how to have custom play back of flash videos

[Aryeh Friedman]

I often want to control how a flash video is controlled as a simple
example I may want to put it on infinite loop with other overlapping
sound and perhaps video sources a more complex one is if I want to
seriously play with the video (as much vlc allows)... so basic I am
asking how do I a) download flash reliably and 2) convert it to some
format vlc/tutom/etc, can handle