orangerunner

That was my first disc as well. A buddy bought it for my birthday in 1998.

I didn't even own a DVD player until my birthday in 2003!

I think I replaced at some point with the Criterion Collection version that was 16:9 anamorphic.

davidh777

I got Lost in Space, Devil's Advocate, Lethal Weapon 4, and something else (not one of the other listed selections). Devil's Advocate is probably the only one I watched.

Devil's Advocate was a cardboard snapcase, but Lost in Space was a keepcase because it was a New Line Platinum series.

Trevor

I'm pretty sure I've never watched that free copy of Lost in Space, or the film at all. Not completely disinclined to watch it, but there always seem to be better choices on what to do.

davidh777

It's not impossible that I saw it in theaters, and I kind of had the hots for Heather Graham at the time. It might've had some cool effects.

But no, with your backlog, you have no reason to ever watch it, not even if you're still saving the best for last.

morriscroy

Another amusing "unreferenced material" case, was the jumping man on older Universal released dvds.

mythmaker18

mine was (I think) Star Trek: The Motion Picture Director's Edition, which would have been 2001.

I was a little late to the DVD party, mainly because I was waiting for the whole region-free thing to get sorted out. My first player was a Sampo.

I haven't watched that DVD in years.

Incidentally, Star Trek: The Motion Picture Special Longer Version was the first VHS tape I ever bought.

morriscroy

Similar sentiments here too.

Though I waited an extremely long time for a completely different reason. After my first dvd purchase turned out to be defective, I was extremely reluctant to purchase any further dvds at the time (circa late-1990s). In the end, I didn't start collecting dvds until sometime in 2011.

With that being said, my other initial dvd purchases were titles that I was willing to watch through from beginning to end, and all the special features, trailers, ads, etc ... Stuff like Cheech and Chong, Total Recall, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, etc ...

Without knowing any easy ways to check dvd discs for random bad sectors due to manufacturing defects, for a long time I was very reluctant to purchase any dvd discs that I was not willing to watch through immediately. (Even titles that were $5 or less). At the time when I first purchased a computer with a dvdr drive (circa early-2000s), I tried checking my movie dvd discs by copying the *.vob files. But unfortunately, the computer just kept on returning a read error message and gave up repeatedly. (Later I found out this dvdr drive behavior was done deliberately by design in the dvd css encryption specification).

It wasn't until many years later, when I finally figured out how to check dvd discs for random bad sectors due to manufacturing defects in an easy fast systematic way.

Alan Smithee

That was from Billy Elliott, I think taken from one of the Universal "sizzle reels". I think some sort of copy protection was put in around that, but it never stopped anything I tried.

I used DVDShrink to find the hidden picture of disc producer Van Ling's dog on the 2nd Abyss disc- there was some secret way to get to it but it never got out.

morriscroy

DVDshrink was one of the first programs I tried using for checking my dvd discs for bad sectors, back in early 2011. After a few days, I came to the conclusion that unfortunately it wasn't very good for my intended purposes.

By then dvds with extreme basketcase drm schemes (in addition to generic css) were already widely available, which easily crashed DVDshrink. My first dvd disc with such extreme basketcase drm which I purchased at the time in early 2011, was the 2009 Star Trek reboot. Fortunately with some elbow grease, there were other programs which could check these basketcase drm dvd discs for random bad sectors due to manufacturing defects (as opposed to the deliberate bad sectors drm).

I was looking for a program which dumped out a lot of information about whether there are reading problems, and/or if the drive was producing garbage sectors when reading *.vob files (ie. sectors with all zeros or garbage random data which were not mpeg2 in any way). Unfortunately there exists some computer dvdr drives which returned garbage sectors while reading *.vob files, such as some dvdr drive models manufactured by LG etc ... (One becomes an expert on dvd drives designed by different manufacturers after awhile).


(These other particular "grey market" programs will remain unnamed).

mwbmis

1998. Impulse bought a DVD player and bought Boogie Nights, the Fugitive, and Das Boot with it. Haven't owned any of those discs in years, but I did watch my Blu-Ray copy of Boogie Nights in the last six months.

jjcool

Lethal Weapon 4 was the fifth one I got for free. I seem to remember that and Lost in Space being in snapper cases. I specifically remember many of the New Line Platinum Series being in snapper cases. Stuff like Lost in Space, Blade, and Austin Powers.

Norm de Plume

I don't know if it was the very first DVD, but one of the first I bought in '98 was an enjoyable low-budget "paranoia" thriller/drama called Stuart Bliss, which I blind-bought, back when I did such things.

kd5

I think, although I won't swear to it, that the first DVD I ever bought was Legend: Ultimate Edition. If it was, we've watched both versions numerous times. Still like the theatrical version best, with soundtrack by Tangerine Dream, Jon Anderson, and Bryan Ferry.

zoomgirl

I don't remember my first DVD...but I remember my first VHS purchase. Arsenic and Old Lace and I had ordered it from some Mom and Pop store and paid about $30 bucks for it. I have it on DVD and watch every Halloween.
NO idea what my first DVD purchase was...and that will haunt me.

meshershark

My first DVD was "The Matrix", which coincidentally I just watched yesterday. It holds up surprisingly well.

Gobear

When I bought my first player in 2000, it came with The Matrix as well, along with Pink Floyd: The Wall and True Stories (the Talking Heads movie). I dumped The Matrix DVD years ago during Best Buy's Upgrade and Save program, but I still have the other two.

flansered

Mallrats and the Criterion Robocop. Mallrats was a new release, so it had to be july 1999. Mallrats has been sold off and replaced with a blu-ray that is still unwatched.

Maz Kanata

Ever After, that Drew Barrymore Cinderella movie that I got for free though I can't remember why.

AGuyNamedMike

I'm pretty sure it was Contact. Haven't watched it in years, though.