My Final Redbox Rentals
Actually, I just bought the discs.
All good things must come to an end. I'm not exactly sure how good Redbox was during its near-twenty-year run, but it did supply a gasping last breath to physical media rentals as brick-and-mortar stores died out. I can remember my first Redbox rental, Jim Gaffigan's 2006 stand-up special Beyond the Pale. I thought it was the way of the future. Movies in CVS parking lots!
And while it was convenient for two-buck rentals of six-month-old movies, it quickly got a reputation for a variety of reasons. When I moved to Baltimore, for example, I noticed that the machines were almost only stocked with DVDs and rarely Blu-rays. They weren’t being maintained or kept up.
Simultaneously, the term "Redbox movie" became derogatory and as Redbox has slowly died (and is now dead), it's a baton they've passed on to "Tubi Original."
Well, I can now say I also know what my final Redbox rentals were. I was doing a grocery pick-me-up at Safeway when I saw the printed-out sign covering the screen. THE LAST DAY FOR THIS REDBOX WILL BE MONDAY 7/22. PLEASE RETURN ALL RENTALS BY 7/22.
I knew what I had to do. I had one final Redbox night where I marathoned three DVDs straight out of those red hardshell cases. I initially planned on renting all three movies, but when I saw that it was just one dollar more expensive per disc to buy it outright, I thought I would take a souvenir for the road. What follows are my final three Redbox rentals purchases.
Small Engine Repair (2021)
The seemingly casual reunion of three old friends at an out-of-the-way repair shop masks a hidden agenda fuelled by the arrival of a privileged young yuppie.
I knew that I wanted a mix of genres and with action and horror flicks on the way, I needed to start with a drama. That is, after all, where I've had the most success in my Redbox career. I got Waves from a Redbox and that movie is damn near perfect. I'm pretty sure I got The Peanut Butter Falcon from a Redbox and that movie is so good it has a Bernthal to burn.
Jon Bernthal also appears in Small Engine Repairs, reprising his role from the stage play of the same name. John Pollono adapts and directs his play and also reprises his original role. And it's very much still a play. They yap yap yap in the Chicago storefront theatre style for the first 70 of the 103 minutes and then it goes totally crazy, which is what plays like that do. It's pretty clear that they are trying their best to make it a movie, with new characters and a variety of locations, but the script is roughly the same. But plays are cool! So I liked it.
The cast is great, the twist is exciting - it's totally an underseen gem. That's what Redbox is for! And I was grateful that I watched at least one good movie...
American Siege (2021)
An ex-NYPD officer-turned-sheriff of a small rural Georgia town has to contend with a gang of thieves who have taken a wealthy doctor hostage.
Bruce Willis, Gerard Butler, John Cusack, and Mel Gibson were the four heads of the Redbox Mount Rushmore, but Bruce was Washington. I knew that I had to sneak him into this marathon somewhere.
Bruce caught a lot of crap for a lot of years for doing these Redbox eight-day shoots, and then we all found out why and felt like dicks for making all of those jokes. We should. We were dicks. But I've been able to find some diamonds in the rough, like when I wrote about 2021's Midnight in the Switchgrass.
Unfortunately, I did not have the same luck with American Siege. It seemed like something I was primed to like, from the hostage plot to the messy politics of it all, but it just wasn't thrilling at all from the jump. Stakes were low, plot was scarce, characters were generic. Why can't bad movies be better? I love a good bad movie.
Wicked Games (2021)
When Harley joins her boyfriend for a Halloween weekend at his family’s estate, they’re invaded by a band of masked freaks and forced into playing a game. But the intruders don’t know that Harley is ready to fight back with her own tricks.
Wicked Games is another movie I chose because of the two-line synopsis. I knew I had a talky drama and a Bruce action film, so I wanted a horror film to complete the Redbox trifecta and end my marathon. I was tapping through the horror screens when I stopped on Wicked Games, having never heard of it before. Taylor immediately stopped me, "This is the one. You love 'bands of masked freaks!'" She's right. I do love bands of masked freaks, more commonly known as home invasion horror films.
And this started with some masked freaks, so I was satisfied. But it quickly turned into a You're Next (great movie)/Ready or Not (okay movie) riff, which was unfortunate because I've seen those movies and they were both better.
I'm totally down for a low-budget, messy, indie-to-its-core popcorn flick if it's doing something exciting or fun or dangerous or different. I just can't say that about Wicked Games. But I can say that I'm pretty sure I've never seen a tag on someone's shirt in a movie before. So at least that was new!
I ended my Redbox journey going 1-for-3, which sounds about right. That's a pretty good batting average for them. And now I own all of these movies as a little keepsake, which I absolutely did not need but is cool anyway.
Credit: Each plot synopsis from Letterboxd via TMDb.
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