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Released by: VHShitfest
Released on: June 17th, 2014.
Director: Dan Kinem, Levi Peretic
Cast: Various
Year: 2013
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The Movie:
If you were to ask the average person on the street when the last time he or she rented a VHS tape you'd probably get some funny looks, maybe a smart ass comment or two about the death or the format or maybe just some confused, blank stares - after all, a lot of people wandering around these days are too young (or weren't even born) to remember when those tapes ruled the world. The fact of the matter is, however, that VHS may not be the powerhouse format that it once was but it still has a legion of devoted fans and collectors out there dedicated to preserving the format and the countless movies it unleashed upon a rental hungry public in its eighties and nineties boom years.
Directors Dan Kinem and Levi Peretic, through a successful crowd funding project, sought to document those collectors and their obsessions and the end result is Adjust Your Tracking: The Untold Story Of The VHS Collector. And that's a pretty apt description of just what this documentary is all about. This isn't a history of the format, that was already told and handled well in Rewind This, but instead it is a look at those who collect and in many ways preserve those analogue gems. When you figure that more movies were released on the format than were ever released on DVD, let alone on Blu-ray, there's reason for this collection and rare release such as films like Chester Turner's Tales From The Quadead Zone and Black Devil Doll From Hell are covered. This particular tape sold for hundreds of dollars on eBay and in some ways helped to legitimize the format as legitimately collectible.
A lot of what's talked about here, however, is why people collect. VHS scene stalwarts like Alamo Drafthouse's Zach Carlson (who puzzlingly sits in a ball pit while being interviewed) and Massacre Video's Louis Justin (who is one of the key players in the 'boutique VHS release' resurgence of the last few years) share stories about what got them into the format, their tactics for hunting down tapes and what drives them to keep doing it. Many of the tactics used by record and comic book collectors apply here as well - you've got to search out those odd stores and dig through dusty, sometimes moldy, boxes of old stock looking for those gems, and you've got to hit those flea markets and those thrift stores on a regular basis in hopes that something uncommon or interesting will show up and, if you've got the money, you need to keep an eye on eBay auctions.
The documentary also covers the advent of social media and how Facebook groups have connected obsessive VHS collectors from all over the world, allowing them help each other fill those holes on their want lists and share information about favorite labels and releases. Along the way we also learn about the toils of various rental store owners in an age where online streaming and digital downloads threaten the very existence of physical media and of course we're treated to plenty of pertinent clips from various releases along the way.
The documentary is a little disjointed at times and it's a bit rough around the edges but it does paint an interesting portrait of an interesting collector scene and document not only its origins but, yes, its importance as well. Some of the interviewees come off as the OCD collector types you might expect them to be, others as perfectly balanced individuals who do this for fun and for the love of movies. Either way, if you have an interest in the format or in why people collect what they collect, this is a pretty interesting (and often times quite amusing) watch.
Video/Audio/Extras:
The feature is presented in 1.33.1 fullframe and it looks fairly soft and fuzzy - which was completely the point as they mastered this on VHS to replicate the look for the format the people behind the movie obviously worship. As such, the clarity you'd expect from a nicely authored DVD isn't quite there, but it works in the context of the movie. Colors look good and everything is perfectly watchable and there aren't any issues here.
The English language Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo track on the disc is also fine. The interviews are plenty easy to follow and the levels are properly balanced throughout. There are a few spots where some 'of the ear' drop outs are present and what not and a couple of moments where the audio is just slightly muffled but odds are pretty good that if you're not reviewing the disc and listening for things like this that you're not going to notice them in the first place.
Extras, well… there's a lot, starting with two commentary tracks on disc one, the first from co-directors Dan Kinem and Levi Peretic, and the second with co-producers Josh Schafer and Matt Desiderio. There's a bit of crossover between the two talks but so too is there a lot of good information about how this project came to be, how it was funded, the travel and research that was involved in putting it all together and some of the trials and tribulations of working on such a niche product as this one. Both tracks are well paced and delivered with some decent humor, making them easy to listen to and interesting.
Disc one also includes three featurettes. Video Shelf is a twelve minute piece that interviews the father and son team that run a video store. Here they talk about the changes in home video and media consumption and how those changes have affected their business and also share some other hardships that they've incurred. It's not the feel good short movie of the year but it's interesting. The second featurette is It Wasn't in Vain, It Was in Staten Island which is a seven minute piece about the last days of Staten Island's Bayware Video and the liquidation sale that took place (as featured in the documentary) before it was shuttered. The last featurette is the seven minute The Ballad Of Chester Turner and it's a really fun look at the resurgence in the popularity of the man's work (Black Devil Doll From Hell and Tales From The Quadead Zone) thanks to his movies being reissued by Massacre Video. We also get some amusing footage from his appearance at Cinema Wasteland.
The second disc contains a whole bunch of related clips and what not, starting with Foggy Mountain Breakdown, a nine minute video document of the documentarians in a remote part of the Pacific Northwest looking for a location. From there, check out the two Q&A sessions on the disc, the first with Peretic and Bleeding Skull's Joseph Ziemba running nineteen minutes and the second with Kinem, Peretic and Jay Morong running twenty-three minutes. These are basically panels in which the participants talk about the project, what went into making it and about the format that the movie documents. Again, there's some crossover with the commentary tracks but these are interesting in their own right.
Rounding out the extras are well over two hours of extended interviews with various collectors and VHS scene experts that offers more insight into the collector mentality, more tours of various collections and more thoughts on what made the format such an explosive part of home video history. There's also just under a half an hour's worth of deleted scenes here, covering various specifics such as the impact of Faces Of Death being released on VHS (the director and his wife are interviewed here!), why Scarecrow Video in Seattle kicks so much ass and the importance of low budget shot on video movies to the format and the rental industry as a whole. We also get two trailers for the feature as well as animated menus on both discs. Inside the keepcase is a color insert booklet that features some slick artwork at a quick essay on the project written by Josh Schafer.
The Final Word:
While it's basically a bunch of vignettes focusing on, as the title implies, obsessive VHS collectors, Adjust Your Tracking is nevertheless a pretty interesting watch. It not only shows off some ridiculously impressive collections but also manages to delve into why these people collect and what the format means to them, which gives it more merit than had it just been a bunch of neat footage of people showing off their rare tapes. On top of that this release is stacked with extras, some of which are just as interesting as the feature material itself.
