A Slice of “Videoheaven”

Independent filmmaker Alex Ross Perry spent the last decade working on an incredibly ambitious project. In between making arthouse films like “Listen Up Philip” with Jason Schwarzman and “Her Smell” with Elizabeth Moss, he’s been chipping away at something epic.

“Videoheaven” is a 3-hour documentary/video essay about the history of video stores from their origins in the early ‘80s through their decline in the 2000s. What’s unique about his film is it’s constructed entirely of scenes from hundreds of movies, TV shows, and commercials set in video stores, with narration provided by Maya Hawke.

The concept is similar to 2003’s “Los Angeles Plays Itself,” a documentary about LA told through its use as a location in movies. The difference is Los Angeles is still here, while video stores are mostly gone, their memory preserved in amber through these movies and shows.

The film is cut into multiple segments, which is helpful for pacing. These cover the birth of video stores, the stereotype of know-it-all employees, their dominance in the ‘90s, and their eventual decline. It’s incredible to see how many sitcoms in the ‘90s used video stores as settings for episodes, with countless jokes about the taboo “back rooms.”

The narration is very academic, feeling at times like an overachieving college project. For some that will be a turnoff, but for someone who grew up going to video stores it felt like evidence for the value of these lost places that’s too often written off as nostalgia.

“Videoheaven” made me remember the video stores of my youth in Emporium. I’d pick out movies at Olivett’s and Market Basket while grocery shopping with my family. I learned about low budget horror films at the Happy Shack and Video Shack (funny we had two shacks). I’d go to Take Two Video when a new movie poster went up and ask if I could write my name and number on the back so I could have it when they took it down. Even Sheetz rented movies.

Video stores are mostly gone, outside of a handful of independent stores scattered across the country. “Videoheaven” is a memorial to something we lost, but never properly mourned.

Rating: 8/10

“Videoheaven” is now available to stream on the Criterion Channel.