The world's archives

193–240 of 3,392 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 OnesFilms for young children by name: nursery rhymes, lullabies, preschool.
KidsCartoons and animation, children's and family films, and educational films, unless they deal with war, propaganda, crime, horror or drugs, or carry racial caricature.
TweensDocumentaries, science, nature and space, classic comedies, newsreels, commercials and lectures.
TeensEverything else, including anything we cannot tell about; war, crime, horror and westerns go no lower.
AdultSexual themes (such as the old "sex hygiene" films), gore, surgery, slaughter, atrocity footage.
Internet Archive [Twin Peaks Tunnel Construction and Opening] 1917 · Short · 6 min · Subtitles Twin Peaks trolley tunnel under construction and opening ceremony. Internet Archive All Night 1918 · Feature · 57 min A French bedroom style farce, a down-on-their-luck married society couple (Dorian and Warren) persuade an unmarried pair (Valentino and Myers) to take their… Internet Archive "A Temporary Truce" (1912) director D. W. Griffith 1912 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive Jack and the Beanstalk 1917 · Film · Subtitles Jack, a young boy from a poor family, exchanges the family cow for some magic beans. The beans grow overnight into a huge beanstalk which Jack climbs into the… Internet Archive Eyes of Youth 1919 · Feature A young woman, confronted by four options for proceeding in her life, is granted the ability to see what results would come from her choice of of the options.… Internet Archive "Cinderella" (1914) starring Mary Pickford 1914 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "A Tin-Type Romance" (1910) starring Florence Turner 1910 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "Ingmar's Sons" (1919) director Victor Sjöström (Seastrom) 1919 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "The World and Its Woman" (1919) director Frank Lloyd starring Geraldine Farrar 1919 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive [Parade Celebrating Chinese Republic] 1912 · Short · 2 min · Subtitles San Francisco, California: Parade celebrating the formation of the Chinese Republic under Sun Yat-Sen. Internet Archive THE MUSGRAVE TREASURE (1912) 1912 · Feature Georges Treville stars as Sherlock Holmes in an adaptation of Conan Doyle's "The Musgrave Ritual" Internet Archive Charlie Chaplin . A Night In The Show (1915, Classic, Silent, Short, Colorized Film noir) 1915 · Feature AKA: Charlie at the Show PLOT : Mr. Pest tries several theatre seats before winding up in front in a fight with the conductor. He is thrown out. In the lobby… Internet Archive "Love In The Hills" (1911) director D. W. Griffith cinematographer Billy Bitzer 1911 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "For Better, for Worse" (1919) director Cecil B.DeMille starring Gloria Swanson 1919 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive The Deluge 1911 · Film · Subtitles This is a silent Biblical drama performed 3317 years B.C., a picture of the destruction of the world by a flood. The Lord, observing the wickedness of the… Internet Archive "The Birth of a Nation" (1915) part I, director D. W. Griffith, cinematographer Billy Bitzer 1915 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive Going Straight (1916 Classic, Silent, Film Noir (tinted), Drama) 1916 · Feature · 58 min TAGLINE : Have we killed him? PLOT : A man and his wife both have criminal pasts, but have quit crime and are now respectable citizens. One day a member of… Internet Archive America Goes Over (Part I) 1918 · Short · 13 min · Subtitles Government-produced historical record of major World War I battles. Internet Archive The Sentimental Bloke (1919) 1919 · Short The film is based on C.J. Dennis' 1915 Australian poem The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke. The film was produce by a South Australian company, The Southern… Internet Archive "Julius Caesar" (1914) 1914 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive Mabel and Fatty Viewing the World's Fair 1915 · Short · 17 min Silent comedy legends Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle and Mabel Normand at the 1915 San Francisco World's Fair Panama-Pacific Exposition. The theme of the expo was… Internet Archive Animated Putty 1911 · Feature Internet Archive "The Woman God Forgot" (1917) director Cecil DeMille starring Geraldine Farrar 1917 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "The Kiss Of Death" (1916) director Victor Sjöström (Seastrom) 1916 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "Bobby The Coward" (1911) director D. W. Griffith starring Robert Harron 1911 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "The Wicked Darling" (1919) director Tod Browning featuring Lon Chaney 1919 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "Fisher Folks" (1911) director D. W. Griffith cinematographer Billy Bitzer 1911 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "The Lily Of The Tenements" (1911) director D. W. Griffith cinematographer Billy Bitzer 1911 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "A Gold Necklace" (1910) with Mary Pickford 1910 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive Home Electrical, The 1915 · Film · Subtitles Great old-fashioned silent film with great intertitles. 01:01:58:22 Great shot of electric horseless carriage-style automobile; men drive off in early… Internet Archive "The Failure" (1911) director D. W. Griffith cinematographer Billy Bitzer 1911 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive Max Linder in: A Farm-house Romance (Idylle a la ferme), 1912 1912 · Short · 9 min Pathe comedy by Max Linder. Premiered in Vienna June 14, 1912 and released in the US Dec. 20, 1912. "Max, who has sponged upon a wealthy uncle, is told by… Internet Archive "The Message Of The Violin" (1910) director D. W. Griffith cinematographer Billy Bitzer 1910 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "The Indian Brothers" (1911) director D. W. Griffith cinematographer Billy Bitzer 1911 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive Mabel, Fatty and the Law 1915 · Short · 11 min AKA "Fattys Spooning Days" After falling out, Mabel and her husband decide to go to the park to make up. While they are there they meet a couple in a similar… Internet Archive Modes of the Moment 1917 · Short · 3 min · Subtitles Early "footery fashions" film sponsored by the Walk-Over Company. Internet Archive The Cheat 1915 · Feature · 58 min Title: The Cheat Summary: A venal, spoiled stockbroker's wife impulsively embezzles $10,000 from the charity she chairs and desperately turns to a Burmese… Internet Archive "When A Man Loves" (1911) director D. W. Griffith with Mary Pickford 1911 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive The Unchanging Sea 1910 · Short · 14 min In this story set at a seaside fishing village and inspired by a Charles Kingsley poem "The three fishers", a young couple's happy life is turned about by an… Internet Archive "The Reformers" (1913) director D. W. Griffith cinematographer Billy Bitzer 1913 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "An Even Break" (1917) starring Olive Thomas 1917 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive "Barney Oldfield's Race For A Life" (1913) director Mack Sennett 1913 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive America Goes Over (Part II) 1918 · Short · 15 min · Subtitles Government-produced historical record of major World War I battles. Internet Archive "In Life's Cycle" (1910) director D. W. Griffith cinematographer Billy Bitzer 1910 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie… Internet Archive [Stunt Compilation] 1918 · Newsreel · 10 min · Subtitles Daredevils on skates, motorcycles, skis, airplanes, and windmills. Internet Archive National Cash Register 1910 · Film · Subtitles Compilation of historical film clips on the history of the National Cash Register Company. CONTAINS GOOD MATERIAL OF CHEERING CROWDS, PICNICS, HISTORICAL… Internet Archive A Days Pleasure (1919) 1919 · Feature A Day’s Pleasure (1919) is Charlie Chaplin’s fourth film for First National Films. It was created at the Chaplin Studio. It was a quickly made two-reeler to… Internet Archive "Muggsy's First Sweetheart" (1910) director D. W. Griffith with Mary Pickford 1910 · Feature This gem is presented by Silent Hall of Fame. Please visit https://silent-hall-of-fame.org/ to support our non-profit mission and the legacy of silent movie…