...that Billboard magazine started publishing its "Videocassette Top 40" chart.

The chart first appeared in the "Week ending November 17, 1979" issue. Here're the top-selling movies that first week, along with their tape distributors:

#1 Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Magnetic Video
#2 M*A*S*H, Magnetic Video
#3 The Sound of Music, Magnetic Video
#4 The African Queen, Magnetic Video
#5 The Godfather, Fotomat
#6 Saturday Night Fever, Fotomat
#7 The Graduate, Magnetic Video
#8 Patton, Magnetic Video
#9 Carnal Knowledge, Magnetic Video
#10 The Adventure of Sherlock Holmes' Smarter Brother, Magnetic Video
#11 The Godfather Part II, Fotomat
#12 The Man Who Would Be King, Allied Artists Video
#13 The Groove Tube, Meda
#14 The Poseidon Adventure, Magnetic Video
#15 Hello Dolly, Magnetic Video
#16 King Kong (1933), The Nostalgia Merchant
#17 Papillon, Allied Artists Video
#18 In Praise of Older Women, Magnetic Video
#19 Looking for Mr. Goodbar, Fotomat
#20 Night of the Living Dead, Meda
#21 The Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox, Magnetic Video
#22 The Making of Star Wars, Magnetic Video
#23 The Longest Day, Magnetic Video
#24 The King and I, Magnetic Video
#25 Amos and Andy--TV Series (All Shows), (no distributor listed)
#26 Von Ryan's Express, Magnetic Video
#27 The Day the Earth Stood Still, Magnetic Video
#28 King Kong (1977), Fotomat
#29 The Betsy, Allied Artists Video
#30 A Touch of Class, Magnetic Video
#31 El Cid, VCI/The Source
#32 Flesh Gordon, Meda
#33 Tora! Tora! Tora!, Magnetic Video
#34 Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry, Magnetic Video
#35 The Wild Geese, Allied Artists Video
#36 Murder on the Orient Express, Fotomat
#37 The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea, Magnetic Video
#38 Tunnelvision, Meda
#39 Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Magnetic Video
#40 The Young Lions, Magnetic Video

A couple of things to note:

• "Meda" had not yet changed its name to the more familiar "Media"
• Magnetic Video was the early powerhouse player, with over half of the films on the list--mainly because it had snagged contracts with 20th Century-Fox, Viacom, AND Avco Embassy
• Note that these are the top-SELLING videotapes; it was another several years before Billboard started its rental chart.

I remember renting Dirty Mary Crazy Larry on VHS back in 2003 just before it made its debut on DVD.

There was one old ma & pa video store that still had a copy.

I think the sales chart probably referred to copies of tapes that were sold to rental stores, not the ordinary Joe. I don't think too many people were buying $89.95 VHS tapes back in 1979 dollars.

The first VHS titles I remember seeing at the retail level was Jaws, Blues Brothers & Slapshot around 1985.

If I remember right, sell-through titles like Flashdance ($39.95) were only available as an order-on-demand from the local video stores and were not available through the standard retail outlets.

Very cool. Thanks for posting.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid was the only movie to be released on the Magnetic Video label AND on D-VHS! (Well, Alien was too, but the D-VHS was the 'director's cut' and the Magnetic Video was after they'd stopped using their original cover layout.)



I have a few of the other tapes listed there, but only one Fotomat tape and I've never found an Allied Artists one.

#16 King Kong (1933), The Nostalgia Merchant

This was the first pre-record I acquired, but I got it in 1983.