Authenticity Watch: VHS

From - where else -- the NYT.

Technological slumming -- check:

“You just don’t get the same feeling in a pristine print of a DVD,” Mr. Kinem said. “With VHS it’s like I’m experiencing an old grind-house movie theater. I would never watch them on a computer.”

Old-timey small-town slow-ism -- check, check, check:

“VHS represents a period when you could walk into a mom-and-pop video store, and what you could rent was limited to what was right in front of you,” Ms. Davis said. “There were these amazing illustrations on the big boxes, and no one had any idea what the movie was. You were taking a gamble. It’s the opposite of instant gratification.”

Nostalgia for manual labour -- check.

“VHS is cumbersome,” said Mr. Husney (who was creative director of Intervision before moving to Drafthouse). “You have to maintain it. It has to fit on a shelf. You may have to dust it off. But you also get to interact with a piece of art on a personal level.”

Thanks to Simon Cott.