I am 21 years old. I am therefore able to legally drink alcohol, vote in an election, get shot out of a circus cannon in 34 states and remember all the words to the theme song from MacGyver"" (trick question: there are none). I am also old enough to have had to purchase ""Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan"" in both VHS and DVD format, and I'm the last generation who will be able to make that claim.
This year, the DVD will celebrate its 10th year of release in the United States.
Sure, ""Sex, Lies and Digital Video Disc"" doesn't have the same ring to it, but the rise of DVD has given movie buffs more than we lost when we gave away the videocassette. No longer do we have to fear getting our tape ""eaten"" by an old, unreliable tape machine, nor do we have to deal with the declining picture quality when we play our favorite films to the point that we wear out the tape itself. With the addition of directors' commentaries, we can hear from Martin Scorsese on ""Goodfellas,"" or get that apology we've always wanted from Joel Schumacher for making ""Batman and Robin.""
We can now listen to our favorite movies' scores and voice tracks in stereo-quality sound, with a clearer picture than I ever saw with VHS. I was the first among my friends to get a DVD player, and even though the player was on the smallest television of my house, my friends and I were amazed by the picture, and the fact we could blast the volume on ""Tomorrow Never Dies"" and still get the crystal-clear sound we desired when we heard the soothing voice of Pierce Brosnan and the force of a 007-sized explosion.
But what I'll remember most about the DVD is how it brought so many great films to a generation who had never seen them before. Back in the VHS era, your average video rental store had the new releases and the classics. If a movie didn't fall into the category of ""Taxi Driver,"" ""Casablanca"" or ""The Godfather,"" good luck finding it at Blockbuster. The DVD changed that; because a DVD is so much cheaper to produce than a cassette was. Companies can buy the rights to more movies, rarer and older ones that never saw video release, and give film buffs the selection and variety they've never had before but have always deserved.
Now, wherever you can find movies, you're no longer stuck with whatever happens to be a new release - you can find everything from vintage John Wayne to early Hitchcock, from ""Nosferatu"" in its original German to ""Fletch."" The DVD made great-yet-unheralded films available whenever we wanted to see them.
Yes, DVDs have come a long way since the general populace mistook them for tiny laserdiscs 10 years ago. One day, when finding a VHS player is harder to find than talent in a Dane Cook movie, maybe my collection of tapes will mean more to me than they do now. But as for the moment, keep the nostalgia - I'll take my DVD collection any time, any place.
Of course, by that point I'll probably have to buy ""Wrath of Khan"" again.
We're sorry, but Brad is busy indulging in a DVD viewing marathon, complete with commentaries and deleted scenes. If you wish to reach him, e-mail him at"" boron@wisc.edu._ He'll hopefully get back to you as soon as he completes his viewing session._
