How dangerous is it to buy more than you can watch? (1 Viewer)

[Frank@N]

I've been a movie lover for many years and can't seem to resist buying good movies at rock bottom prices.

I think the old LD price structure pre-conditioned me to go ape-$&!^ every time I see a good flick under $10.

Bottom line, I've got 100 new movies and 20 used movies to be screened and I....keep....buying...more.

Today alone I bought 4 new ones: Say Anything SE (9.99 CC), War of the Roses SE (9.99 CC), Ed Scissorhands 10th AE (9.99 CC), and Go (7.99 BB).

If one these discs comes up defective, would a retail store allow you to exchange 6 months later?

If know this probably goes against their written policy, but how firm have you found them to be?

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Welcome to the forum, Frank! Good to have you here.

I own about 1500 DVDs. Of that, 1,000 are still
in the original shrinkwrap.

I have no idea how many DVDs could be defective
or not -- but it is very rare that I have found
DVDs to be defective (unless it is a mass glitch).

My advice? Keep buying, my friend -- especially
if you are finding good deals that may not be
around tomorrow.

 

[Paul Arnette]

Good God, Ron! And here I am thinking I need intervention with a hair under 100 unwatched.

 

[Ruz-El]

The only way to curb this is to lose your job. It's about the only thing that slowed me down.:b

 

[Rich Malloy]

I would recommend that you curtail your buying. 120 unwatched titles should provide you with plenty of options, and I seriously wonder if you'll ever watch them all before the introduction of blue-laser HD-DVD or whatever the next, best format is.

And ask yourself this: why do I need to own these DVDs right now when there is little chance that I'll be watching them anytime soon? Sometimes I think folks are engaging in compulsive behavior and justifying it as "collecting". If you've met many "collectors" (as opposed to movie-lovers, music-lovers, etc.), you'll recognize a certain pathology that seems to have infected them all. Some of these wackos seem to get the greatest thrill from scoring the hardest-to-find objects (say, OOP Criterion discs) with the strange intent of leaving them unopened on a shelf. Apparently, the act of tearing off the shrinkwrap dilutes the value of the object in their eyes... even when they could never, ever, under any circumstances part with their beloved, shelf-bound, shrink-wrapped precious.

It's a psychological condition, and it effects different people in varying degrees. I'd say you might have a very mild case... don't let it get out of control. Remember, you got into this hobby because you like to watch movies, and not because you like to stare at a shelf filled with unopened fetish items.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

I'm in precisely the same boat. Buy too many DVDs to watch...then I watch them months after purchase. I've had 3 defective discs so far (Mad Mad world, Swiss Family Robinson, and A Star is Born) and I need to see if deep discount dvd will do exchanges or not. I'll let you know when I find out!!!

dave

 

[Paul McElligott]

It's only dangerous if you stack them too high and it falls on you...

 

[Ron Reda]

I do the same thing. I have over 200 DVDs right now with about 30 that I have yet to watch. What I do is keep the receipt, open the DVD shrink wrap and put the receipt inside the DVD case. Once I watch it, I toss the receipt. If it has more than one DVD on it, I check off the register entry and put the receipt in the other DVD case. I've been doing this for some time and haven't come across a bad DVD. If I do, I still have the receipt. My thought is that, even if it is 6 months later and I bring it back, they'll replace it for me or have an extremely upset customer on their hands!

 

[Matt Pasant]

I liken it to this.

I have managed to keep my collection at about 350-380 for years. I sell off, and new ones come in.

But It seems I always have a running deficit of 20-30 titles. I guess its like having a DVD Debt, gross revenues for the year 119 bought dvds, 89 Watched, Gross DVD total (20). And it builds and builds.

To where you are spouting off lines that Khan immortalized when looking at your dvd colelction thinking "Time is a luxuary you do not have".


-- Matt

 

[Mike Broadman]

Rich, I pretty much agree with you. Right now, I have two unwatched DVDs. After I watch one or both (and have money), I'll order a few more. There are dozens of discs I want to own, but I see no point in acquiring them if I can't ever get to watch them.

 

[Jeff_HR]

The only "danger" is to your bank account.

 

[Peter McM]

I went through something similar when CDs first came out in the 80's; for the first few months I bought most major new releases in the fledgling format--even music I really didn't care for that much. Only when I could no longer brag about being "cutting-edge" did I cut back.

The time has long since come for DVDs. I now rent far more than I buy, purchasing only those which I know I will want to revisit from time to time. I see in the weekly roundup in the Coupons & Bargains forum, what people claim they are getting, and don't see how they can possibly watch all those and still have a full-time job to pay for them!

 

[Bruce Hedtke]

An industry secret is that each DVD is encoded with self-destructing algorithms and unless exposed to air outside of the shrink wrap, this doomsday device detonates, wiping out all the 1's and 0's on the disc while at the same time, emitting a lethal discharge of low-grade EMP that also destroys all DVD's within a 10 foot radius. As you can see, the danger is VERY real. I can't give you information about when the self-destruct mode occurs because that is classified double top-secret and only the heads of studios knows for sure. My advice is to open every DVD and play it at least once, thus neutralizing the self-destruct mechanism.

Another theory is that unopened DVD's can communicate with each other. There is a Mother computer somewhere that can speak to DVD's that are shrink wrapped and that communication link is lost once the wrap is severed. Mostly Mother tells the DVD's to use subliminal messaging. That's why when you walk through a Best Buy or Circuit City, you get this unsatiable urge to buy, buy, buy! But, sometimes...when MOther detects a disc that has been purchased and remains unopened, she will send an order for the disc to morph into a throwing star and attack the owner. You say you have 120 yet to be watched? Get out of the house, NOW! And Ron has 1000 still in the package? My God...it's armeggedon.

Bruce

 

[Charlie B. Ch.]

I would say that it is danger to your health. I rarely go to the gym now as opposed to before. I just bought the first 4 seasons of Buffy from BB. I don't know how am I going to fit them into my DVD watching schedule. Maybe I have to cut my sleeping time also. :frowning: This is becoming too crazy.

 

[Eric Meske]

Best...thread...ever.

 

[Jesse Skeen]

I still think of everything in terms of laserdisc prices- anything under $15 is "Free" as far as I'm concerned! I've got over 100 DVDs I haven't watched yet, as well as about 100 LDs bought at clearance prices the last couple years.

 

[Sean Campbell]

Any disc I buy I try to watch it within a week ( unless it's just to replace a VHS, in which case I can sometimes wait months ).
For the remainder of this week I have to get through:
The last 7 episodes of Babylon 5 season two
Animal Farm ( recent live action version )
Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas
Dawn of the Dead
Leon ( which isn't mine, but I need to watch it soon as my friend wants it back on Saturday )
Alice in Wonderland ( Disney version )

I think I can manage...

 

[Edwin_M]

I also have this problem. As of right now I have 62 dvds unwatched not including Buffy season 4 and South Park season 2. Some of these I've had for over a year, like Ben-Hur which I've had since Christmas '01. Besides not only having to watch the movie I also find it necessary to watch all the extras and listen to all the commentaries before I allow myself to put it on the shelves along with the ones I feel I completed. I've never been able to not have a stacked tower of dvds to watch for years now. I've thought to myself that I should stop buying so much but sometimes there are great bargains to be had and I just have to get in on them. This week Best Buy has a 2 for $20 deal going on and I took advantage to pick up some Kubrick titles I didn't have. About defective discs, I also keep the receipts all together in one place and just hope whatever problem they may have is minimal, for example The Grey Zone which stutters for two seconds but I don't find it necessary to return because of it because although it's a great movie I don't plan to watch it repeatedly or with friends like some other discs. But if it's a big defect then I've found that some retailers are ok with returns if you have the receipt. In my experience it all depends on the employee you're dealing with. I once encountered a very nice Circuit City employee who let me exchange my copy of Leon (the one with the bad 5.1 track) two full years after I bought it and without the receipt.

Sometimes I think I'm crazy for having so many dvds (1100) and so many unwatched ones but then I think, like Rich, that I got into this because I love movies and that eventually I'll get through them all.

Whew, thanks for letting me getting all this out in the open, if you'll excuse me, I have some dvds to watch.

 

[Paul_Scott]

count me in w/ the old laserdisc club.
i feel very much the same way about under $15 titles, and i have a similar backlog of unwatched/unopened discs (probably well over 100 if you count box sets).
and i just don't have the time to watch as much as i would like.

i just picked up the LOTR:EE last week for $20.
this would have easily ben a $125-150 LD set.
how can you think twice about dropping $20, even if you won't pull it out and watch it for a while?
$15? i could barely buy bare-bones used LDs for that price back in the day.

this compulsive buying really ramped up once i got a projector.
i rarely go out to the movies (just 3 times this year so far), so i try to rationalize the numerous blind buys as i would movie tickets.
plus i periodically thin out my collection.
once i finally get around to opening and watching a title, unless i really, really enjoyed it and think i will revisit it sometime (maybe in a year or two), it goes in the 'to sell' pile.
after the costs it ususally comes out to the price of a rental, with the plus that i get to watch it at my convienence and mood.

i hate that i tie up so much reall money in things that just sit on the shelf, but on the other hand, it's nice to go thru the shelves and find something completely fresh and unwatched.
makes it doubly enjoyable sometimes.

 

[Frank@N]

Like Ron, I've abandoned networks and cable (except for CNN).

But I can still only watch about 5 movies a week.

With 120 movies to go, I'm pretty much set for the rest of the year.