anyone else's DVD purchasing habits in decline?
 

After buying Napoleon Dynamite for 6 dollars at best buy, I can't think of the last DVD I bought.

I used to buy them much more regularly, but every week I check the "new releases" here, I'm like ... nope, don't want any of that.

Is everything out now? (except for howard the duck)

all that's left are TV shows, I think.

No, but then again I only but what I like to watch repeatedly.

I wish. I'm steadily purchasing more than I ever have. Most of my purchases are not new releases, but mostly older films or TV shows.

No. I like to buy most new purchases.

Mine have been in rapid decline. It may be because I am running out of room to store them all in my tiny apartment (600). It may be that I am waiting for the format war to cool down some, or that I havent been able to watch movies like I used to.

I've basically come to a complete stop. There are no new releases that I see myself needing (Pink Floyd - Pulse being the lone exception), and I picked up the 98% of the rest of my "To Buy" queue during the DDD sale. Stick a fork in me, I'm done :)

Mine are definitely in decline... mostly double-dips and very obscure stuff. A few TV shows that are still finishing up.

Instead of looking forward to major titles, I'm ordering things like:
Flash Gordon: Animated Series
The Noah
Olympia
Radioland Murders double-dip
Who Am I This Time?
etc.

Good stuff that I'm glad to finally get in the collection. But not exactly "must see TV". ;)

I think the market is just saturated. The good news is that the next few years will save me some $$$, and also give the studios incentive to revisit past mediocre editions and scrape the bottom of the barrel for some *really* obscure stuff.

I suppose by the time things trickle down to practically nothing, I'll have an HD-DVD player, so I can start over again...

For me it's coming to the point that I've more or less got every DVD I've wanted to. Nearly every great movie, and my favorite TV shows I all own now. Even on DVDAf, I only have a handeful of movies and series that are on my wishlist, and most are just too pricey for me to buy right now.

So, I'd say mine have definately decreased.

That and the fact that nothing good has come in theaters lately.

I think my slow down is due to the newer format and the lack of quality movies coming out. A while back I was buying alot but they were mostly older movies I liked.

I stopped buying dvd's about 6 month's ago, after steadily purchasing 3-4 a week for about 6 years.

The logic was that the new format (whichever one) would obsolete standard dvd, and I would be burned, like I was with laserdisc (after recently having sold my $4000 LD collection on Ebay for $99).

Then, about 8 weeks ago, I was out trying to buy a copy of Barfly and found that the only dvd's available were going for 80 bucks on Ebay, and it hit me;

This might be the most important time to go out and start buying up dvd's of my favorite films. I have been buying 10-20 a week since April.

Why?

Because the Studios are going to start OOP'ing their old dvd's in favor of HD (even if that only means waiting out the format war) , and shelf space at Best Buy is going to get even tighter than it is already, and no one want's to get stuck holding inventory.

I'm not buying any copies of Star Wars, or Terminator 2 or Casablanca. Those films will ALWAYS be available.

But how long will it take for Barfly to get released in HD? Five years? Ten? Will there even be dvd's by then?

I just bought the unrated director's cut of Basic Instinct (admittedly not the greatest film) because most studios are only releasing the R rated theatrical versions in HD.

Today, I'm going over to Borders to see if they have any copies of Bound left (did you know THAT one is now OOP?) The dvd is Unrated AND has a commentary track from the now notoriously reclusive Wachowski Brothers. This will be a collectable if they never make another film.

Anyway, to the original poster's question, (Is everything out now?) I think I read somewhere that less than 20% of all the films ever made have found their way to video. So, not even close.

Yeah, I've reached the point where I already own most of the movies I like. If anything, I've been selling off discs I don't think I need. Most of my purchases now are esoteric foreign films or double dips (for new transfers).

It's hard to say for sure whether my DVD purchasing is on the decline or not. It certainly isn't on the rise. I guess the reason it is difficult to say whether or not it is wanning is because I am finding that my tastes are changing as I get older, and even if they weren't, there would still always be new films to discover. Because of that, I've never thought that 'everything is already out'.

With that being said, there are a lot of factors at play which could be construed as my DVD buying slowing down. One is renting more and blind-buying less. Another is that my collection is in a sort of self-canibalization mode. As I await the right time to get involved with HD home video, I am taking this time to go through my collection and sell off those titles that I no longer want to afford upgraded and new 'must-haves' I discover along the way, all while saving for a Blu-Ray and/or HD DVD player.

Mine has declined, but only for monetary reasons (a baby can do that to you)
I was never really a new-releases-every-week buyer, but I would do a columbia house enrollment every couple/few months to catch up on DVDs. Now, I don't really have the money for that, so I'm just holding out for when my fiancee start's working again so I will have a little spending money :)

A little. Mostly because there isn't that much new stuff coming out I want. I'm not holding out for HD or anything. I'm probably averaging around 2-3 new movie/tv dvds a month, and in addition I still buy quite a few wrestling titles (especially ROH stuff). I also do the occasional Columbia House enrollment.

Most of my purchases have been TV on dvd as of late. And most of that is stuff that probably won't see HD for many years, ie. Doogie Howser, Fresh Prince, etc.. Besides that, when i look at the New release movies that are coming out, nothing jumps out to me as "Have to have." For example, I really want the V for Vendetta 2-disk but i'm beginning to think that i will end up holding out for HD for that. But the TV stuff i can buy without feeling too bad about it because of how cheap some of them are or the fact that they won't be released again for quite awhile.

On the flipside, if i were just starting to collect DVD's now, i would be going crazy buying up used/new stuff because the prices are pretty damn cheap and people are starting to unload some of their collection for the HD stuff.

Very much so. In part because most of the catalog releases are out now, and in part for more personal reasons--like not wanting to add more shelf space, and having less spending money than a few years back.

I still buy a lot of dvds, but most of them are TV shows now. Some decent sales on older cartoons, and trying to complete the series I never found used have been filling in for newer ones that i used to buy...

Buying DVDs for later re-sale is a very risky investment. You are much better off by putting your money in a savings account or the market. Barfly is an exception to the appreciation rules, since it was a small film from the 80's that only grossed $3 million and probably only had a limited DVD run. Basic Instinct on the other hand has had multiple editions on VHS, Laserdisc, and DVD and has sold millions of copies, so there's never going to be a shortage. It's also shown fairly regularly on TV since it was a big hit. You can't say the same about Barfly. Even Bound has probably had a decent DVD run thanks to its Matrix connection and the fact that it has long been a budget title for under $10.

As a Half.com seller, I've seen most of my collection go for only a few bucks a disc. Movies that will sell for over $20 are extremely rare nowadays.

This appears to only be happening with Blu-ray. They're possibly doing it because Blu-ray discs don't have the space to put on the extended versions. I say this because the single layer Blu-ray discs can't even fit the extras from the SD versions. Plus the PQ is really not very good. The current crop of Blu-ray discs are ripe for the old double dip right out of the gate. I think they're saving the "uncut" versions for this planned double dip.

HD DVD doesn't appear to be having the same trouble: all the extras are being ported over and Doom was released as the uncut version. Lethal Weapon was released in theatrical form, though, and according to reviews it looks like it needs remastering anyway.

A few months ago, I stopped buying any DVDs. I may pick up certain TV show sets still. However, I can't stand watching SD DVDs anymore because the quality is so bad after you've seen the HD DVD version. I could see flaws before, but after watching HD DVD and seeing NONE it is hard to go back.

I would like to think my spending has gone down but I think it's more like I purchase less on the new movie front and more on the used DVD market. But the big purchases, the box sets, still happen twice a month. I'm working on a lot of season sets and collection sets (Alfred Hitchcock, Bogart, Noir) that sort of thing. I'm not even thinking about HD or Blu-ray.

Major decline for me, I am just buying re-releases that I don't have yet and that I want. I will start buying new releases when the format war cools off. By that time, they probably will be re-releasing some HD titles that I want with additional features.

I would say I'm slowing down because nothing is really tempting, though I do like the re-releases of older titles i.e. Tora! Tora! Tora!. Making me appriciate older films more than I used to.

Myself I was buying alot of tv show box sets but I finally realized I was only watching them once and that was it. So I have slowed way down on tv shows and I am being very picky about any blind buys, so yes I have slowed way down in all areas of dvd's..

My spending has declined from about the beginning of this year. I think that it's mostly because of both the format war and just being content with what I have. I have gone down to about 4-5 DVDs a month from maybe triple that?

Agreed. I'm talking about personal consumption here. But as long as we're talking about investments, I've been blind-buying dvd's without any worry about whether I'll like them or not. Films like Almodovar's Live Flesh and Eric Schaffer's The Fall (both recently OOP). They only cost me 10 bucks, and if I hate them, I can get 3 times that much back on Ebay (not that that's my goal, but I feel protected).

This was absolutely not the case with Laserdisc, where I was routinely paying $50 per disc.... ugh.

Anyway, it took ten years for cult films like The Little Girl Who Lives Down The Lane and Magic to show up on dvd. By the time they get to HD (never?), there will be another new format.