General: My film collection

A friend of mine recently wrote in his blog, "If you have a large music collection, don't leave it to your family when you die. The chances are they won't appreciate it and they'll dump it in the trash. It's better to sell your records before you go, so they'll be in the hands of someone who will find pleasure in them".

Those are wise words, but there's a fault in his argument. Some of us are ill and know we're going to die, but death can also come unexpectedly. I could be hit by a car crossing the road tomorrow.

I used to have a large music collection, about 1800 CDs, but in June 2000 everything was stolen while I was in hospital. I know who took them. It was Thomas Kuzilla of Dearborn Heights, Michigan. He knew they were worth a lot to me, so he sent me emails offering to sell them back to me. I was in hospital for over a year, and I didn't read most of the emails until I got home. His girlfriend, who was my ex-girlfriend, sent me a package with about 20 CDs. She wrote that she couldn't send more without Thomas noticing. I don't know how he was treating her, but she was obviously scared of him.

But that's getting off the topic of this post. I've re-bought my favourite CDs, but I had to make do with downloading MP3's for the rest, so today I only have about 100 CDs. My main collection is my film collection on DVD and Blu-ray. Apart from 1600 films, I have dozens of television box sets, so it's difficult for me to estimate the total number of discs. If I were hit by a car tomorrow my daughter would be overwhelmed by the size of the collection and wouldn't know what to do with it. Her mother, my ex-wife, has already told me I should throw my DVDs away because they take up too much space, so I have little doubt that in the event of my sudden death most or all of my collection would be destroyed.

My film collection is a mixed bunch. Most of the DVDs are common films that can be bought as used copies for two pounds or less. There are a few rarities among them that collectors would pay high prices for. If my daughter tried selling a few of my DVDs on Ebay and didn't get much for them she would give up and throw the rest away.

How can I get around this? I could put a clause in my Will that my property isn't allowed to be destroyed, but I don't know if it would be enforcible. It might be legally enforcible, but in practice it would be impossible to check. My family might nod politely to the lawyer reading out the conditions, but ten years later they would assume everything's been forgotten and they would dump everything anyway.

Think of this blog post as a promise. In the event of my death, whether it's in 30 years, seven years or tomorrow, any of my friends who read this have permission to visit my house and take with them any of my DVDs or Blu-ray discs that my daughter doesn't want to keep. My collection is well sorted by category, so unless everything has already been thrown into boxes it should be easy to find what you like.

In case anyone intends to ask me why this post includes photos of Ai Shinozaki, let me ask you a question first: Is there any reason why I shouldn't post photos of her? She's the world's most beautiful actress, in my opinion, so she deserves to be seen.