My first DVD was The Birdcage. I picked it up along with my RCA 5200p way back in Feb '98. There wasn't alot to choose from back then so I figured the bright picture on the Birdcage would show off the better picture quality. Now nearly 700 DVDs later I still look at that movie on my DVD shelf and think back to how I got started collecting DVDs.
The first DVD I ever bought was: Charlie's Angels, the movie, in June 2002 I think. But only because it was on special! I swear! (because unlike you guys, I don't have the T&A excuse for buying this movie)
The first DVD I ever had was given to me for my birthday -- it was The Monkees: Our Favorite Episodes. But the first ones I ever bought were Frequency and Shanghai Noon in November 2000. Had to watch them with the DVD-ROM on my computer with the tiny monitor (there's nothing quite like seeing Jackie Chan fighting when he's only 2 inches tall.) Got a DVD player for Christmas that year and have been buying DVDs like a maniac ever since.
Depressingly the first DVD I recall owning was 'Lord of the Dance' with that git Micheal Flatley in it. It came free with the DVD Rom in my PC at the time, I didn't want to take it but they forced me. It has since been inflicted on my Parents.
When I finally got around to purchasing a DVD player and discs to go with it I believe my first DVD was 'The Thing' which I still have. (But would trade in for a second for a decent anamorphic transfer, complete with the excellent commentary at least of course).
The first disc I bought was Das Boot. The sound had been remastered for 5.1 digital. The movie is simply the best WWII submarine movie ever made. It is odd how many people bought DV discs before they bought a machine. I did the same thing.....movie first and player second.
I wish they would redo Stalingrad in the same manner that they did Das Boot.
I don't know about that. The first time I became aware of DVD was when a guy told me about it at an electronic store. One computer was showing ST Generations, and when we asked about it we were told it had a DVD-ROM -back then this was new, I had never even heard of this.
This was the first week of March 1998 (it's a long and boring story about how I know this, so just trust me on this). So there were definitely ST Generations DVDs in NZ in March 1998.
I bought "Blazing Saddles", "Bonnie And Clyde" and "Bladerunner" in 1997 about 8 months before purchasing my first DVD player! I wanted to be sure the format was definitely better than LD which I had been collecting for 12 years prior.
I started just buying widescreen films that were only available full-screen on LD, but after my CRT projector was installed the following year and I saw the improvement on the big screen, the LD's started selling off like crazy!
I must have gotten 20 Warner titles free through their "buy 3, get one free" promo, as well as the fantastic bargains of 800.com reel.com and buy.com!