Prelinger Archives
7,681–7,728 of 10,346 films, free to watch, from the world's open archives.
Where these films come from, and who sees what
Every film here plays from the archive that keeps it: the Internet Archive, Wikimedia Commons, the NASA Image and Video Library, the Library of Congress and Open Images (the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision). Nothing is copied to this site. Each film's page names its archive, links to its page there, and states its licence or status as the archive does.
Archive films carry no age ratings, so each is placed from the collections it sits in and the subjects the archive gives it, cautiously. Sexual content and nudity are left out altogether.
| Little Ones | Films for young children by name: nursery rhymes, lullabies, preschool. |
|---|---|
| Kids | Cartoons and animation, children's and family films, and educational films, unless they deal with war, propaganda, crime, horror or drugs, or carry racial caricature. |
| Tweens | Documentaries, science, nature and space, classic comedies, newsreels, commercials and lectures. |
| Teens | Everything else, including anything we cannot tell about; war, crime, horror and westerns go no lower. |
| Adult | Sexual themes (such as the old "sex hygiene" films), gore, surgery, slaughter, atrocity footage. |
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 98343: Children
To come.
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 001708
An American family travels to Santa Catalina Island and other Southern California locations. Leader notes: "Al + Ann Catilina San Dimas Mother Victoria Laura…
Internet Archive
[Untitled: CBS Newsroom]
Workers in suits in offices. Film cans on shelves. CBS logo
Internet Archive
[Gould can S-22.8: Aztec Sacrifice]
Ceremonial Aztec Sacrifice
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 003387
Home movie picturing family events, including a child's Christmas in Detroit, and visits to Detroit, Canada and Niagara Falls. Note in can states: "Shauna's…
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 000885
Travel by train through a snowy mountainous landscape; multigenerational family groups gather at home and in the garden. Can notes: "Krebs Schuster To Calif.…
Internet Archive
Vista Stock Shots: San Francisco, Skyline Stock Footage, Golden Gate Bridge
Internet Archive
Glass : Its Discovery, Manufacture and Use
Silent film looks at the discovery of glass and how it is manufactured.
Internet Archive
Our Town Today
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 98764: Ohio Family
To come.
Internet Archive
Century of Progress Exposition - Around the Fair With Burton Holmes
Internet Archive
Land, The Part I
Difficulties faced by family frmers
Internet Archive
[Besler Corporation film]
Steam-driven aircraft, trains and automobiles.
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 97505: South Dakota & Wyoming
To come.
Internet Archive
Home movie: 000543d: 1950s Pennsylvania, Conneaut Lake, social and recreational scenes
Home movie: 000543d: 1950s Pennsylvania, Conneaut Lake, social and recreational scenes
Internet Archive
Sports in Boobeville
Two film segments spliced together. The first film features boxing and is likely a segment from the film How to Train by Gene Tunney (see item 202378). The…
Internet Archive
[California Industries]
Survey of industry in Central and Northern California, set to a Wurlitzer organ soundtrack. Covers lumber, glass, paint, cement, mineral, oil, steel and iron,…
Internet Archive
Home Movie: Zellerbach Collection: 012669
James D. Zellerbach, U.S. Ambassador to Italy 1957-60, and family take the ocean liner Queen Mary to Europe and tour Italy in the late 1940s. Includes silent…
Internet Archive
Home movie: 010065_001: 1960s New York and DC tourism and family
Home movie: 010065_001: 1960s New York and DC tourism and family
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 10995: Home Scenes
To come.
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 000936
Farm labor and ice skating on a pond. Can notes: "End of this reel lent to Dan Efroymson for copying 9/10/87 / Florida 1949 / old pictures / Carrie's 8th /…
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 097700
Images of yard work in early springtime, gardening, and spring flowers blooming. Much of the film is composed of closeups of flowers.
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 004760
Content warning: Titles use an offensive term for an Indigenous woman. Travel through the Southwest and California with images of Grand Canyon National Park,…
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 003434
Shows the seasons changing from a snowy winter to a floral spring and an active summer filled with water sports. Features sequence of women dressed up in ball…
Internet Archive
Song Birds as Neighbors
Internet Archive
Home Movie PA 000230
Home Movie PA 000230
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 097783
Trips to Bryce Canyon National Park and Grand Canyon National Park, and people posing outside of their homes and a school building.
Internet Archive
Home movie: 001133: 1970s California and the West
Home movie: 001133: 1970s California and the West
Internet Archive
Home Movie: Koura Collection: 005832
A visit to Japan by a Japanese American family with attention to devotional and respectful visits to cemeteries, religious sites, tourist destinations, and…
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 096513
Kodachrome color footage of rural North Carolina in the early 1940s, showing picnics, kayaking, boating in the surf and autumn leaves.
Internet Archive
[Germany Stock Scenes]
Internet Archive
[Home Movies: Camp Polk]
Internet Archive
In Siamese Society
In Siamese Society
Internet Archive
Fulton National Bank of Atlanta
Skeletal Entry
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 98996: Unidentified
To come.
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 97207: Family and Travel
To come.
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 11780: Graphman Collection
to come
Internet Archive
[Conner NARA footage]
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 97289: Springfield Fair, Catskill Game Farm
To come.
Internet Archive
1008 Grandma Goes To School Silent
to come
Internet Archive
[Home Movies: Can 10680: Michigan]
train yard (B&W), family, birthday
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 004718
A trip through the central coast of California, including footage of California missions, Hearst Castle, and a Barry Goldwater presidential campaign event.…
Internet Archive
20 Years an Esso Dealer
Skeletal Entry
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 004269
Travels in England, Scotland, and the Netherlands in the 1930s. Features Changing of the Guard ceremony, a survey of historic architecture, and pre-World War…
Internet Archive
Home Movie: 97501: Family and Home
To come.
Internet Archive
Forest Fun: Growing Trees
Live action and puppet animation about california forests
Internet Archive
The Arm Behind the Army
Content warning: Includes images of people killed in the Holocaust and Nazi leadership personnel and iconography. Artful persuasion film uses historical…
Internet Archive
America's Critics Abroad
At the height of the Cold War, this tidbit of propaganda was produced using ridiculously exaggerated caricatures of American types to instruct members of the…