Playing DVD movies on Ubuntu 21.10

I have installed Ubuntu version 21.10 on a friends 12-year-old Gateway laptop.

I tried playing a DVD movie with the Videos software included with Ubuntu, it opens the movie but then it just gives a blank screen, I can click the Pause/Play button but no picture or audio.

I then installed VLC using the command

$ sudo apt install vlc

and looking on this site it says the following needs to be installed

$ sudo apt install vlc-plugin-access-extra libbluray-bdj libdvdcss2

This gives the error message:

Note, selecting 'libdvd-pkg' instead of 'libdvdcss2'
Unable to locate package libblueray"

VLC version is 3.0.16-1

I ran VLC and tried to play a DVD movie, I clicked Media/Open Disk and selected DVD, Disk device: /dev/sr0 - the DVD Title displays at the top header and then closes with no error message. I restarted the computer but the same thing happened. The DVD plays on my Windows 10 desktop using VLC and on my DVD player attached to my TV without any problems.

I live in Australia and purchased the DVD in Australia, DVD region is 4.

I then ran VLC from the Terminal, it also didn't work, here is a screenshot of the error:

I have tried numerous other procedures from searching this site and the Internet but nothing seems to work, so I reinstalled Ubuntu 21.10 and tried again to play DVD movies, the same problem.

Audio CDs play without problem.

Any suggestions about running DVD videos on Ubuntu 21.10 would be appreciated, I have only been using Ubuntu for a few days so please, nothing too technical.

1 Answer

As per guiverc advice, I installed libdvd-pkg using the command "sudo apt-get update -y" then "sudo apt-get install -y libdvd-pkg"

I ran Videos and it displayed a message saying "DVD Source is required to play this file, but is not installed", I clicked the button "Find in Ubuntu Software", it said it was not available. I did a Google search and found this website and installed it as per instructions.

Still it didn't work. I then tried to play a .VOB file on DVD using Videos, this said MPEG was not installed, I clicked the button "Find in Ubuntu Software", and it installed OK. It then played the .VOB file. I then ran Videos and it played the DVD movie.

Still VLC will not play DVD movies.

I'm not sure which of the above solved the problem, I have never installed MPEG software before, this might be the answer. If anyone has a definitive answer please post it, especially playing DVD movies on VLC.