Wudaokou DVD Shop

[stephaniepainter3]

After having not been to Beijing for a year, as soon as I arrived I was eager to see if Wudaokou had changed much. However, I was very disappointed when I realized that the "DVD SHOP" was gone! I used to go to this shop every week and buy cheap bootleg movies!

Does anyone know another dvd shop in Wudaokou?

[Cat Jones]

There was one in the Xijiao Hotel off WangZhuangLu. Not sure if it's still there though.

[ChTTay]

The small road that leads to 华请嘉园 next to Burger King. The road is just after a bakery on the left and perhaps a clothes shop, after that is the road, after the road is Burger King.

On that road a woman sells DVD's on a table almost every evening. Another woman (perhaps related) sells clothes in the same general area.

They have been there a few months but who knows when they might move on again

[Ruben von Zwack]

Are they any good? I'll be in Beijing soon and I want to buy some DVDs. But in the past I had many bootlegs that aren't working or causing problems, it's so disappointing. Anyone know a posh big DVD (and music CD and books ) store in Beijing where you can get lost for an hour or two just browing?

[stephaniepainter3]

Ok, if i am around wudaokou in the evening I will look for that lady. I am really bummed that the "DVD SHOP" is gone... They let you preview the movie in the store, so that you could examine its quality...

[Cat Jones]

You can *cough* download this stuff in China you know?

[PengHaoShi]

There are a few in the Sanlitun area, in the small backstreets behind the main Sanlitun south area and on the groundfloor of the fake market. Another small, but good one is in the Jenny Lou shop at Chaoyang park.

@Ruben: In Sanlitun you have Page One (big, modern store for English and Chinese books), next to Sanlitun the Bookworm (bookstore, cafe, event place: http://beijingbookworm.com/about-us/ ) and the big Chinese bookstores in Wangfujing like Xinhua.

But a big shop, selling DVDs - perhaps even real ones - I really don't know, neither in Beijing nor in Shanghai. I think, there is just no market for that. People either buy the fake ones on the street or download them from the net. Might be somebody else knows, I'm now here for only 12 years.

[ChTTay]

I don't buy DVD's ... but my friend has bought from that stall and he said the quality was fine. I think one DVD he bought was of unwatchable quality but otherwise no complaints. They have a small DVD player there usually (where they watch their own DVDs) so maybe they'd let you check the quality.

[tysond]

Malaysia used to be renowned for high quality fake DVDs. I've even been in Thailand and China and had street hawkers tell me "top quality! from Malaysia!".

However the market is in severe decline, not so much because of crackdown by police, but downloading.

A friend of mine walked past his regular DVD vendor in Kuala Lumpur who yelled at him "Hey, you never come here no more. You haven't been downloading have you? Don't do downloading. Don't download. Downloading is illegal one, you know? Illegal one!". He felt bad and bought a few fake DVDs for old-times sake.

I buy my DVDs on Amazon.cn legit whenever I can (actually DVD-9s are quite inexpensive). If not available (and a lot is not) I stream/download what is not available. I tried buying street DVDs and 90% didn't work. Stuff from Jenny Lou's in Sanlitun was OK but the information on the back was usually wrong (format, language, etc). I want accurate information on subtitles and languages. Also Jenny Lou's didn't seem to have much Chinese dubbed stuff, and I kind of hate how everything just comes in paper sleeves and not proper cases.

[stephaniepainter3]

Cat Jones, I would totally download stuff in China, but my internet is really slow... I am studying at BNU right now, and my VPN isn't working.... so it would be great if i could just get a dvd

[roddy]

BNU - there used to be a couple between the main gate and ... oh god, I'm forgetting my Beijing geography. The bridge on the north third ring road. One on the west side, one on the east. 'Course, there's entire subway lines gone in since then.