Our pal Leonard Maltin mourns the demise of VHS tapes. Well, not really. He's actually mourning the loss of some great packaging and certain movies which were available in that format and haven't made it to DVD or Blu-ray.
I have a shelf downstairs of Betamax tapes of shows and movies available nowhere else and every so often, I have my assistant transfer a few more of them to digital format. One of these days, I'll start on the shelf of VHS tapes that I didn't toss once DVDs came out of the same material.
While we're on the subject of Maltin: Last Monday night, Leonard emceed a wonderful program at the Academy of Motion Pictures theater — a screening of Bambi preceded by some fascinating "extras." At the reception preceding the program, I got to spend some time talking with Peter Behn, who at age four supplied the voice of Thumper. I can't imagine what it would be like to be part of something so beloved and historic at that age, and to go through life with people telling you how what you contributed to at age four was so meaningful to them. It was a fun evening even though Bambi is far from my favorite Disney film.