LibGuides: Film: Overview

Introduction

Welcome! Whether you're looking for articles, film criticism, or streaming video, this guide can help you find it.

Articles, Reviews, & Other Resources to Start With

Film Indexes Online This link opens in a new window
Combined access to several collections of film- and entertainment-related articles.
Includes these collections:
- AFI Catalog (1893-present)
- Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive (1880-2000)
- FIAF International Index to Film Periodicals (1972-present)
- Film Index International (1900-present)
- Performing Arts Periodicals Database (1864-present)
Performing Arts Periodicals Database This link opens in a new window
1864-present; index of articles in theatre, dance, & film.
Internet Movie Database This link opens in a new window
Database of information about films, television shows, video games, cast & crew members, production data. Includes links to reviews.
Entertainment Industry Magazine Archive This link opens in a new window
Complete runs of digitized major trade and consumer magazines, from their inception to 2000, including Variety, Billboard, and others.

Including the collections "Cinema, Film and Television" and "Music, Radio and The Stage," this archival research resource contains the essential primary sources for studying the history of the film and entertainment industries. Core US and UK trade magazines covering film, music, broadcasting, and theater, together with film fan magazines, and music press titles, from the era of vaudeville and silent movies through to 2000. [More info]

Suggested Streaming Film Collections

Academic Video Online This link opens in a new window
Offers nearly 70,000 streamed videos in a wide range of subject areas. Includes documentaries, feature films, news programs, and more.

Academic Video Online delivers nearly 70,000 titles spanning the widest range of subject areas including anthropology, business, counseling, film, health, history, music, and more. The database includes includes documentaries, interviews, feature films, performances, news programs and newsreels, demonstrations, and raw footage. Distributors include CNN, PBS, A&E Television, BBC, 60 Minutes (CBS), Sony Pictures Classics, First Run Features, Documentary Educational Resources, and many others.
Alexander Street Video This link opens in a new window
Streaming videos and documentaries.
Independent World Cinema: Classic and Contemporary Film This link opens in a new window
Over 400 of the most important and innovative films from the early 20th Century to today.

Features independent distributors Zeitgeist Films, Pragda, Milestone, and Oscilloscope. Includes feature films, animated films, and documentaries.
Kanopy Streaming Video This link opens in a new window
Over 30,000 documentary from an array of producers and distributors.

Kanopy Streaming offers a variety of documentary and feature films from an array of producers and distributors including BBC Active, California Newsreel, Checkerboard Films, Criterion Collection/Janus films, Documentary Educational Resources, First Run Features, Green Planet Films, Kino Lorber Edu, Media Education Foundation, National Film Board of Canada, PBS, Psychotherapy.net, and the DEFA Film Library's (East) German Film Collection.

All videos work on PCs with Flash, iPads, iPhones, and mobile devices. To facilitate teaching, they can be projected in lecture halls, embedded in authenticated web pages, and watched off-campus (with login) with unlimited simultaneous viewers. Users can also create Playlists and make clips.
Silent Film Online This link opens in a new window
Classic films from the silent era, in streaming video.

Classic and little-known films from the silent era, the 1890s to 1930s. Feature films, shorts and serials are represented. Includes classics such as "Birth of a Nation", "Intolerance", "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" and Battleship Potemkin". Included are films distributed by British Film Institute National Archive, Cineteca Bologna and Lobster Films in Paris.

When complete, Silent Film Online will include films distributed by Flicker Alley, including several early films by Charlie Chaplin, Lumiere, Mendel, Cecil B. DeMille, and Abel Gance.

Covers 1890s-1930s.