This is the first film to be released directly on VHS in 20 years!

Robert dos Santos directed This Is How the World Ends, a science fiction thriller for your… VCR!

In the age of streaming and platforms, a South African director is making the most improbable bet of the year: releasing his film… directly on VHS.

Titled This Is How the World Endsthis science fiction thriller even claims the status of the first “Direct-to-VHS” film in almost 20 years!

It must be said that the last VCR was manufactured in 2016. And most of the devices are out of service, covered in dust in the back of the garage or have long been thrown into the recycling center.

But Robert dos Santos, who is making his first feature film here, sensed the right promotional opportunity to put his film forward.

He explains in Variety that this choice of VHS is also a symbolic response to the rise of artificial intelligence in the industry:

“The idea was to ask what VHS looks like in 2026 and how to reinvent what Direct-to-VHS means today. For a long time, it was an insult. On the contrary, we want to show that a film released on VHS can be produced with care and intended for a real audience..”

The first orders seem to prove him right: more than 1,000 cassettes have already been pre-ordered around the world even before the official release, scheduled for June 7 on the occasion of National VCR Day. The film could then experience an even more atypical journey with a possible theatrical release, currently under discussion after several promising meetings at the Cannes Film Festival.

So what is this about? The film follows Tom, a young man who journeys through a world on the brink of collapse to find his sister. As a war breaks out between humanity and machine states controlled by artificial intelligence, some believe the end of the world is approaching. Danni then decides to join “the last party on Earth”, organized in the middle of the desert, while her brother goes looking for her.

Josh Kempen plays the lead role in this post-apocalyptic adventure filmed largely in Afrikaburn, the South African equivalent of the famous Burning Man.

“Some people think we are shooting ourselves in the foot by already releasing the film on VHS. But others think it’s great, because we’re building a community of viewers who love our way of making cinema and the creative process as much as the end result..”

What makes you want to go looking for your VCR?