1980s Video Shop

In 1985, when we bought our first video recorder, there was only one place in the whole town to rent videos - an ex-hair salon squashed into a row of terraces. It had a sign above the door with Charley's Videos hand-painted very badly in a grammatical mangle of extras es and apostrophes.

Inside, everything was impromptu, as though they might have to pack up at any moment, stuff all the videos into a suitcase and leg it from the police. The wooden counter, on which a rack of sweets and popcorn attempted to convince you that watching a film on your seventeen inch Japanese TV with wood veneer panelling was exactly the same as watching it on the big screen, gave you splinters if you weren't careful. The carpet had damp stains, and white dots from accidents with peroxide, and there were velvet curtains at the back, through which the owner disappeared to find the right cassette for the case you passed to him. It had the musty smell of a charity shop - not Oxfam, but something less well known, like The Cats' Protection League or Arthritis Awareness - old women's perfume, sweat, damp dogs, fags.

The videos were set out in a kind of mathematical way - a Cartesian coordinate system born out of the Video Recordings Act (1984). The x axis went in alphabetical order, the y axis rose in age restriction, so that the 18s were at the top, well away from curious fingers, with Aaron the Axe Killer at one end and innumerate zombie films at the other. But the shop was so small that you could see the covers quite clearly and while my sister was choosing the Disney film she wanted, I would gaze at the images of gore, my little brain extrapolating from the picture on the front what the film would be like. Even aged ten, it wasn't all that difficult.

Nowadays, the promotional posters for horror films tend to be subtly suggestive of the gore content (OK, I'll give you Saw and Hostel). Resident Evil shows two young ladies that, take away the enormous Aliens guns, might be off clubbing. Take away the name of the film from the poster too and it could be advertising Trance Nation Volume 5. The Ring has, er, a ring, a glowing, spooky-looking ring though, it has to be said. 28 Days Later shows a solitary figure wandering in front of a London skyline. It's quite nice really, all done in red and black, almost like a woodblock print. Take away the movie blather and you might have it on your wall.

In the 80s, though, things were pretty literal. It was a much easier age. Things were explained. If you were wondering what Psycho Stripper might be about, the cover of a woman in stockings and suspenders holding a bloody knife in one hand and a man's head in the other, made the decision about whether it was something grandma might like so much easier. There must have been a prevailing Ronseal/Catchphrase sensibility amongst graphic designers at the time - does what it says on the tin / say what you see.

Zombie Marines = half decayed geezers in military gear.

Devil Cheerleaders = Cheerleaders with red pointy horns and tails.

Head Vice Hell = head inside a vice, flames, possibly, in the background.

Golden rules:

Women must always be half naked.

There must be at least one expression of hammed up terror.

There must be lots and lots of blood and the blood must always be very very red.

You get the idea.

Eventually my sister chose Dumbo and the man disappeared behind the velvet curtains. I got a palm full of splinters from the counter. The blood was redder than real blood. It ran down my wrist. And I started thinking about the plot for Stigmata Boy.