Old man: "I'm so sick of that damn widescreen crap! I wish they'd just get over it already!"

"Quick! Tackle that bald guy! He's got 10 copies of the unreleased Ed Wood DVD. For the LOVE OF GOD....... STOP HIM!!!!!"

At least he did not recommend Knockaround Guys (Con Air was pretty good).

Last week in the new release section at Walmart:

J6P: "Ah... Don't you have Open Range in full screen?"

New department manager: "Nah... but I saw it in a theater and it was widescreen there, too... so it's not so bad."

When DVD was first being introduced, a friend and I were asking about how the players did still-frames as we were used to the days of CAV vs CLV laser discs.

The sales rep, honest to God, said "Well, maybe DVD doesn't use frames."

Two instances:

The first one was about six years ago, I was in a Wal-Mart in, I think, Newton, Kansas. (It's important that it was in Kansas.)

This father and his son, who looked about seven, were paying for a video game in the electronics department. The kid had a little wallet, looked like he'd gotten money for his birthday or something. I'm in line behind them.

The video game was something like $39.99, and the kid gives the old man at the register forty dollars. The old man tells the kid that he needs more money, because Bill Clinton needs his cut. The kid looks sort of puzzled, and the old man asks the little boy if he likes Bill Clinton, and the kid shakes his head "no" and the dad and old man both laugh.

At that point, I interrupt them (I'm in a hurry and these jack-offs are wasting my time, but clerk/customer acquaintance chit-chats are another rant) and say that they're wrong. The federal government doesn't have the power to levy sales taxes, so Bill Clinton has nothing to do with sales taxes, and that those are set by the states. And that it would be more accurate to say that "Bill Graves" needs his cut. (Bill Graves was the governor of Kansas at the time.) The old man and the dad gave me dirty looks.

The second one was also in a Wal-Mart (notice a pattern?). This was last Christmas, and I walk into the DVD section. I see a blue vest helping an old pinch-faced, blue-haired lady. I don't pay any attention to them at first, but I see the kid pick up a copy of "Bruce Almighty," and he commences to tell her what it's about. Presumably, she was looking for a Christmas gift for someone. After the kid explains the movie to the old lady, she says "I don't like that. I don't like that witchcraft stuff." The kid then tells her that it wasn't witchcraft, and that God gives Jim Carrey his powers, and that it was really funny. She says, "It still sounds like witchcraft." At that point, I was starting to crack up, and walked away. I very nearly picked up a Buffy the Vampire Season Five, handed it to her, and told her to get them that, because there weren't any witches in it. Or lesbians, or anything like that.

i was working at blockbuster around the time when the 1st harry potter came and lotr came out.

customer 1: Whats lord of the rings?
customer 2: Its kinda like harry potter

if it wasnt a buisy friday night i would have been on the ground laughing

Many years ago, I was in the Tower Records at Lincoln Center in NYC. The customer in line in front of me was buying Ken Russel's GOTHIC on laserdisc. The clerk said to him "Have you seen this movie?". He answered "Yes". SHe then said "And you're BUYING it??????"

Lost in Translation is out on DVD and still in the movie theaters.

Man, that is perfect.

And it is already in the $5 bin at Wal-Mart. .

A colleague of mine was after a new tv but discovered that some of his dvds would still have black bars on them, even on a widescreen tv.

"Until they sort out whether to use 2.35 or 16:9, I'll stick with fullscreen".

Where he bought a 29" 4:3 tv in the UK, I don't know.

but won't these idiots that buy foolscreen with 16x9 tv's have black bars on the sides?

No, they just use the TV's 4x3 stretch mode like they use with regular cable broadcasts. No problem, now it fills the screen and they're happy. Yes it will look like crap but they probably won't care, it looks just like TV they normally watch.

Not sure how stupid this is, but back in 1991 while browsing at a Sam Goody's store, a customer goes up to one of those teenage employees. He asks, "Excuse me, but do you sell laserdiscs?" The teen looks a little confused for a second, and responds, "Why, sure." And he makes a gesture with his arm to point out all the CDs the store has. The customer then has to explain that laserdiscs are movies on disc format, and the teen is even more confused. "Oh. I didn't know you could watch movies on those things," he says.

Gotta love newbies.

Back when the Pacino/Williams Insomnia came out I went into a Hollywood Video.

Me: Do you have the Criterion "Insomnia" DVD?
CSR: Uh, no, that's still playing at the movies.
Me: No, I'm talking about the original. The one in theaters is a remake.
CSR: It is? [Without looking] Uh, no, we don't have that.

How come I get the reverse-dumb CSRs?

LOL !! I love it !!

"VHS is better."

In Wal-Mart -

Redneck holding Death Wish 4/5 DVD set says to clerk:

"Is this full-screen or wide-screen?"

Clerk: "Looks like full-screen to me."

Me, waiting in line behind Redneck: "Did you know that most full-screen discs are altered from their original aspect ratios?"

Redneck: "Look, man. I don't care about that. I want full-screen DVD's because I've got a full-screen TV!"

A guy asking for THE MAN WHO WASN'T THERE in color isn't as absurd as you think. The film was shot in color, and simply released in black and white. The studio insisted they shoot in color because the Asian market would demand it.

The color version is on DVD in Region 3. I guess they were right!

MWWT in color...thats just terrible!

Weren't you taught to not cast pearls before swine?



That's not stupid. Said the right way, it can be brilliant. I just might have to use that!

One of the stupidest things I have ever heard was a customer saw movies marked off 25% and held up a 9.99 video and asked, "Does the 25% off make this five dollars?" Dude was serious too.

One time in Best Buy (note that most of these stories occur in Wal Marts or Best Buys!) I over heard two ladies talking, trying to figure out what this "new fangled" widescreen DVDs were for. "What are those for?" asks one of them. "I think they are for people who own widescreen TVs."

It amazes me when people never realize there were actually widescreen VHS tapes in the 80s. I have told people about this and they are all surprised and like, "REALLY?" Yeah, I had to go to a segregated section of a specialty store to get them, but they were out there.

I didn't know this! I'll need to check it out here.

OHHHHH NAVY SEALS

That's awesome! I'm gonna use that line if I ever work cashier. Customer hands me 2 Fast 2 Furious
Me: Have you seen this movie?
Customer: Yep
Me: And you're buying it?

That's great.