UNIVERSAL VIDEO: One of the Oregon Coast’s Last Video Stores

A Tour by D.M. Anderson & Lucy Anderson

The family and I love visiting the Oregon Coast, and are fortunate to live close enough that we can venture there a few times a year. More often than not, we choose the town of Seaside because the weather in this region is wildly unpredictable. So if it happens to be too cold, windy or rainy to hang out on the beach (about 50% of the time), there are lots of shops, arcades and an aquarium to justify the drive. There are also plenty of antique stores. I don’t know if this is true for coastal towns in other parts of the country, but in Oregon, antique stores and the beach go together like cops & doughnuts.

Off the beaten path of Seaside's main street leading to the beach is a place called Universal Video, which is kind of an antique store unto itself. In business since 1983, it’s one of the last remaining video rental stores on the Oregon Coast. Considering all the other attractions in town to grab people’s attention - and money - I don’t know how the place manages to remain in business. Perhaps it’s simply a labor of love for the two older gentlemen who greeted my daughter, Lucy, and I as we entered. In addition to being the presumed owners, I suspect these two guys are the only employees.  

Walking into this place was like going back in time…to when mom & pops still dominated the rental business and new releases were promoted with poster & big cardboard displays (that would probably go for hundreds on eBay). Practically a museum of a bygone era, shrines to the likes of Pulp Fiction, Jurassic Park and Liar, Liar were everywhere, likely in the same spots as they were when put there in the '90s.

When I asked if I could take some pictures, the guys’ congenial smiles that told me that a majority of their visitors come in to do the same thing…

Thousands of DVDs

Thousands more.

A big VHS selection!

The back room (with more VHS) that was probably the "adult" section back in the day. All mom & pops had 'em. 

Lucy unearths a priceless relic from the 23rd Century.

Overlooking the checkout counter.

Something has survived...like this awesome display.

I've never seen this particular promo, and I was unable to talk them into selling it to me.

In the 90s, no video store was complete without these things hanging from the ceiling.

KITTEN COLLECTIBLES #12: Re-Entering THE BLACK HOLE

A Treasure Hunt by D.M. ANDERSON💀

In addition to watching and writing about films, I’m something of a memorabilia collector. Cursed with a teacher’s salary, I ain’t out there bidding on Dorothy’s ruby slippers or anything, but certainly enjoy haunting local shops for a variety of movie-related stuff. Or when feeling particularly bold, I’ll occasionally overpay for some retro relic on eBay. More often than not, I leave stores empty-handed. But every now and then, I’ll find a small treasure that doesn’t completely empty my wallet and give it a new home in the Dave Cave.

In Kitten Collectibles #3, I wrote of my antique finds related to Walt Disney’s space opera suppository, The Black Hole. Released in 1979 and touted as the studio’s first PG-rated movie, this was Disney’s attempt to capitalize on the success of Star Wars. They failed, of course, but not for a lack of trying, which included pumping out gobs of tie-in merchandise…including books, lunchboxes, school supplies, records, games and action figures, the last of which is ironic since the movie hardly has any real action. Unless he had faulty wiring upstairs, I doubt there was a single kid who ever put an Earnest Borgnine figure on their Christmas list. Most of this stuff ended up on clearance shelves faster than the E.T. Atari game.

The Black Hole is not, nor has ever been, a good movie (you can read my personal assessment HERE), though it’s since earned something of a cult following among middle-age sci-fi fans whose judgment might be clouded by nostalgia. That’s not to say I don’t like the movie. There have been numerous occasions when I’ve revisited The Black Hole and enjoyed its kitschiness. 

And as a collector who regularly haunts local Portland antique stores, I have found myself grabbing anything related to The Black Hole over the years, not because I’m some sort of superfan, but because this shit doesn’t show up that often. Most shops are glutted with Star Wars toys unloaded by guys who probably held onto them since childhood thinking it was a path to early retirement. But The Black Hole? That’s fucking rare, and I still keep a vigilant eye out for that elusive Ernest Borgnine action figure. 

In the interim, I recently added to my unintentional Black Hole shrine with a few more treasures…

The wife and I visited Portland’s Memory Den for the first time. Located in an old warehouse, it’s a two-story antique mall loaded with interesting booths, though some of them are the obvious result of someone cleaning out their garage, or trying to push old clothes as “vintage” before giving up and unloading them at Goodwill. There was also a section with old arcade games, which the proprietors encourage patrons to try out. Hence, there were two middle aged guys so intensely engaged in a tabletop hockey game that you’d think they were competing for the Stanley Cup.

When I wasn’t startled like being tased by these two fuckers every time one scored a goal, I managed to find some cool stuff, the real treasure being The Black Hole Space Alert Game. Being 46 years old, the box wasn’t in great shape, but all the pieces were intact! I’d never seen it before, but after reading the instructions, it’s basically a variation of Candyland, where players have to escape the Cygnus by making their way to the probe ship. As movie tie-in games go, this one is kinda lame (like the movie), but the board, which unfolds like a Twister mat, is pretty cool. 

I briefly considered asking my oldest daughter, Natalie, if she’d be interested in playing a round. She’s 30 now, but the original Candyland was one of her favorites when she was little. However, I also remember it was her first hard lesson that life isn’t always fair, and she'd often rage-quit by throwing the pieces and flipping the board when things didn’t go her way. While I’m sure she’s gotten over that by now, I decided not to risk the same thing happening to my latest treasure. 

So I’ve added the game to other recent finds related to The Black Hole, such as the novelization by Alan Dean Foster (which is actually pretty good). More amusingly, I found the children’s book, a family-friendly version of the original story. Part of Disney’s Wonderful World of Reading series, the story is told from the POV of V.I.N.C.E.N.T., the movie’s obligatory “cute” robot. To avoid traumatizing the kiddos, it mercifully leaves out the parts where every character dies and main antagonist Hans Reinhardt ends up in hell with evil robot Maximillian. 

Without really trying, I’ve acquired nearly as much Black Hole memorabilia as I have for genuinely great sci-fi films like Alien. And I'll keep doing so until I snag that Harry Booth action figure. What the hell is wrong with me?

KITTEN COLLECTIBLES #9: Another Small Town Alien Invasion

A Treasure Hunt by D.M. ANDERSON💀

In addition to watching and writing about films, I’m something of a memorabilia collector. Cursed with a teacher’s salary, I ain’t out there bidding on Dorothy’s ruby slippers or anything, but certainly enjoy haunting local shops for a variety of movie-related stuff. Or when feeling particularly bold, I’ll occasionally overpay for some retro relic on eBay. More often than not, I leave stores empty-handed. But every now and then, I’ll find a small treasure that doesn’t completely empty my wallet and give it a new home in the Dave Cave.

About once a year, I'm dragged kicking and screaming to my mother-in-law’s house. Not that I don’t enjoy her company, but we live in Portland, Oregon and she lives four hours away in Grandview, Washington, a small agricultural town where the cows outnumber the people. To get there, we’re required to drive through the Columbia Gorge, which is admittedly beautiful, but interminable if you’ve been making that trek most of your adult life. 

Oregon is widely considered a “blue state” populated by liberal-thinking people, which to a certain extent is true. But that’s only west of the Cascade Mountains, where most of the population lives. The further east you go, the towns grow smaller, while the number of TRUMP banners and pick-ups grow larger. It’s through this wasteland of gun racks & MAGA hats we must journey.

Still, my wife and I make the most of it by making stops along the way…wineries, the local fish hatchery and a little antique store I discovered a few years ago in the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it town of Bingen, Washington.  Located on the main (only?) street is Antiques & Oddities, a large place with a few dozen vendor booths. For the most part, these booths offer genuine antiques, as opposed to stuff someone’s trying to unload after cleaning their garage. 

Since I only visit the store about once a year, I usually find something that makes paying the bridge toll into Washington worth it. This time I grabbed something I didn’t know even existed: a board game from Parker Brothers based on the classic 1977 film, Close Encounters of the Third Kind…still sealed! The movie doesn’t really seem conducive to a board game tie-in and the description on the box makes it sound kinda boring. But hey, I wasn’t planning on opening it to find out, anyway. The sealed box alone was worth the forty bucks I shelled out for it. 

Another thing I didn’t know existed was a line of action figures based on the 1999 film, Virus. The movie itself is a derivative Alien rip-off about an extraterrestrial entity that manipulates technology and turns its victims into Borg-like monsters. As disposable sci-fi junk-food goes, it’s a passable time killer, but does feature Jamie Lee Curtis. The figure I found is her character, Kelly Foster (with a similarly hot bod). I didn’t pay much for it, but there’s something fun about finding relatively obscure action figures nobody asked for based on movies nobody saw.

We left about seventy bucks lighter ($80, counting the coffee we needed to stay frosty for the rest of the journey). But this brief detour was well worth it, as I’d never seen either of these things before.