20th Century Fox

One of the first features shot in CinemaScope, this Twentieth Century-Fox adventure drops a Romeo-and-Juliet romance into the sponge-diving wars of Tarpon Springs, Florida. Robert Wagner plays Tony Petrakis, son of a Greek sponge-boat captain (Gilbert Roland), who falls for Gwyneth Rhys (Terry Moore), daughter of the rival clan led by Richard Boone. Directed by Robert D. Webb, the film is remembered less for its melodrama than for Edward Cronjager's Oscar-nominated underwater cinematography and a shimmering early score by Bernard Herrmann. Shot on location in Florida and the Bahamas, it entered the public domain in the United States after its copyright was not renewed.

Adventure · Drama

Warner Oland's tenth outing as Charlie Chan sends the detective to a San Francisco mansion where Allen Colby, the heir to the Lowell fortune, has returned after being presumed drowned for seven years — and is murdered at a séance before he can reclaim a cent. Chan sifts through a household of psychics, suspicious relatives, and a butler who knows more than he says, while the killer keeps striking. Henrietta Crosman and Rosina Lawrence co-star, with Jonathan Hale as the police chief. Directed by Gordon Wiles, it is one of the more atmospheric of the Fox Chan pictures, leaning hard into spiritualism and old-dark-house menace. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal of copyright.

Mystery · Crime · Thriller

From her hotel window, Janet Stewart witnesses Dr. Richard Cross (Vincent Price) murder his wife — and the sight leaves her in a catatonic state. Worse, she's committed to Cross's own sanitarium, where the doctor must decide whether to cure her or make sure she never recovers. Shock was Vincent Price's first real stab at a psychological thriller, and he plays the charming, increasingly desperate psychiatrist with silky menace. Made at 20th Century Fox on a B-picture budget, it's in the public domain.

Noir · Thriller · Drama

A 1950 American drama written and directed by George Seaton, shot on location in bombed-out Berlin barely a year after the airlift ended. Montgomery Clift plays Danny MacCullough, a C-54 flight engineer, and Paul Douglas plays Hank Kowalski, a ground-controlled approach operator whose wartime experience as a POW leaves him bitter toward the Germans they are now feeding. Danny falls for a German war widow (Cornell Borchers) whose motives are not what they seem. Nearly every military role apart from the two leads is played by actual Air Force personnel, and the film incorporates real airlift operations at Tempelhof, making it a semi-documentary record of Operation Vittles. The copyright was never renewed; this is the complete 120-minute print rather than the common 102-minute cut.

War · Drama

A wealthy insurance broker receives a death threat from a killer known as the Gorilla and hires three bumbling detectives, the Ritz Brothers, to protect him. On the appointed night, a real escaped gorilla appears at the mansion just as the lights go out, and the detectives scramble through secret panels and hidden catacombs trying to tell the murderer from the ape. Bela Lugosi plays the sinister butler, Peters, in a role originally written for Peter Lorre. Allan Dwan, a veteran director whose career began in the silent era, keeps the slapstick moving at a brisk pace. The film is based on the 1925 stage play by Ralph Spence that was a Broadway hit. It entered the public domain due to non-renewal of its copyright.

Comedy · Horror

Shirley Temple stars as Sara Crewe, a wealthy girl left at a strict boarding school when her father goes off to war. Reported dead, he is presumed lost and Sara is reduced to a servant, but she clings to her imagination and kindness. One of Temple's best-remembered features, lavishly produced in Technicolor. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Family · Drama

A writer, injured on an African safari and waiting to find out if his leg will be amputated, drifts in and out of fevered memories of the women and adventures he let slip away. Gregory Peck stars in this loose adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's short story. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Drama · Adventure · Romance

A 1950 American war drama directed by Jean Negulesco and produced by Nunnally Johnson, based on Agnes Newton Keith's memoir of her imprisonment by the Japanese in Borneo during World War II. Claudette Colbert plays Keith, an American writer living in North Borneo who is separated from her husband (Patric Knowles) and interned with her young son in a brutal women's POW camp, where the camp commander Colonel Suga (Sessue Hayakawa) — an admirer of her book — proves an ambiguous figure. Grim and unusually frank for a studio picture of its era, the film was shot on location and earned Colbert some of the strongest reviews of her career. It entered the public domain through non-renewal.

War · Drama

Africa Squawks is a 1939 Terrytoons cartoon directed by Connie Rasinski, featuring the character Major Doolittle. The paunchy, monocled Englishman and his valet Jarvis go big-game hunting in Africa, where they try to trap a lion by dressing the servant in a lion skin — only to be outwitted at every turn. The short was part of a brief Terrytoons series built around the Colonel Blimp-like Major Doolittle. The film is in the public domain.

Animation · Comedy

Ten strangers lured to a remote island mansion by the unseen "Mr. Owen" are accused by a gramophone recording of crimes the law couldn't touch — then begin dying one by one, following the nursery rhyme tacked above the mantel. René Clair's adaptation of Agatha Christie's novel keeps the jagged suspense while letting an impeccable ensemble — Barry Fitzgerald, Walter Huston, Louis Hayward, Roland Young, June Duprez — play it with dry wit. Still the benchmark screen version of the most-read mystery novel ever written. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Crime · Mystery · Drama

One of the first features shot in CinemaScope, this Twentieth Century-Fox adventure drops a Romeo-and-Juliet romance into the sponge-diving wars of Tarpon Springs, Florida. Robert Wagner plays Tony Petrakis, son of a Greek sponge-boat captain (Gilbert Roland), who falls for Gwyneth Rhys (Terry Moore), daughter of the rival clan led by Richard Boone. Directed by Robert D. Webb, the film is remembered less for its melodrama than for Edward Cronjager's Oscar-nominated underwater cinematography and a shimmering early score by Bernard Herrmann. Shot on location in Florida and the Bahamas, it entered the public domain in the United States after its copyright was not renewed.

Adventure · Drama

Jackie Cooper plays Bill Peck, the mischief-making boy of George W. Peck's stories, whose pranks and misadventures keep landing him in trouble just as his father (Thomas Meighan) is running for mayor. When Bill's well-meaning meddling threatens to torpedo the campaign, he has to set things right the hard way. Directed by Edward F. Cline — a veteran of the Keaton shorts — for Sol Lesser Productions. The film is in the public domain.

Comedy · Family

From her hotel window, Janet Stewart witnesses Dr. Richard Cross (Vincent Price) murder his wife — and the sight leaves her in a catatonic state. Worse, she's committed to Cross's own sanitarium, where the doctor must decide whether to cure her or make sure she never recovers. Shock was Vincent Price's first real stab at a psychological thriller, and he plays the charming, increasingly desperate psychiatrist with silky menace. Made at 20th Century Fox on a B-picture budget, it's in the public domain.

Noir · Thriller · Drama

A 1950 American drama written and directed by George Seaton, shot on location in bombed-out Berlin barely a year after the airlift ended. Montgomery Clift plays Danny MacCullough, a C-54 flight engineer, and Paul Douglas plays Hank Kowalski, a ground-controlled approach operator whose wartime experience as a POW leaves him bitter toward the Germans they are now feeding. Danny falls for a German war widow (Cornell Borchers) whose motives are not what they seem. Nearly every military role apart from the two leads is played by actual Air Force personnel, and the film incorporates real airlift operations at Tempelhof, making it a semi-documentary record of Operation Vittles. The copyright was never renewed; this is the complete 120-minute print rather than the common 102-minute cut.

War · Drama

A wealthy insurance broker receives a death threat from a killer known as the Gorilla and hires three bumbling detectives, the Ritz Brothers, to protect him. On the appointed night, a real escaped gorilla appears at the mansion just as the lights go out, and the detectives scramble through secret panels and hidden catacombs trying to tell the murderer from the ape. Bela Lugosi plays the sinister butler, Peters, in a role originally written for Peter Lorre. Allan Dwan, a veteran director whose career began in the silent era, keeps the slapstick moving at a brisk pace. The film is based on the 1925 stage play by Ralph Spence that was a Broadway hit. It entered the public domain due to non-renewal of its copyright.

Comedy · Horror

Shirley Temple stars as Sara Crewe, a wealthy girl left at a strict boarding school when her father goes off to war. Reported dead, he is presumed lost and Sara is reduced to a servant, but she clings to her imagination and kindness. One of Temple's best-remembered features, lavishly produced in Technicolor. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Family · Drama

A wealthy woman in the middle of a divorce shoots her husband, and calls the one person she trusts to help her cover it up: her boyfriend, a San Francisco police lieutenant. He helps her hide the body, and then has to keep the investigation away from the crime, which is hard because the detective assigned to the case is his own younger brother. Lee J. Cobb plays the lieutenant who bends the law for love and then watches the walls close in, and Jane Wyatt is the woman who pulls him down with her. The film was shot on location in San Francisco, and the city's hills and stairways become part of the chase. It was the first independent production of Phoenix Films, run by Jack M. Warner, the son of Warner Bros. chief Jack L. Warner. The film entered the public domain due to non-renewal of its copyright.

Crime · Noir

A writer, injured on an African safari and waiting to find out if his leg will be amputated, drifts in and out of fevered memories of the women and adventures he let slip away. Gregory Peck stars in this loose adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's short story. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Drama · Adventure · Romance

A 1950 American war drama directed by Jean Negulesco and produced by Nunnally Johnson, based on Agnes Newton Keith's memoir of her imprisonment by the Japanese in Borneo during World War II. Claudette Colbert plays Keith, an American writer living in North Borneo who is separated from her husband (Patric Knowles) and interned with her young son in a brutal women's POW camp, where the camp commander Colonel Suga (Sessue Hayakawa) — an admirer of her book — proves an ambiguous figure. Grim and unusually frank for a studio picture of its era, the film was shot on location and earned Colbert some of the strongest reviews of her career. It entered the public domain through non-renewal.

War · Drama