DVD player issue?

I have several feature film DVDs now which have serial codes that I can use to obtain a digital copy of for use on my iPad etc. None of these DVDs will 'load up', nor will any other DVD films that I have to view on my computer. I am also unable to burn anything using iDVD onto blank discs which have recently been purchased. There is a wait of 10-15 seconds, some whirring in the background, and then the disc is finally ejected.

Although my mac is just over 2 years old, I had never used the disc player until very recently. CDs containing music do eventually load, as do photo CDs bizarrely.

Any information and/or help would be greatly appreciated, as I have a surprise video that I would like to record onto disc for my sisters wedding coming up in a few weeks.

There are multiple "heads" in a modern CD/DVD drive, and it's not at all unusual to have one fail, while the others work fine. Seems to me like you might have a bad drive. Unfortunately, the slot-loading drives are just not as reliable as a typical tray-loading drive.

If the machine is out of warranty, the easiest solution is to just pick up a cheap external/USB drive.