Wednesday, February 2, 2011

You Will Never Get to Valhalla Via Netflix

"But, you then say, at least you can get, albeit only by mail, rare gems and high-culture treasures you’ll never find in the few remaining storefront video places. No again. I’ve been wanting to watch a DVD of Richard Wagner’s opera Die Walküre. It’s one of the masterpieces of the operatic repertoire, and, for that matter, of Western culture. If I go to Blockbuster.com, which I guess I’ll have to do, I can order it conducted by James Levine or Pierre Boulez or Hans Knappertsbusch or Daniel Barenboim or Hartmut Haenchen or Lothar Zagrosek. Netflix gives me exactly zero choices. Or, to be more precise, it offers three, none of them streaming of course, but says I can’t order any of them. I can 'save' them, as they are all 'DVD availability date unknown.'" [Source]