Tucked in an unassuming suburban strip mall that’s one bus ride away from Carleton University, Movies ‘n’ Stuff is Ottawa’s last video rental store.
Red blocky letters display the name atop its door near a smoothie shop and a grocery market on Kilborn Avenue. Film and television posters for popular recent releases cover up the entire front window, hiding the 12,000 titles on DVDs, BlueRays and VHS cassettes inside.
On a regular day, owner Peter Thompson sits behind the store’s counter laden with film discs, assorted papers and a gumball machine. A three-foot tall Darth Vader statue on a tall shelf overlooks him, an homage to The Empire Strikes Back, one of his favourite films. He awaits a stream of regular customers, about 50 or so per day, to come in, make film-related conversation and browse his seemingly never-ending shelves.
“Top Gun came out in ‘86 and it changed everything for me,” Thompson tells the Charlatan from behind his counter. “I saw it for the first time at 10 or 11-years-old with a buddy. We saw it, it was loud, it was fast, and then I started to realize there’s way more than just that.
“I guess it made an impression on me.”
Thompson’s parents opened Movies ‘n’ Stuff in 1984. It was once a chain of five Ottawa locations. Familiar with managing the store since he was a young adult, Thompson purchased the business about eight years ago.
He has witnessed Movies ‘n’ Stuff outlast Blockbuster stores, the dominant era of streaming and similar businesses like Glebe Video and Elgin Video shutting their doors. Now, Thompson says he doesn’t often think about how he runs the city’s only video rental store left standing — but community support and his willingness to adapt have helped to keep things afloat.
“I’ve been up against this and that and whatever,” he says, “but just put the work in and you’ll be all right.”
The era of streaming
Thompson didn’t always plan to take over the business.
“When (my parents) were going to retire, I thought, ‘Okay, what am I doing here?’” he says, adding that he had other career prospects, like various sales jobs.
He was also a Carleton history and film studies student before he left school to briefly produce small films and write screenplays.
When word spread that the store may close, “People came in droves and said, ‘Don’t do it!’”
Thompson developed a business plan with his knowledge about managing the store with help from his mother, a chartered accountant.
The dawn of streaming services was at the front of his mind.
“Streaming is here, but it’s going to fracture so much that after a while, a lot of people are going to get really annoyed,” Thomson says of his thought process.
“I thought I could still make a go for it.”
In 2025, British Columbia research group Convergence Research estimated that 46 per cent of Canadian households no longer subscribe to cable, and that Canadians are continuously opting for paid streaming platforms like Netflix or Disney Plus.
Marc Furstenau, a Carleton film studies professor who researches technology and film, theorizes convenience and availability are driving factors.
“You go to the video store, and there are only so many copies (of films) that people want to see,” Furstenau says. “With the internet, it’s actually unlimited because there are as many copies for people who want to see it.”
Streaming algorithms are also programmed to provide curated recommendations, Furstenau adds.
“You’re constantly having films suggested to you … in a much more comprehensive and systematic way.”
But Thompson doesn’t think that streaming selections and recommendations are all that great, calling some streaming giants’ content “rubbish” and “trash.”
“Ninety-nine out of 100 times, you’re not going to have a video store, so you’re going to whatever rubbish Netflix you have and check your algorithms that say you might like this or that,” he says.
“That’s no problem, but you’re missing a huge part of the movie world.”
Thompson has spent years curating Movies ‘n’ Stuff’s stock with physical copies of old, niche and international films that are not easily available online to set his collection apart. Thompson has also branched out to sell physical copies of films online.
“Every day, really, somebody comes in and says, ‘Do you have this?’ and I’ve heard of it,” he says. “No amount of algorithms is ever going to get you to that point.”
Outliving video store giant Blockbuster
But before streaming had even become something for Thompson to compete with, he had to outlast his neighbours.
He recalls a time in the 1990s when Movies ‘n’ Stuff was a five minute drive from three Blockbuster video stores.
One Blockbuster manager once paid a visit, he recalls.
“The manager of one of them came in and said, ‘We’re going to put you out of business,’” Thompson laughs. “I remember looking at him and thinking, ‘I don’t think you know what you’re talking about.’”
Due to a myriad of reasons, including poor leadership and an inability to compete with streaming, the worldwide video rental chain closed its more than 9,000 stores by 2014.
Ottawa’s Blockbusters were “too big” and “without a good selection,” Thompson argues.
“The Netflix of today, that’s what Blockbuster was. It’s big, it’s fun and it’s empty.”
Rallying a community
Apart from his selection, Thompson believes Movies ‘n’ Stuff’s community plays a big part in its success. He has known some of his customers for more than 30 years.
“Once you know somebody and you like doing it, why switch it up too much?” he says.
Rylan Charron, a fourth-year civil engineering student at Carleton, can’t remember his first visit to Movies ‘n’ Stuff.
“I may have even been as a baby, being taken in my parents’ arms,” he laughs.
Living a 10-minute walk away, Charron and his family would walk to the store about three times a month. He remembers his mom making casual conversation with the owner and his dad flipping through collections of DVDs before the family would come together and settle on a movie to rent.
“It would feel sort of like an activity,” Charron says. “More than the way you go on Netflix and just pick out a movie.”
Charron and his family stopped visiting as frequently just before the COVID-19 pandemic — for “no real well-defined reason” — but he remembers re-visiting Movies ‘n’ Stuff with his girlfriend sometime last fall.
“It brought back a lot of those feelings from when I was younger,” Charron says. “Very nostalgic, for sure.”
Thompson made sweet conversation with the handful of customers who streamed in on a Tuesday afternoon — chatting about their jobs and (of course) their movie opinions while handling transactions.
“You can come in and talk, and I get to know you,” Thompson says. “I’ve become almost a bartender, in that respect.
“You can never underestimate the power of a community who knows you already.”
Throughout history, films were dominantly watched in public spaces like movie theatres, Furstenau says. As in-home viewing became possible over the decades, film watching has slowly become more of a private experience.
According to a 2025 TeleFilm Canada study, movie theatre ticket consumption in 2024 was about half of what it was in 2019.
For Furstenau, video rental stores are “incredibly important” because of cinema’s history in communal spaces. He says video rental stores may see a rise in popularity like vinyl and CDs’ increasing growth.
“People are already less and less satisfied with streaming sources. They’re more expensive, they determine what’s available and what’s not, and what you can see and what you can’t,” Furstenau says. “A video store might have a chance to return.”
Usman Karimi*, vice-president of the Carleton Film Society and a third-year aerospace engineering student, says he has never visited Movies ‘n’ Stuff. However, video rental stores were special to him growing up in the United Arab Emirates.
“One of the first movie posters that ever stood out to me (at a video store) was for Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight. It was a picture of the Joker and it said, ‘Why so serious?’” Karimi recalls.
His mom originally thought it was too scary for a young Karimi, but he was “blown away” when he watched the film two years later.
“I wasn’t a comic book or superhero kid growing up, so if I saw that online and I saw it was a Batman thing, I probably wouldn’t care about it,” Karimi says. “Because I saw it presented in such a cool and physical way, it changed my view of things.”
The future of Movies ‘n’ Stuff
While the community was what originally talked Thompson into taking ownership of Movies ‘n’ Stuff, he says realizing that he could make a living from it is what assured him that he could stay.
After all, in addition to his 40,000 films he has to sort through, he also has a wife, three cats and a 13-year-old daughter at home to help care for.
When asked what he anticipates for Movies ‘n’ Stuff’s future, Thompson laughs. “Does anyone really know the future of any business that’s not Amazon or the like?”
If he were to retire, Thompson says he would box up his tens of thousands of films and sell them — “That’s worth a lot of money right there!” — then write a book with his daughter if she shows any interest.
But for now, Thompson will continue to greet Movies ‘n’ Stuff customers under the watchful eye of his Darth Vader statue.
“I could probably live forever doing this.”
*Usman Karimi has previously contributed to the Charlatan.
Featured image by Simon McKeown/the Charlatan.
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