in the last couple years. Just last week corporate giant Blockbuster announced it would close its remaining stores. And in Vancouver the epidemic has been particularly swift and cruel. Since March the death knell has swept the citys independent stores, starting in the east with Commercial Drives Alpha Video and extending westward to Main Streets Happy Bats Cinema, Gastowns Reel Bulldog Video and the West Ends Independent Flixx. And, sometime soon, it will claim West Fourths Videomatica.
When it does, it wont just mean the end of an era for the 28-year-old institution. Itll mean guys like Balogh and Summers will be out of a career. The two are part of the last generation of young, mostly male, movie buffs whove turned an all-out obsession into gainful employment since the first Betamax machines found their way into suburban living rooms more than 30 years ago.
Weve all known that Video Store Guy, the one whose extensive grasp of all things motion-picture at once inspires and intimidates casual renters and hardcore cinephiles looking for a Friday night flick. The Video Store Guy isnt just another retail slave, hes the authority on the good, the bad, the obscure and the experimental. He occupies a kind of cult status. Hes a late-20th-century pop culture archetype. Or rather, he was.
When the last video store goes, when Netflix, Telus TV and bit torrent deal the final blow, so too, goes the friendly neighbourhood Video Store Guy.
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Balogh and Summers didnt set out to be cult figures. Its probably why they embody the role so well. Not to reduce them to stereotypes, but every inch of them, from Baloghs Shaggy (as in Scooby Doo) hairstyle to Summerss unruly curls, wild eyebrows and ironic T-shirts plays to it.
Its actually kind of a burden, says Balogh, a beanpole of a man. People talk about you all the time, you know they do. They build pretty elaborate characters in their heads about you and I dont know how accurate they are.
Neither he nor Summers got into this line of work for the vague notoriety or local celebrity status. Theyre not snobby or surly at least not to the customers. They just love movies. Love them in a way that in another arena would be labelled obsessive compulsive. In the annals of the video store, however, it has allowed them to rise to the top of their field. An admittedly specialized field.
So much of my life is movies, and this is only one part of a mental film landscape, explains Summers, who landed at the store 11 years ago at age 20. Its the only real job hes ever had. The only one hes ever really wanted.
After a brief stint at a movie theatre concession and another rental shop, Summers finally got the call from Videomatica after applying several times, even turning down a part-time offer to hold out for the full-time gold standard. This place is like film school that I get paid to go to, he says, humming to himself as he stocks DVDs and sorts the receipts, bouncing on the toes of his black Keds. As the buyer of the sales division, Summers is in charge of what goes on the floor. The job requires he meet the exacting standards of the collectors who rely on the store for its expert selection of curio-cinema, classics and cult offerings. Summers is that expert. He jokes the job fulfills his high school dreams, but theres a case to be made that, at 31, hes still in love. Its pretty effing cool.
And although the pay leaves much to be desired, the autonomy afforded him as a bad authority figure in a place full of people who cant deal with authority, suites him just fine. Hed happily stay here forever if the store werent closing and maybe if he got a raise.
It takes a lot more than a predilection to dissect the minutiae of motion pictures to be a winning Video Store Guy. Yes, you have to have personality, but you also have to be personable, deft with administrative details, and do it all with a patient and pleasant demeanour.
Enter Balogh. Manager and rental savant of sorts. Sure, the 30-year-old history grad can politely hassle delinquent renters and coax a list out of an archaic dot matrix printer like its nobodys business. But he really shines when it comes to dealing with the customers.
After seven years at the store (three before that at Blockbuster) Balogh knows his clientele. He knows the woman in the floral hat will need the running times of all her historical dramas, and that the man in the khaki pants will want the DVD of Fantastic Planet that includes the bonus features. He cheerfully writes the title of the Motown documentary hes playing (Respect Yourself: The Story of Stax Records) for everyone who asks. Hes only ever been interested in movies, and here he got to learn all about them. At this point Im basically a film historian without the credentials.
Whats made the job worth doing is working with and serving other people who love them too. I love talking about movies more than watching them.
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There used to be a lot more people to talk to.
You missed, like, the biggest crowd Ive ever seen, Balogh says to Summers when he walks in, three minutes late for his 1 p.m. start. There were like 30 people here.
Actually, there were 10, but after years of watching customers fade, a little hyperbole is excusable.
They were all baby boomers, young people almost never come in anymore. Only one deigned to rent a movie. The rest came for the free Moneyball tickets offered in Videomaticas bimonthly newsletter. It doesnt seem to bother Summers and Balogh though, they just wonder aloud how the films screenwriters, Steve Zaillian and Aaron Sorkin, might have ironed out their script as they ready the now-empty store for the day.
Its business as usual here, until its not.
Im still in denial, says Summers. Its hard for me to get in the mindset that everythings leaving. Like Balogh, hes got no set plan. He might do more stand-up or sketch comedy. The pair have been working on a web series, Support Your Local Video Store, they launched on YouTube last week, shot, of course, on location. There are more plans in the works for creative projects and when the end of days finally arrives, itll be good to have more time to work on them.
Theres a sense from both that the closure might be coming at a good time, personally. Ill get to enter a whole new world of wages not seen since before Bin Laden, Summers jokes.
Im 30 years old; its time I got a real job, adds Balogh, who might pick up some work on music video sets, or coast on E.I. for a bit.
In fact, both say they likely would have left the store for better-paying pastures by now if it werent closing. But it seems a spurious claim. Despite knowing since May of Videomaticas impending closure, neither has bothered to shop a résumé around. The idea of leaving the grungy store in its hour of need draws audible gasps. Theres too much to do, a collection to find a home for, boxes to pack, grieving customers to console, a commitment to honour.
Like any good captains, theyll go down with the ship.
