Original DVD remote and my attempt to redesign it:
Sample task models (even these level of roughness helped a lot):
Basically, my solutions leaves only the elements you need to access directly while watching videos: "play" (/pause when pressed again), "volume", "brightness", "subtitles" and "menu". The rest of functionality can be made accessible through the menu (hence the arrows, plus "enter"). On top is power on/off and eject/inject.
Try it yourself - here's the link