Nettle: One User's Experience: The GreenCine Review

November 06, 2003

The GreenCine Review

Over a year ago, I started a series of reviews on the Netflix DVD rental service. I was a customer, I liked the service, and it become a long-running series that's still ongoing with occasional installments.
At the time, I considered writing reviews of other DVD rental services. My first target was to be GreenCine, a San Francisco-based outfit that has positioned itself as the alternative to Netflix, for those who prefer unusual, rare, foriegn, and especially indie film rentals. Sounded interesting!
I remember surfing through the GreenCine site last year, and performing the famous Nettle "Z test" on them. The Z test, you'll recall, is where I simply type in the letter "Z" into the search box, to see if the site returns with Costa-Gavras' famous film, "Z". Netflix passed the Z test with flying colors, and I rented the film from them, and all was good.
GreenCine failed the test, returning a bunch of meaningless results. That was August 2002. I mentioned this fact to one of the founders of GreenCine. He begged me to hold off reviewing GreenCine as they were a tiny outfit without the financial deep pockets of Netflix, and they knew their databases were weak and their site needed work. So, I held off.
Fast forward ahead more than a year. I felt enough time had passed, so I signed up for GreenCine's trial service. Did the "Z" test. It failed. Nothing had changed.
I explored the site for several weeks. Actually rented a few titles, well, tried to. Nothing seemed available. Nearly everything was marked with a red indicator in my queue indicating, "fuhgeddaboutit."
Nevertheless, I did screen-grabs of the site, jotted down notes, collected observations, wrote up a list of suggestions. And I thought, I'm just not in the mood to do this.

So instead. Here is my review of GreenCine, based on my experience trying to find DVD titles that I could actually expect to get in the mail before the trial period ran out. Apologies to Monty Python.

Customer: Good Morning.
GreenCine: Good morning, Sir. Welcome to GreenCine!
Customer: Ah, thank you, my good man.
GreenCine: What can I do for you, Sir?
Customer: Well, I was, uh, surfing the web just now, skimming through FilmCritic, Slate, and Salon, and I suddenly came over culturally benighted.
GreenCine: Benighted, sir?
Customer: Cinematically nescient.
GreenCine: Eh?
Customer: 'Ee, ah wants a movie!
GreenCine: Ah, a movie!
Customer: In a nutshell. And I thought to myself, "a little French farce will do the trick," so, I curtailed my websurfing activites, sallied forth, and infiltrated your site of webitude to negotiate the rental of some fine unusual cinematographs!
GreenCine: Come again?
Customer: I want to rent some DVDs.
GreenCine: Oh, I thought you were complaining about the user community!
Customer: Oh, heaven forbid: I am one who delights in all manifestations of the purple-haired facial-pincushion convergence!
GreenCine: Sorry?
Customer: I dig the users just fine my man!
GreenCine: So they can go on listing their favorites, can they?
Customer: Most certainly! Now then, some DVDs please, my good man.
GreenCine: Certainly, sir. What would you like?
Customer: Well, eh, how about starting off with a little Costa-Gavras.
GreenCine: I'm, a-fraid we're fresh out of Costa-Gavras, sir.
Customer: Oh, never mind, how are you on Bunuel?
GreenCine: I'm afraid we never have that so early in the month sir, try next month.
Customer: Tish tish. No matter. Well, stout yeoman, one Wong Kar-Wai and one Kubrick, if you please.
GreenCine: Ah! It's beeeen on order, sir, for two weeks. Was expecting it this morning.
Customer: 'T's Not my lucky day, is it? Aah, Tarantino?
GreenCine: Sorry, sir.
Customer: Jarmusch?
GreenCine: Normally, sir, yes. Today the server's acting up.
Customer: Ah. Cuaron?
GreenCine: Sorry.
Customer: Ichaso? Kunuk?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Any Bergman, per chance.
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Wachowski?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Godard?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Polanski?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Ah. Welles?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Cassavettes?
GreenCine: (pause) No.
Customer: Ken Russell?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Tony Scott?
GreenCine: (aghast) Certainly not, sir!
Customer: Yes that would be a Netflix pick, wouldn't it. Hmm. De Palma, Borzage, Mankiewicz, Burton, Hawks, Peckinpah, Mamoulian, Fuller?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Sayles, perhaps?
GreenCine: Ah! We have Sayles, yessir.
Customer: (suprised) You do! Excellent.
GreenCine: Yessir. It's..ah,.....it's a bit scratched...
Customer: Oh, I like it scratched.
GreenCine: Well,.. It's very scratched, actually, sir.
Customer: No matter. Fetch hither the scratched digital disc of John Sayles! Mmmwah!
GreenCine: I...think it's a bit scratchier than you'll like it, sir.
Customer: I don't care how fucking scratched it is. Hand it over with all speed.
GreenCine: Oooooooooohhh........! (pause)
Customer: What now?
GreenCine: The SuperDrive's eaten it.
Customer: (pause) Has it.
GreenCine: Yes, sir.
Customer: (pause) Sirk?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Ray?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Zinnemann?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Kurosawa?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Coen Brothers?
GreenCine: No, sir.
Customer: You...do *have* DVDs, don't you?
GreenCine: (brightly) Of course, sir. We're an online DVD rental service, sir. Specializing in independent, foreign, and unusual titles for the discerning film buff! We've got--
Customer: No no... don't tell me. I'm keen to guess.
GreenCine: Fair enough.
Customer: Uuuuuh, Erich von Stroheim.
Owner: Yes?
Customer: Ah, well, I'll have some of that!
GreenCine: Oh! I thought you were talking to me, sir. Ulrich Van Stroheimer, that's my name.
Customer: (pause) Spike Lee?
GreenCine: Uh, not as such.
Customer: Uuh, Kramer?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Keaton?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: De Mille?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Truffaut.
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Lars von Trier?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Curtiz?
GreenCine: No.
Customer: Corman?
GreenCine: Not *today*, sir, no.
Customer: (pause) Aah, how about Spielberg?
GreenCine: Well, we don't get much call for it around here, sir.
Customer: Not much Sp-- he's the single most popular director in the world!
GreenCine: Not 'round here, sir.
Customer: (slight pause) and who IS the most popular director 'round hyah?
GreenCine: David Lynch, sir.
Customer: IS he.
GreenCine: Oh, yes, he's staggeringly popular 'round these parts, squire.
Customer: Is he.
GreenCine: He's our number one best rental, sir!
Customer: I see. Uuh... David Lynch, eh?
GreenCine: Right, sir.
Customer: All right. Okay. 'Have you got any?' he asked, expecting the answer 'no'.
GreenCine: I'll have a look, sir........nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnno. All rented out.
Customer: It's not much of a web service, is it?
GreenCine: Finest on the net!
Customer: (annoyed) Explain the logic underlying that conclusion, please.
GreenCine: Well, it's so easy to use, sir!
Customer: It's certainly uncontaminated by DVDs....
GreenCine: (brightly) You haven't asked me about Tarkovsky, sir.
Customer: Would it be worth it?
GreenCine: Could be....
Customer: (slowly) Have you got any Tarkovsky?
GreenCine: Yes.
Customer: Excellent. I would like to rent The Sacrifice, the original Solaris, and this Andrei Rublev here.
GreenCine: Fine choices, sir. I'll just put them here in your queue. You should see them in your post box sometime in mid-2004, sir.
Customer: Figures. Predictable, really I suppose. It was an act of purest optimism to have posed the question in the first place. Tell me:
GreenCine: Yessir?
Customer: (deliberately) Have you in fact got any DVDs here at all.
GreenCine: Yes, sir.
Customer: Really?
(pause)
GreenCine: No. Not really, sir.
Customer: You haven't.
GreenCine: No sir. Not a scrap. I was deliberately wasting your time, sir.
Customer: Well I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to shoot you.
GreenCine: Right-O, sir.
(The customer takes out a gun and shoots the owner)
Customer: What a *senseless* waste of human life.

Posted by brian at November 6, 2003 11:35 AM | TrackBack

Comments

That's great, Brian! It brought back all the joy of the MP sketch. Unfortunately for GreenCine, it's now linked in my brain as the "cheese shop of DVDs". I doubt they shall get my custom.

But this does bring up the question of what other alternatives to Netflix you might recommend to us?

Posted by: Roger Karraker at November 6, 2003 03:01 PM

I've been a Greencine customer for 2 weeks and so far, so good.

Plusses:

- better selection of stuff I want, especially anime

- human response from customer service

- they know Korea is not in Southeast Asia (while I was a subscriber, Netflix always had their Korean films in the Southeast Asia category).

Minuses:

- I live in Minneapolis, they're in SF. It's one day slower than Netflix.

- more to be discovered, no doubt.

Posted by: Dave Rolsky at November 6, 2003 04:23 PM

Enjoyed the "skit." I went to GreenCine's page to do the "z test" myself. Then I did my own test...I'm not a "great indie buff" but just plugged in a foreign flick I had watched a few months back by a chinese filmmaker. The flick was "To Live." My search results were

'N Sync: PopOdyssey Live (2001) 2 Live Crew - Greatest Hits (1992)
7 Days to Live (2000)
Aaron Carter - Aaron's Party: Live (2000)
AC/DC - Stiff Upper Lip Live (2000)

Clicking on "view all results" gave me ten pages of results (or more,) and mostly concerts. I did find "To Live" on page nine of the results pages (alphabetical order)

I did find the movie on page one of a search after I typed in the director's whole name Yimou Zhang.

On one page, there were some "user comments" and one included a person saying:
"I've rented 30 DVDs (most anime) with GreenCine so far. Only four of the titles are available from Netflix."
This made it sound like Netflix doesn't stock a lot of Anime. I'm not an Anime junkie, but Netflix stocks a huge amount of Anime! I've even rented quite a few Anime movies myself, just because there are so many!
Anyway, I'm quite happy with Netflix; won't be changing anytime soon. :)

Posted by: toni at November 11, 2003 03:32 AM

Yes, Greencine has a wonderful selection. Yes, their customer service is great. Yes, it's nice to support an indie business over a monolith like Netflix. HOWEVER, there are some distinct liabilities with Greencine's service:

a) Lots and lots of titles. But you'll likely never watch most of them, because they'll stock one or two copies of really oscure, cool films and you're battling a hundred other users to get a hold of that title. They emphasize range of selection, not quantity of those titles so you'll be waiting...and waiting...and waiting...and god help you if someone just sits on that one copy of a DVD, never returning it back to GC. I've had items on my queue for two to three months, at the top of the queue, and I don't expect to see them anytime soon.

b) They have ONE distribution center in San Francisco. Which means that EVERYTHING gets sent in and out of one center. Which means that you'll be waiting a VERY long time if you don't live in the Bay Area for things to go back and forth. East Coasters have reported long, long waits for their DVDs. I live in Southern CA, and items will take up to a week to get to me from SF.

c) They have had many problems with shipping... it may or may not have something to do with ongoing issues with the USPS. In any case, you'll often wait up to a week from the "shipping date" for DVDs. Netflix due to their many distrib centers will take a day or two. Again, it's not fair to impose this David-and-Goliath comparison, but the hard fact is that you will WAIT for your DVDs.

They're a good company with good customer service...but from a consumer standpoint, the fact of rarely getting the items they offer, plus the LONG shipping times, makes the whole package less attractive. Great in concept, problematic in execution.

Posted by: Terry at November 11, 2003 10:39 AM

The notion that GreenCine doesn't have any titles available is absurd. I have been a customer of theirs for over a year and there has been only a few times (maybe 10 titles) I have had to look elsewhere for a movie.

For a short time I used Netflix, and found it to be a very efficient service. GreenCine, on the other hand, is much more like the local video store that has contests, staff and customer recommendations, they remember your name, hold movies for you and give the kids ballons.

Posted by: Doug at December 10, 2003 01:42 PM

i was an early customer who stumbled in a little after they opened their doors. i live in san francisco and liked the idea of supporting a local startup, especially after the rather bleak couple of years the local tech industry had experienced. so, i tried it out, after trying netflix for a while and not finding some of the titles i was looking for.

after a couple of days poking around greencine i cancelled the account at netflix just at the end of the trial period, even though i'd put together a queue at netflix (i'm a really enthusiastic clicker) of a couple hundred titles. greencine had all of them in their catalog and a bunch of others so i was all set.

and, i'm still all set. i get discs fast in the mail, my queue moves ever onward despite the availability markings on any particular title, i read what people have to say, stuff like that.

netflix sets a high standard for this business! they do a lot of things right, and like ebay, they have the mindshare and the money, it's hard to compete with them. greencine is doing a creditable job and the availability is a lot better than this review indicates. plus there is a lot of editorial content at the site that beats the crap out of bland marketspeak and automatic recommendation software.

Posted by: david at January 5, 2004 08:46 PM

Greencine is great...if, like David, you live in San Francisco.

East Coaster wait 5-9 days. I live in LA and it takes up to a week for stuff to get to me from SF.

If they resolved their shipping and availability issues, I'd wholeheartedly recommend them. As it is, I recommend them, with reservations.

Posted by: Terry at January 14, 2004 11:28 AM

I tried Greencine for about six mos. A few snags with shipping, but customer service was always pretty responsive.

problem was, nothing was ever available. Great selection. I waited. And waited. And waited. Finally drove me back to Netflix. All the items that were in perpetual "red" or long-wait status came to me in a matter of days. couldn't quite believe i was actually going to see the stuff i'd wanted to see, instead of waiting around on the off-chance i'd get them off my Greencine queue (stuff was on that queue for four-six months and was NEVER available).

Greencine is great in concept, and they're a fun little community. But kind of worthless as a national DVD service. Great selection but the service is just too rinky-dink.

Posted by: Kevin at April 8, 2004 12:47 PM

Hmmm, thanks for all the input. Since I'm in VA, and have tried NetFlix for the past month, I guess I won't be switching soon. I was looking forward to it for the adult and anime selection at greencine, due to the price-rise in the standard DVD rental package from 19.99 to 21.99 at Netflix.

Oh well, I'm hoping someone somewhere will start an alternative service.

Posted by: Bunny at April 16, 2004 10:13 PM

I live in Hawaii and I'm getting movies plenty fast enough. I use Netflix for mainstream stuff, so I really don't have any issues as far as availability is concerned.

Their search engine sucks, but they know this, and they say they're working on it. One-word titles are especially problematic. I use the advanced search feature, and use actor/director searches.

Posted by: Charles Woods at April 18, 2004 12:49 AM

I switched from Netflix to Greencine about a year ago because of the much better selection of Anime, Bollywood, Hong Kong action flicks and television series (especially BBC). The wait can be long for individual titles, but as long as I keep a well-stocked queue (never a problem), I've always got good stuff arriving at my door. Living in Florida, the shipping times were a little slow at first, but in the last 6-8 months, its improved amazingly. I get DVDs 2-3 days after the shipping date, compared to 1-2 days from Netflix's shipping center in Georgia. Also, they've added cardboard sleeves to their DVD's which has taken care of the occasional broken DVD. Overall, I'm very satisfied.

Posted by: Patrick Bartlett at June 10, 2004 07:43 AM

I am still debating trying this service, but I did just go and check, they now have Z, which everyone should see, i saw it when it first came out and again recently, just as powerful and even more relevant to this country.

Posted by: Wayne at June 19, 2004 07:56 PM

I live in Northern, VA. Does anyone else think that Greencine has improved its overall service yet to the east coast? I really want to try their service but hope its not a bad decision for me. I am a big indie film fan. Please help.

Posted by: Nadia Padia at July 16, 2004 05:33 AM