T&V Home Video
This post is the first article in a series called Movie Memories. These are places and moments that made us into the weird movie lovers we are today.
I have loved watching movies for as long as I can remember. I can’t tell you the first movie I saw in theaters or the exact movie that just clicked for me, but I definitely know where this cinephile was created: a Blockbuster knockoff in my hometown which also happened to be an ice cream shop. My Burlington County people know: I spent many Friday nights (and post-softball game celebrations) at T&V Home Video. At least, that’s what I think it was called. It seems that the internet has wiped away all traces of this place, something that I didn’t think was possible.
T&V Home Video was a tiny shop sandwiched between my favorite pizza place and the local hardware store in town. Looking back, I can’t imagine that it looked much like the shiny, expansive Blockbuster stores that I visited only occasionally, when I slept over my cousins’ house twenty minutes north. I remember a few specifics about the place, a few images that are stuffed into the “Childhood” filing cabinet in the back of my brain.
Entering the store, upon immediately turning left, I could find myself staring at the VHS covers of new releases. They weren’t along the wall, but on a stand that was just slightly in your way at all times. For some reason, the only movie that seemed to ALWAYS be on this shelf was “Me, Myself, and Irene.” (Listen, I don’t make the rules when it comes to childhood memories)
Behind that shelf were the horror movies. Why were the horror movies getting such prime real estate? I have absolutely no clue. These covers were often caked in a thick coating of dust, made even more obvious by the fact that most of the horror film posters used varying shades of black. I literally only remember two covers from this section: one with a guy that had a bunch of pins in his head? And one with a scary ventriloquist dummy. “Dead Silence?” Does that sound like a movie with a ventriloquist dummy? Whatever, these covers haunted my dreams for years.
I’m sure the other sections on the other side of the store existed, but 9 year old me did not care AT ALL. I was focused on two things and two things only:
- The ice cream case on the left and
- The Mary Kate and Ashley movies on the right.
I wasn’t always allowed to get ice cream when I went to T&V. That was reserved for post-recreation sports games (win OR lose) and special occasions. My order was pretty much always Moose Tracks in a sugar cone. Ugh the best.
The Mary Kate and Ashley movies? Well this is where it got complicated. There were two types of Mary Kate and Ashley movies. The ones I didn’t love were the detective stories. Not a fan. I liked the ones where the twins held a party. If I remember correctly, there were like, twenty different types of parties. I can guarantee you this was the beginning of my “I just like when the Avengers sit and talk and joke before the action” movie taste.
Pretty much every Friday night, my family and I would head to the very back of the store and check out whatever MK&A travesty my sister and I were interested in and a movie for my parents. Looking back, it seemed like we did this for years and years, decades even, but with time and age comes change. T&V is no longer there on Broad Street. The signs have possibly been gone for longer than they were actually up. Sometimes, I wonder, did I imagine it? This little slice of late 90’s paradise? Then randomly, searching through the internet, I will steal a glimpse of a “Joe vs. the Volcano” poster, or the cover of “The Sixth Sense” and I’ll remember--T&V is but a memory, but one that will last a lifetime in my movie-loving mind.