Most of you guys have heard of ClearPlay, right? For me, ClearPlay has always been this unattainable thing that I would like to have but it's too expensive, etc etc. Well, then I heard about VidAngel. https://www.vidangel.com/
At first I was put off by VidAngel because of three things.
1) I couldn't view what movies they had without creating an account.
2) Their lingo seems to be "Watch movies however the bleep you want," and I think that is kind of in poor taste.
3) They advertise watching movies for $1 (SD) or $2 (HD), if you sell them back. In the interest of full disclosure, they charge $20 right off, and when you sell it back within 24 hours (which you can have done automatically so you don't forget, which is cool) instead of actually refunding to your credit or debit card, they put $19 (or $18) credit on your VidAngel account, to be used for your next movie. Which will dig into your actual money another $1, and so on, so it's basically like you're keeping $19 in your account at VidAngel in order to use their service.
So, for number one... it was true, but all they required was your email and a password made to view and change settings and everything. They won't actually ask for billing information until you're really going to buy a movie.
For number two... I have no excuses to make for them. That's in bad taste. :P
For number three, this is a bit of a bummer, BUT if you really want your money back, you CAN (at least, they say so-- I haven't tried it myself) close your account and they will refund you whatever money you had left in credits. So it's still more fair than it COULD be. ;)
Anyways. So, before publishing this post, I decided to give it a go. Y'all have probably heard of Austenland... although I didn't expect much from this movie, I was curious about it (I mean... how could I NOT be...) so I decided that, as now I had access to a filter, I would give it a go. If you're curious about the movie, you can ask me about it. Even encourage me to give a review. But this is a review of VidAngel, not Austenland, so.
However, I will say the one of the very few things that satisfied me in the movie was JJ Feild's character and acting. Ahhhhhh. *inserts pictures*
And Jane's WALLPAPER! and china!!!! And rotary phone! And also this quote.
Now, moving forward. For your account you can have general settings to specify the kinds of things you do and don't want to see in each category. But you can also change the filter for particular movies-- which obviously I would always do. For this one, I filtered out all the swear words-- and that worked beautifully. The conversations still made sense although it was obviously muted in some spots-- but it was tactful so I couldn't tell what they were going to say. There was a lot of suggestiveness in this movie, I have to say, and even though I did set the filters pretty high, there were still some things that made me uncomfortable. So just be aware that if it's a movie that has a lot of that, it won't be easy for them to filter out without you missing some of the story.
This movie didn't have much in the way of violence, so I couldn't really test that out, but I've examined the filters for other movies/shows and it looks pretty thorough. (That's another thing-- you could totally make an account just to see exactly how much content is in something, if IMDb isn't working for you.)
The streaming wasn't great, although I didn't buy the HD because I'm cheap. And I'm not sure how much was the fault of my computer. But, the process was all very simple and easy to use.
I definitely recommend it for language, and also movies where there's like, That One Scene. And I think it's lovely that you're not required to have a membership.
It would even be good just for looking at movies! There are links to trailers and EVERYTHING! I have to say, this website is pretty cool.
As for the period drama selection-- it's not great, but there are still some things you might find interesting. And they are still adding to their collection. (Something that made ME excited-- THEY HAVE SHERLOCK. Yusssss.)
Now, IF YOU'RE INTERESTED IN TRYING THIS. I really am writing this post out of the goodness of my heart. BUT. If you're going to get an account, do let me know first so I can email you an invitation... that way, if you click on my link, and then make an account, and then end up getting a movie, you will be one of the five people who could make it possible for me to have a year of free movies with VidAngel, which would be SPLENDID and I would be very pleased. Heehee. Oh yes and it needs to be by November 21st. ;)
So. That's all for now, folks.
4 comments:
My family recently discovered Vidangel and it's been AWESOME. I've seen so many movies lately that I never thought I'd get to see because of Content. :) The only issue we have with it is that, because the amount of Internet we can use is very limited, we can't just watch the movies we've purchased whenever we want. :P But other than that, it's great!
~Eva
P.S. Although I must say that I thought their logo was in bad taste, too.
I just watched Austenland for the first time last week! Mostly for JJ Fields, but I was a little curious about the movie as a whole, too. I really liked it; nice little chick flick.
My family did use Clearplay for about a year, but we don't watch many movies that require a filter, so we dropped our membership. I still have siblings in kindergarten and elementary grades, so I don't see us watching any movies that would need a filter system anytime soon.
I've never heard of VidAngel! What an odd payment system... But that would be certainly useful for good movies with uncomfortable uses of the English language.
Yes, please do review Austenland! I'm very curious about it! Did you like it?
Ooh yes please! :-) I'll check it out!
~E
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