The Top Selling VHS Tapes in Britain

Hello pop pickers and welcome to the latest chart run down. Following the overwhelming response to the audio cassette list it is time we paid a visit to the humble cassette tape’s big brother – the video. For so long a staple part of the entertainment lover’s life, VHS has taken a bit of a hit recently. I think most of you reading this will admit that the last few months have seen it become officially the minority partner in the viewing several’s buying portfolio. But it is still a viable old format – not for it the anonymous and unloved grave of vinyl. Oh no – videos are still for sale by the thousand – 61,000 are available at Amazon.co.uk. Sixty one thousand video tapes – that’s more than I’ve got and I’m a fool.

Cue the chart rundown music as we look at the twenty best selling videos right now at the nation’s number one entertainment boutique…

At number 20 opportunity arises when a French baker takes Anjelica Huston to a Tom Jones concert in "Agnes Brown".

At number 19 it’s a case of knowing your role and shutting your mouth as a now illegal "WWF" branded video extols the virtues of future Doom star, The Rock.

At number 18 a vagabond poet and his delectable daughter set the ancient city of Baghdad on its ear in "Kismet".

At number 17 David Bowie and some Muppets entertain a young girl in George Lucas’s "Labyrinth".

At number 16 it’s the costume drama that started the now wretched trend for soapy old novel adaptations, Colin Firth’s chest stars in "Pride and Prejudice".

At number 15 - no doubt riding on a new wave of popularity following its mention in the Christmas Invasion, it’s "The Lion King".

At number 14 it’s more animated fun as Disney apparently "recapture their magic" with the "Little Mermaid".

At number 13 it’s more of the same as Jim Davidson presents a night of comedy featuring Bernard Manning, Jim Davidson, Mike Reid, Hale & Pace, Roger De Courcey, Jim Bowen and many more in "Let It Be All Right On The Night"

At number 12 it’s Mickey and the mops in "Fantasia".

At number 11 we have the classic Doctor Who story "The Horns in Nimon" in which Janet Ellis is menaced by ballerinas with big horns and Graham Crowden actually manages to upstage Tom Baker at the peak of the latter’s insanity.

And so we enter the top ten with the vitality of VHS surging through our veins. This is the format of the future – harder to scratch than a DVD, harder to lose under the sofa than a DVD, more satisfying to throw at the television when Jim Davidson hosts a night of offensive comedy than a DVD and less able to force you to sit through patronising anti-piracy videos than a DVD.

At number 10 it is the classic melodrama, "Gone With the Wind" in which something classic and dramatic happens. I don’t know what it is and I probably never will. But it is popular and will no doubt be remembered long after "No Sex Please, We’re British" has been forgotten.

At number 9 you can forget about passively watching the Teletubbies and start dancing with them in this interactive classic. The box proclaims "Twelve Teletubby dances are featured with children playing and dancing in the real world" which sounds exciting enough to crack the top ten on its own. But there is more – one reviewer notes "a computer-animated bear does a convincing Grateful Dead-inspired number" and in my book that’s known as added value.

At number 8 you may want to look away if you’re a liberated person of restricted height, it’s "Snow White and the Seven Dwarves". Hi ho, hi ho, it’s off to number 8 we go…

At number 7 tighten hips, buttocks, inner and outer thighs, flatten the tummy, lift the bust and tone the whole body with Callan Pinckney’s modestly titled exercise programme, Callanetics.

At number 6 it’s more healthy fun with Anita Harris’s "Fizzical! - Triple F System". Join one of Britain’s biggest stars as she triple F’s her way to physical perfection.

At number 5 it’s more grunting, groaning and cross dressing in 1996’s "Wrestlemania XII". If you love clashes of ego, selfish politicking and pointless humiliation, this is the tape for you.

At number 4 it is the Special Editon of "Pinocchio". I don’t know what constituted a special edition in VHS days – possibly a foil cover, a trailer for other Disney videos and a picture which didn’t look as if it had been sat on. Or maybe they added an audio commentary which played out of the left speaker while the dialogue came solely from the right.

At number 3 it’s more Disney – a trend methinks – as "Beauty and the Beast" sings and dances its way to almost the top of the charts. The video’s listing lifts its text from the DVD version which can only serve to convince the doubters that VHS is the format of tomorrow, the day after and even as far as next week.

So near and yet so far, at number 2 we say goodbye to Disney and hello to "Pennine Steam In The 60s". It does exactly what it says on the tin – "A look at the steam locomotives of the Pennines in the 1960's". Still not sure whether to invest in 56 minutes of the finest railway action money can buy? What if I told you it contains "Huddersfield to Marsden"? I can see you’re tempted. If I add "Bradford to Huddersfield" will you bite? Of course you will.

And – fanfare please – the number one best selling video at Amazon is…

The Jungle Book. Proof, if any be needed, that VHS is one of the bare necessities of life.

So don’t be bringing me tales of an ex-format. This is VHS not laserdisc – the future is bright, the future gets chewed up and the future takes up a lot of space.

Post script

Since I wrote the above – barely an hour ago – it is all change. Video is a fast moving industry and the landscape changes on a minute-by-minute basis. We see, for instance, Pride and Prejudice leap all the way up to number 5, the Pennine Steam classic drop one place to number 3 and Jim Davidson score his second top twenty hit with "Sinderella", the cleverly titled adult pantomime which doesn’t feature as much nudity as people hoped. By tomorrow who knows what will be there. There is more life in the old dog than even I thought and one day, yes one day, video will return.

Like hell it will.