After more than 30 years of going to the local video store, the last one in my home town, a Family Video, is closing down. Back in the 1980s, there were at least four in my small town of 7,000, each one a different company (one was a Video Connection, another was owned by the local supermarket, and the fourth, as far as I know, was an independent stand-alone operation. We never had a Blockbuster, though there was one in the next town ten miles over that I rented from often). This is my haul from their going-out-of-business sale:

War of the Worlds (1953)

Officer Downe (2016, Kim Coates)

Jason X (Jason of Friday the 13th in Space)

Exposed (2015, a little of Keanu Reeves, a bigger role for Ana De Armas, who only speaks her native Spanish in this very weird movie)

Rogue One (Star Wars; in my opinion, the darkest of the SW franchise next to Empire Strikes Back, though RO is overlong in the beginning)

Dragged Across Concrete (Mel Gibson and Vince Vaughn, as gritty and nihilistic as ever)

Escape From New York (the first 20 minutes of this movie is the best part, from Donald Pleasance at the start to the laughing man in NYC)

The Family Video in my town officially closes on January 22, 2021. I really enjoyed going there . . . sadly, in this streaming/virtual future we now live in-- where human contact is seldom necessary or even required for most of life's activities --an era has come to an end.

(Full disclosure: I've never seen "Clerks"-- but I've heard the gist of its plot, and figured this board was as good as any to leave a video store elegy).