The Last Video Store leans heavily into campy horror tropes, featuring fictional characters that resemble some of our real life favorites.
Movie fans are likely to be able to tell you every little detail about their favorite films and the lore that surrounds them. If those favorite films fall into a franchise, the knowledge they possess is almost endless. The Last Video Store takes place mostly in one setting, Blaster Video, where the owner and sole employee Kevin is there to tell anyone who walks in the door all about every single VHS that they have.
The way of renting VHS tapes has gone the way of the buffalo, something that is very much addressed in this film. It is apparent from the start that he doesn’t have many customers anymore. At the start of the film Nyla, the daughter of his best customer, stops by to return some tapes. However, one of those tapes does not belong to Kevin.
After explaining the best and worst parts of the movies that her father rented to Nyla, something she listened to all but unwillingly, his curiosity gets the better of him and he plays the strange VHS. It turns out this is a cursed VHS tape, the video necronomicon, and it has the power to pull characters out of films into the real world. It should come as no surprise that the villains Kevin just detailed to Nyla are the ones that keep appearing in the shop.
Horror trope after horror trope is brought into The Last Video Store: A misunderstood slasher with a hockey mask, a giant bug creature, and a narcissist action star. Think The Ring, but meta. Many horror films are quite predictable and well, this movie is too. The ending is hinted at the start of the film and just about anyone paying attention will know how that final fight plays out.
For those who love campy horror with eye-rolling humor and ridiculous action sequences, this one is for you. Because Kevin knows so much about movies, he has a leg up on the characters brought to life that don’t quite realize what has happened. Kevin is reminiscent of Randy in Scream, in that he truly has invested a lot of time in these films.
The Last Video Store certainly tries to show some love to straight to video sequels and franchises that seem to never end, despite their budget cuts. It is campy and filled with eye-rolling humor, but there is most definitely an audience out there who will enjoy it.
Sometimes it feels like it is doing too much, and trying too hard to embrace those tropes and combine its versions of well loved films. Unfortunately, even though it clocks in at under ninety minutes, it feels as if it goes on for too long.
Again, there is an audience for The Last Video Store, as it could become a cult classic of its own, but that just wasn’t us.
Rating: 1.5 out 5
About The Last Video Store
In this love letter to the era of the video store, Nyla brings in a collection of films to quite possibly the last video store on earth only to discover she has the legendary ‘cursed tape’. A film that holds the power to connect the real world to the dimension where movie fantasy exists as reality. Nyla and the video store owner unwittingly awaken a long-dormant curse that unleashes a series of classic cinematic villains plucked from the bowels of the B-movies themselves.
The Last Video Store premiered at Fantastic Fest 2023.