Streaming is the new VHS: Film on TV with Brian Truitt

On today's episode of the 5 Things podcast:

Once upon a time, VHS reigned supreme. You could order them in the mail and for the first time watch older movies in your home when you wanted, sort of the predecessor to 'on demand.'

USA TODAY film critic, Brian Truitt said, "the arrival of the VCR was a godsend to a generation of film fans," as it opened the door to accessing movies like nothing else had at the time.

Then DVD's took over and reigned for about a decade or so until they too fell from the top. Today, DVD's are an after thought as streaming has taken over as king of the home viewing world.

Gone are the days of driving to a video store to rent a movie, now movies are at our fingertips and stored in the cloud as opposed to taking up space on a shelf.

5 Things Sunday host, James Brown sat down with Truitt (and his dogs Moxie and Buttercup) to talk about what the impact is of streaming, especially when it comes to overlooked movies. The dogs chime in now and then with their thoughts in the form of snoring.

For more on this topic, read:

Streaming is the new VHS. Why we still encounter the best movies of our life on home video.

Yes! Columbia house still exists two DVDs for 9.99

Brian Recommends Tubi, he calls it the new Blockbuster. He recommends Hot Take: The Depp/Heard Trial

Follow James Brown and Brian Truitt on Twitter.

If you have a comment about the show or a question or topic you'd like us to discuss, send James Brown an email at jabrown@usatoday.com or podcasts@usatoday.com. You can also leave him a voicemail at 585-484-0339. We might have you on the show.

More: True crime, in-depth interviews and more USA TODAY podcasts right here.

Hit play on the player above to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript below. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

James Brown: Hello and welcome to Five Things. I'm James Brown. It's Sunday, October 9th, 2022. Go Bills. Every week we take a question, idea, or concept and go deep. If there's something you'd like us to look into or just want to say hello, you could always email me at jabrown@usatoday.com or at podcast@usatoday.com. You can also find me anywhere on social media at James Brown TV. We also have a voicemail line 585-484-0339. I love reading and listening to all of your messages.

When I was a kid back in the '90s, my mom, like so many adults in that time, ordered VHS tapes in the mail. I think it was Columbia House that sold them like they were going out of style. I watched Boyz n the Hood, The Lion King, Rising Sun, White Men Can't Jump, Braveheart, Dances with Wolves at home on our old, heavy, blocky two TV. At the turn of the century, I was in high school. It was a weird period for this style of media. VHS tapes were still common, but they were falling out of style. They were battling DVDs for supremacy. Tapes lost of course, DVDs would reign supreme for about a decade until they too fell.

We cover the TV side of this equation with USA Today TV Critic Kelly Lawler in last Sunday's episode. Today we look at the movie side of things with USA Today Film Critic Brian Truitt, who says the impact of streaming on overlooked movies in particular is a lot it was when VHS tapes became common.

Brian, am I on the right track?

Brian Truitt: Pretty much. I mean, I wrote a story that pretty much said streaming is the new VHS because it was that much of an impact in all of our lives. I mean, I'm back farther than you, where I remember getting our first VCR and, oh God, I must've been six or seven, and getting that VCR... and my dad bought it. I mean, he didn't buy it for me, I mean, he bought it for himself because I was just six year old. But because we got it home and all of a sudden... And we had had Super TV, we had tried that. That was weird. That lasted a couple months, I think.

But we got this thing home and we didn't know what it did. No one really knew what it did. I mean, we were taping horror movies and TV shows on this thing, and then we found out, oh, my God, there's a video store that rents movies, and mind-blown because that was like, I didn't really watch movies until that. All of a sudden, every movie you'd ever want that we couldn't see in the theater... Obviously we were going to theaters for new movies and stuff, but older movies and just really random things, the Michael Jackson Thriller home video, you could go and rent that, the making of Thriller, you could go rent these movies.

I was right there at a formative age in the coming of the VCR and how much that blew the doors wide open. And it's what's happened with streaming. Streaming now gives us all a window into just so many more movies and so many more TV shows and so many more everything. Everything we'd ever want is just a couple clicks away. And if you're on Tubi, it's free. Apple TV, you might need your Apple ID to log into or a Vudu account or all these things. But they're all just a couple minutes away. You don't have to go anywhere. You don't have to go to a video store and deal with the nerdy rental clerk or anything. It's really interesting to see, having lived through both those eras, how really similar they are.

James Brown: There's so much I'd like to pull apart there, but before I even pull apart anything, you said something that stomped me, something that I had never ever heard of before in my life. What the hell is Super TV?

Brian Truitt: So we didn't have cable, we round the sticks. There was this thing called Super TV, apart from when we had it for a few months, I'd never heard of it again, but it was like an antenna, it was a satellite thing. I think it was a satellite thing. So the big thing with that was that was the only way you watch Star Wars. VCRs were still really new and there was no Star Wars video cassettes. The only way you were going to see that is through theatrical releases and maybe if you had a laser player, I think. Laser disc, we didn't have that.

But the Super TV thing, it was subscription, a little box thing that they put on your TV. And the big thing with that was you got to watch Star Wars. I don't remember watching anything else other than the time... I think we watched Star Wars one time with that and then soon after that I believe we got our first VCR and then we were off on that course for forever.

James Brown: But it was like a proto subscription?

Brian Truitt: Yeah. It was really weird. It was this weird antenna and there was knobs and stuff. And I couldn't remember working it. I don't remember that much about it, but I remember we didn't have it for very long, but it was a kind of a big deal when we got it.

James Brown: You called the arrival of the VCR a godsend to a generation of film fans. Obviously you described a bit of that in your own background. I'd like to go into that a bit deeper. Was there a particular tape that you picked up and was like, this is... I'm sold?

Brian Truitt: Again, I was young, I was six or seven. Again, we didn't get to video store first. We first started just taping stuff off the TV, and I remember my dad wanted to tape The Howling. It was watered down. It wasn't the R rated Howling which we'd rent or anything, but it was the TV version. We taped that and The New Show, which was while Sarah Live, I think left or got canceled for a little bit and The New Show replaced it a little bit. I can't remember the specifics, but The New Show had Eugene Levy and some Canadian comedians and stuff.

James Brown: SCTV?

Brian Truitt: Yeah, it was some of those, some of them, but it was like a prime time NBC thing, it was on at 9:00 or 10 o'clock at night. Again, it lasted very quickly before it was canceled. Then we got to the video store and that was like... I remember renting He-Man video cassettes, The Thriller, the Thriller music video, that was a big deal. Just really random things.

The thing that really stuck out with me and probably get my dad in trouble, but a few years later, my dad, he couldn't take me to R-rated movies or anything in the theater, but he'd rent R-rated movies, like Revenge of the Nerds and things like this. And after a while, he was just like... I pestered him enough where I was like... He let me see something. Again, he's like, if there was naked people, I'd have to hide my eyes or horror movies.

I remember A Nightmare on Elm Street that way and so many Nightmare on Elm Streets and a lot of R-rated horror movies he'd let me watch, which my mom probably got a little upset about. But we didn't tell her about a lot of them, honestly. If things got too graphic, hide my eyes and stuff or don't look at the naked people. But it bonded me and my dad in a way because it was like, he knew I really liked movies and it was something we could share together. It was the forbidden fruit of R-rated movies.

James Brown: And now, well today, kids don't really need permission. They don't have anyone watching them while they're consuming most of their media. Is this worrisome at all?

Brian Truitt: Me and my wife, we make sure of what our... Our daughter is 10. She's watched Die Hard. I let her watch Die Hard. We watched it together. She wasn't that crazy about it unfortunately. But she liked it when everybody started cussing. That was pretty funny for her. But it's a different generation now. We're very cognizant of what she watches, even though it is a Wild Wild West of the internet and anything. If she goes on our Apple TV and starts scrolling around, she can find all kinds of things that we don't have the parental locks on for. But we make sure we watch what she watches and we know what she watches.

But I think that was the thing that was with my dad because he made sure he knew what I was watching because he watched it with me, and if I had any questions, I would be able to ask him about it, or anything kind of adult related or things like that. He trusted me and he knew that I could handle it. It wasn't like I was going to go sneak around behind his back and watch things that I shouldn't have and things like that. It was an understanding of, "If you want to watch these things, we can watch it together."

Instead of getting into trouble and doing things I shouldn't be doing, it was an understanding of, If you want to watch these things, we should watch it together, but don't watch it by yourself." So for me, it was... Again, I wasn't watching these things when I was six. This is more like seven, eight, nine, as I was maturing and everything. And I mean, I was reading Stephen King books when I was seven or eight, so that drew my mom crazy more than the R-rated already movies, I think that...

James Brown: Do you think your 10-year-old daughter will know the difference between film and TV?

Brian Truitt: Hey man, that is a good question. I don't know. That's a good question. I don't know if I've ever asked her. I think she understands. I think she understands movies and what dad does for a living and what... I've taken her to screens and stuff. So I think she understands movies, because movies are about two hours and when I say, "Okay, we're going to watch this movie." She will ask me how long it is. I don't know if it's because how many hours until she gets to do something else or what, but she understands that movie's about 90 minutes to a couple hours.

But if we're watching a Strangers Things episode or she's watching Teen Titans or something, Stranger Things will go... an episode will run two hours. So that might break her brain a little bit. But I think she understands the TV concept of something that's 30 minutes or an hour compared to when I say, "Okay, we're going to go watch a movie. She does understand that that is a two-hour thing, a self-contained thing where there might be a sequel, there might not, but it's like, "I'm going to go watch this thing for two hours."

James Brown: The line seems very blurry today.

Brian Truitt: For sure. And that's why it's a good question because for other kids and stuff, I'm not sure if they're going to know the difference because like you said, it is so blurry, and Stranger Things, some of those episodes are two hours, two and a half hours, 90 minutes. So they really test what we think of as the TV and movie models. I think for sure this generation's going to really wonder what's TV, what's movies, and it might just become this kind of nebulous thing where it's just like, it's just entertainment and some of it is self-contained, some of it Is just endless six hour movie if you want to binge it or something.

James Brown: From your perspective, just professionally, critically, is the blur a positive? Can you appraise it at all?

Brian Truitt: I don't know. I don't know if it's a positive or negative. I know a lot of people... Kelly, I think is bothered by this. I mean, I think she's kind of a hardcore TV person where she likes a procedural or she likes the TV model of the not six hour TV movies kind of thing. I don't really mind it as much. I think if it's entertaining, it's entertaining. If it sucks, it sucks. Certain things I like to binge, with TV shows, I would rather watch three or four of them at a time than one of them every week. I mean, I've gotten into that kind of Netflix mode and when I watch something, I sit down and watch more than one episode of it unless it's something I really like, then I'll do the weekly thing. But I do tend to binge more with TV shows and I do just kind of weekly one-off watching.

But I don't think either of them is bad, I think everything's a case-by-case basis. Certain things go weekly, I wish they went more binge mode. Certain things are binge mode and I wish were probably more weekly. Everything's a little different. Good stories are good stories, bad stories are still bad stories. Just take it for what it is and then find what you like and go from there. Now I'm not a stickler for the old TV model or the old movie model. I think things are changing and I'm able to adapt pretty much to whatever happens.

James Brown: Has the shift towards streaming changed the nature of movies?

Brian Truitt: Oh, for sure. For sure. Pre-pandemic, streaming, it was still looked down upon. Going back to direct-to-video, VHS movies and stuff, you knew that was bad, you knew Lion King II and a half probably was not as good as The Lion King. Before watching it, you probably knew it's probably not as good. So there is still that mindset and it's still... Even though now that we're... We're still in the pandemic, but we've gotten to the point where people have gone back to theaters.

I love the fact of things like Halloween Ends, when it's in theaters and on Peacock, because even though it's still... I don't mind going back to the theater, I'll wear my mask and it's totally fine. I'd rather watch a movie at home. Going and schlepping to a theater, having to deal with other people sometimes when I don't want to deal with other people. I would rather just watch a movie at home more often than not. So I like the fact of, we reached a point where... Some studios have embraced that of just like, "We know people want to watch things at home and we're going to deliver them where people are. We're going to deliver them in theaters, we're going to deliver them on streaming.

And there isn't that automatic assumption, I think for most people that now if something's on streaming, it's going to be bad. I think in Hollywood, I think there's still some corners of things have to be in the theater or they're not going to make any money. Things have to be in the theater or they're going to look down upon, we need that box office, blah, blah, blah, blah. But I think it's a very old school mentality and Hollywood's like a dinosaur. I mean, it takes them forever to do anything.

But I like Netflix and Apple TV+, they understand the audience of now, they understand that families don't always go to the theaters like they used to, people don't go on movie dates like they used to. They still do sometimes. They'll go see Top Gun and they'll go see a Marvel movie and they'll probably go see the Avatar sequel. They won't go see some of these other movies that aren't kind of must sees in theaters. Those are the kind of movies that should play on VOD or a streaming service because they'll get more eyes on them that way. There's going to be some movies that in the theater that just will tank because it's just... they're not bad movies, but just people aren't going to go to a theater to see them, they're fine to watch at home on TV.

People today are very different than they were pre-pandemic. They've now given us a thing where we can rely now on our devices to entertain us more than ever before. And there's a lot more stuff out there than ever before. And the smart studios in Hollywood are delivering where the people are and are not just putting them in theaters. That's the one good thing about this pandemic I feel, is the fact of, I can watch a good movie wherever. I can find a good movie on Netflix, I can find a good movie on Apple TV+, I can find good movie at a theater. I can find good movies wherever I am, at the moment, wherever I want to go, I can find something good. And I think that's a positive. And it was working its way toward that pre-pandemic and the pandemic just [inaudible 00:19:04].

James Brown: Any famous [inaudible 00:19:05] Brian?

Brian Truitt: ... in terms of that. Go see Good movie. If you're old like me and want that, going to the video rental store and finding something weird feeling, go to Tubi because I think most of their stuff is free. Because they have so much random stuff. It is the most random website of things. But it really captures that old, "I'm going to the video rental store, I do not know what I want to watch, but I want to watch something. They all have all these tabs for different genres. You pull up action and all of a sudden you have, "Oh, would you like to watch Deja Vu, Denzel Washington?" It's right there. They're all covers of old video rental. Gone to 60 Seconds? Sure. Blade? Okay. But it's all these random movies are all right there. Red Dawn, the original Red Dawn, "Would you like to watch the original Red Dawn?"

But they're in a little thing where it's like all the video cassettes are lined up together and you can watch whatever cover looks crazy, whatever cover looks cool, it's got something for you. And I like that. Whereas if I don't know what I want to watch and I want to watch something I'd never seen before, just go to Tubi and they'll have some random thing that you probably... Some of it, you've heard of, some of it is probably some weird thing that maybe just went to video, but it looks kind of fun. That's the closest thing to that old school video rental experience you're going to find.

James Brown: You heard it here first, Tubi is the new blockbuster.

Brian Truitt: Streaming is the new VHS, Tubi is the new Eros or... Yeah, Tubi is the new Eros of blockbuster or Hollywood video.

James Brown: Brian Truitt, thank you for joining me as always.

Brian Truitt: Of course, always love talking to you.

James Brown: If you liked the show, write us a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening. And do me a favor, share it with a friend. What do you think of the show and how is the rise of streaming impacted how you view movies? Email me at jabrown@usatoday.com or leave me a message at 585-484-0339. We might have you on the show. Thanks to Brian Truitt for joining me and to Alexis Gustin for our production assistance. Taylor Wilson will be back tomorrow morning.

For all of us at USA Today, thanks for listening. I'm James Brown, and as always, be well.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Streaming is the new VHS: Film on TV with Brian Truitt-5 Things Podcast