I use VLC for videos. It just works, so I have not thought much about Totem.
However, after installing 8.10 and looking at Totem. I see that there are two
versions of Totem. Totem as installed uses gstreamer, but if you want you can
install Totem-xine which will replace gstreamer as the engine used by Totem with
xine. This reputedly gives better performance. Perhaps others who use Totem can
confirm or deny this. As I say I use VLC. But it may explain why some users
report problems with Totem while others don't.