1950s Films

Two former nightclub partners, now an army sergeant and a hapless private at a stateside training post, run afoul of officers, paperwork, and the women's auxiliary in a series of service-comedy routines. Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis star in their first starring vehicle. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Comedy · Musical

The Los Angeles police know that Pete Ritchie is smuggling narcotics across the Mexican border, but they cannot make a single charge stick. They send an undercover officer, Madeleine Haley, to get close to his operation. Before she can get anywhere, she is grabbed by Johnny McEvoy, a government agent posing as a hoodlum who is also after Ritchie. Neither knows the other is on the same side of the law, and the two of them end up running the border together while Ritchie closes in. Fred MacMurray and Claire Trevor play the two agents who keep each other in the dark, and Raymond Burr is the heavy. The film was the first production of Borderline Pictures, formed by MacMurray, director William Seiter, and producer Milton Bren, who deferred their own salaries to make it. It entered the public domain due to non-renewal of its copyright.

Crime · Noir · Thriller

The seventeenth-century swordsman and poet Cyrano, self-conscious about his enormous nose, loves the beautiful Roxane but helps a handsome but inarticulate rival woo her with his words. Jose Ferrer won the Academy Award for Best Actor for the role. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Drama · Romance · Adventure

Frank Bigelow walks into a police station and says he wants to report a murder: his own. The film then rewinds to show how he got there. Frank, a small-town accountant, is in San Francisco for a few days and is slipped a luminous poison in a drink at a bar. A doctor tells him he has only days to live and no cure exists, and Frank spends his remaining hours trying to find out who killed him and why. The premise, a man investigating his own murder, is one of the tightest hooks in film noir. Rudolph Maté had been a cinematographer before he directed, and the film has a clean, hard look. The story ties Frank's death to a routine bill of sale he notarized, a small thing with large consequences. The film entered the public domain due to non-renewal of its copyright.

Noir · Thriller

Little Audrey tries to avoid a spanking from her teacher by hiding in a magical storybook world, where she encounters storybook characters and comic mischief. A Bill Tytla-directed Noveltoons short featuring Little Audrey. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy · Family

Pleased to Eat You is a 1950 Noveltoons cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Isadore Sparber and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The short features a hungry lion who escapes from the zoo and attempts to find a meal, encountering various animals and people along the way. The cartoon features animation by Myron Waldman and William Pattengill, with music by Winston Sharples. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy

Quack-a-Doodle-Doo is a 1950 Noveltoons cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Isadore Sparber and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The short marks the very first appearance of Baby Huey, the oversized and dimwitted duckling who would become one of the most popular Noveltoons characters. A fox attempts to make a meal of the newly hatched Huey, but the enormous duckling's innocent clumsiness inadvertently foils the predator's plans. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy

Dan Brady is a garage mechanic who wants to impress a waitress, so he borrows twenty dollars from the till at work, intending to pay it back before anyone notices. He does not. One small bad choice leads to another, and within a day Dan has stolen a car, robbed a nightclub, and talked himself deeper with every lie. Mickey Rooney plays him as a normal guy who keeps making the wrong decision under pressure, and the film watches a petty theft snowball into serious crime with a kind of grim inevitability. Peter Lorre is the amusement-pier owner who pulls Dan further in. The film was shot on a low budget with Rooney and Lorre helping to finance it themselves. It entered the public domain due to non-renewal of its copyright.

Crime · Noir

Saved by the Bell is a 1950 Noveltoons cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Seymour Kneitel and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The short features Blackie the Lamb and Wolfie the Wolf in one of their recurring confrontations, this time set in a school context. The Blackie and Wolfie characters were staples of the Noveltoons series throughout the 1940s and 1950s. The film is in the public domain.

Animation · Comedy

Teacher's Pest is a 1950 Noveltoons cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Isadore Sparber and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The short features Junior Owl on his way to his first day of kindergarten, trying to live up to the reputation of owls being wise. But Mr. Wolf knows a few tricks of his own, and Junior ends up in the wolf's pot of boiling water before Mama Owl saves him. This was Wolfie's final appearance in the Noveltoon series. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy

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 1950 American film noir Western directed by John Sturges, starring Lew Ayres and Teresa Wright. Lin Vanner, an American oil company manager in Mexico, shoots a man he believes stole the payroll — then learns the suspect was likely innocent. Guilt-ridden, he seeks out the dead man's widow Ellen and her son at their remote ranch, concealing his role in her husband's death as an uneasy romance grows between them. An early credit for Sturges before his run of classic Westerns, the film is a compact psychological study of guilt and expiation. It entered the public domain and is also known by its reissue title, Tar Comes Back.

Drama · Crime · Western

Jimmy Durante leads a down-on-their-luck vaudeville family whose Christmas turns around when Rupert, a trained squirrel, starts retrieving cash their miserly landlord has hidden inside a wall. Produced by George Pal — later famous for The War of the Worlds — with Rupert brought to life through Pal's signature stop-motion Puppetoon animation. Directed by Irving Pichel, the film blends holiday comedy with a gentle satire on sudden wealth. It is in the public domain through non-renewal of copyright, and later reissued in colorized form as A Christmas Wish.

Family · Comedy

Jackie Robinson stars as himself in this biographical film tracing his journey from college athlete to becoming the first African American player in Major League Baseball, facing bigotry and prejudice with dignity and courage. Co-starring Ruby Dee as his wife. Directed by Alfred E. Green. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Biography · Drama · Sports

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 1950 psychological noir directed by James V. Kern. Robert Young — playing against his wholesome image — is Jeff Cohalan, an architect haunted by his wife's murder on their honeymoon and a string of inexplicable accidents that seem to follow him. When he meets the warmhearted Ellen Foster (Betsy Drake) on a train, she's drawn into his dark world and begins to wonder whether Jeff is a cursed man, a madman, or the target of something more sinister. A moody, underrated mystery with a striking finale at a cliffside house, the film is in the public domain.

Drama · Mystery

A young man waits on death row for a murder he insists he did not commit, while a priest, reporters, and prison officials gather for the execution at dawn. As the hours pass, a reporter pieces together evidence that could exonerate the condemned man — if it arrives in time. A low-budget film noir directed by Paul Sloane, told largely through flashbacks inside the prison. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal of copyright.

Crime · Drama

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

A Noveltoons short from Famous Studios, directed by Seymour Kneitel. Lightning is said to be the fastest horse around and a sure bet for the Ups and Downs steeplechase, but when race time comes, the horse decides to take a nap instead. The jockey tries everything to wake him, and the real fun begins as he devises a plan to enter the race with a sleeping horse. Released June 9, 1950, the cartoon was produced by Famous Studios for Paramount Pictures. The film is in the public domain.

Animation · Short · Comedy · Family

A woman who has drifted apart from her husband must track him down through San Francisco after he witnesses a gangland murder and goes into hiding, with a reporter and a killer both following her. Ann Sheridan stars in this tight, location-shot noir. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Noir · Crime · Thriller

Stan and Ollie inherit a South Sea island, but on the voyage out their boat runs aground on a new atoll rising from the sea, where they declare their own tiny nation, until the discovery of uranium brings the world's powers swarming. The final film of Laurel and Hardy, a Franco-Italian co-production released in the U.S. as Utopia. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Comedy

A 1951 jungle horror film written and directed by Curt Siodmak, the screenwriter of The Wolf Man. On a rubber plantation deep in the Amazon, foreman Barney Chavez (Raymond Burr) kills his employer and takes his beautiful wife Dina (Barbara Payton) — but a witch's curse condemns him to transform into a gorilla, stalking the jungle while the police commissioner (Lon Chaney Jr.) closes in. Essentially a loupe-garou tale transplanted to the tropics, it is a minor-key cult item with a remarkable cast for its budget. The film is in the public domain.

Horror

Bedridden and convinced he's dying, George Jones (Barry Sullivan) becomes certain his wife Ellen (Loretta Young) and his doctor are planning to murder him — so he writes the district attorney a letter accusing them. Then he drops dead, and the letter is already in the mail. Ellen's desperate afternoon chasing a single envelope through a sunlit suburb makes for one of the tightest domestic noirs of the early 50s. Tay Garnett directed for MGM. The film is in the public domain.

Thriller · Drama · Crime

A 1951 Civil War Western directed by production design legend William Cameron Menzies. In 1864, a small Confederate artillery unit under Major Clay Clayburn (James Craig) hauls four cannons to the top of Devil's Mountain, a Georgia peak overlooking the railroad supplying Sherman's march on Atlanta. Their mission: block the Federal trains as long as possible. Opposing them is Union Major Will Denning (Guy Madison) — Clayburn's best friend from West Point — while Kathy Summers (Barbara Payton), the woman both men love, is caught between them. Shot in vivid SuperCineColor, it is in the public domain.

Western

The most famous civil defense film ever made: an animated turtle named Bert teaches American schoolchildren to "duck and cover" when they see the flash of an atomic bomb. Produced by Archer Productions for the Federal Civil Defense Administration and shown in classrooms across the country, it is equal parts genuine safety instruction and Cold War theater — critics have long debated whether a school desk was ever going to help. It entered the Library of Congress's National Film Registry in 2004. The film is in the public domain.

Documentary · Short

The sequel to Father of the Bride. Stanley Banks has finally accepted his daughter's marriage, only to learn she is expecting a baby, throwing him into a fresh panic about becoming a grandfather. Spencer Tracy, Elizabeth Taylor, and Joan Bennett reprise their roles. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Comedy · Family

Go for Broke! is a 1951 war film directed by Robert Pirosh and produced by Dore Schary for MGM, starring Van Johnson as a young National Guard lieutenant who is assigned to command the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, the segregated Japanese-American unit that became the most decorated in American military history. Initially resentful of his assignment, the lieutenant comes to respect and depend on his men as they fight their way through Italy and France. Many of the soldiers on screen were actual veterans of the 442nd, and the film is notable for treating its Japanese-American characters with a dignity and directness that was rare for the era. The film is in the public domain.

War · Drama

A 1951 MGM drama directed by Arthur Pierson. Defeated for re-election to the state legislature, Blake Washburn (Jeffrey Lynn) blames local manufacturer John MacFarland (Donald Crisp) and takes over his uncle's small-town newspaper to crusade against big business. When tragedy strikes his own family, Blake is forced to reconsider his crusade. The film is best remembered today for an early role by Marilyn Monroe as office secretary Iris Martin — a small part, but one of her first credited screen appearances. The film is in the public domain.

Comedy · Drama

An American singer and a European prince fall in love during a brief lakeside idyll, then meet again years later when he is a king in exile and she a Hollywood star. Ezio Pinza and Lana Turner star in this MGM musical romance. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Musical · Romance

A brother-and-sister dance act travels to London at the same time as the royal wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten. Tom Bowen, the brother, falls for a dancer in a rival show, while Ellen meets a British lord. The film is a light MGM musical built around Fred Astaire's dancing, and its famous sequence has Astaire dancing on the walls and ceiling of a hotel room, achieved with a rotating set and a nailed-down camera. Astaire also dances with a hat rack he treats as a partner. The story was loosely inspired by the real-life Astaire sibling act. Jane Powell plays his sister, and the score includes "Too Late Now." The film entered the public domain due to non-renewal of its copyright.

Musical · Comedy · Romance

A 1951 film noir directed by Max Nosseck, starring Lawrence Tierney — later famous as Joe in Reservoir Dogs — in one of his signature roles. Tierney plays Vincent Lubeck, an incorrigible ex-con whose own mother begs the parole board to keep him locked up. Released anyway, Vincent works sullenly at his brother Johnny's gas station while casing the armored car that makes regular stops at the bank across the street, and seducing his brother's girl along the way. Tierney's real-life brother Edward plays Johnny. A lean, brutal heist noir, the film is in the public domain.

Crime · Thriller

A faithful collie named Shep treks across the wilderness to find the man who framed her master for murder in a gold-mining camp. The last of MGM's Lassie feature films, sometimes retitled Lassie's Adventures in the Gold Rush. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Family · Adventure · Western

A small-town girl becomes an airline stewardess and finds herself courted by three different men, all named Mike: a pilot, a cop, and a businessman. Jane Wyman stars with Van Johnson and Howard Keel in this MGM romantic comedy. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Comedy · Romance

An ex-con noir shot on location in postwar Italy. Frank Keeler (Lloyd Bridges) did four years in a military prison for a payroll robbery and never revealed where he hid the money. Now out, he returns to the small Italian town to recover his loot — but the cash has been moved, his old flame Elena (Lea Padovani) has questions, and the gang he double-crossed is waiting. Directed by W. Lee Wilder (Billy's brother), the film pairs Italian neorealist locations with hard-boiled American crime conventions. Released through United Artists, its copyright was not renewed; it is in the public domain in the United States.

Crime · Drama · Noir

A ranch foreman who has spent his life covering for his reckless foster brother finally reaches his breaking point when the brother's schemes turn to theft and murder. Burt Lancaster stars in this lean MGM western. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Western

Two nightclub entertainers, Duke Mitchell and Sammy Petrillo, parachute into a Pacific jungle island where they meet a sarong-clad island princess and a mad scientist named Dr. Zabor, played by Bela Lugosi in full Dracula regalia. Jealous of Duke's romance with the princess, Zabor decides to use his evolution experiments to turn his rival into a gorilla. Mitchell and Petrillo were a comedy team built to imitate Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, and Jerry Lewis reportedly sued to shut the production down. William Beaudine, a veteran of silent comedy, directed with the workmanlike speed that earned him the nickname "One-Shot." The film is a strange collision of horror parody, knockabout slapstick, and stock jungle footage. It entered the public domain because no copyright was ever filed.

Comedy · Horror

Real-life conjoined twins Daisy and Violet Hilton star as a vaudeville singing act whose act is failing until their manager stages a publicity romance between Dorothy and a sharpshooter in the show. The sham engagement turns real, the marriage ends in murder, and the film frames its story as a courtroom problem no jury was built to answer: how do you punish one sister when the other is innocent and cannot be separated from her? The Hiltons, famous from the sideshow circuit since childhood and later seen in Freaks, sing several numbers and get the rarest thing exploitation cinema offered them, a story told from their own point of view. Directed by Harry L. Fraser for producer George Weiss's Classic Pictures, it is in the public domain.

Drama

Abbott and Costello's musical comedy version of the classic fairy tale, directed by Jean Yarbrough. Costello plays Jack, a hapless boy who trades the family cow for magic beans, while Abbott plays Mr. Dinkelpuss, the shady butcher who swindles him. When the beans grow into a giant beanstalk, Jack and Dinkelpuss climb to the cloud kingdom, where they encounter a fearsome giant and a treasure beyond their dreams. The film was originally released in a two-color Cinecolor process and features songs by the Mellomen. It was the first Abbott and Costello film to be independently produced rather than made under their Universal contract. The film is in the public domain.

Comedy · Family · Fantasy · Musical

A former convict is framed for a bank robbery he had nothing to do with and, to clear his name, infiltrates the gang of masked thieves on their way to a heist in Mexico. Phil Karlson's taut, hard-edged noir was a touchstone for later heist films. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Noir · Crime

Shuteye Popeye is a 1952 Popeye cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Izzy Sparber and distributed by Paramount Pictures. A very tired Popeye retires for the night, but his window-rattling snoring disturbs a small mouse trying to sleep in the same room. The mouse's escalating attempts to silence the sailor — and Popeye's oblivious, sleepwalking responses — drive the escalating gag structure typical of the studio's early-1950s output. The cartoon is in the public domain in the United States through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy

Two vaudevillians on the run from shotgun weddings ship out to the South Seas, where they rescue and then compete for a beautiful island princess. The sixth of the Bob Hope-Bing Crosby "Road" pictures and the only one made in Technicolor. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Comedy · Adventure · Romance

Kirk Douglas plays a timber baron who arrives in California's redwood country in 1900 planning to strip it bare, only to run up against a Quaker community whose land sits on the biggest trees. The land scheme he builds with the help of a saloon singer and a treacherous foreman slowly collapses as he falls for the widow who leads the settlers and starts to see what the forest is worth. Directed by Felix E. Feist for Warner Bros and shot in Technicolor among the real redwoods, it is a conservation western a generation before that was a genre. It entered the public domain after its copyright was never renewed.

Western · Drama

A 1952 American-French film noir directed by Rudolph Maté, starring Glenn Ford as Michael Blake, a World War II veteran who returns to France to recover a priceless jeweled gauntlet — the "green glove" — he found during the Normandy invasion and hid in a village church. The treasure is also sought by suave art dealer Count Paul Rona (George Macready), whose men are willing to kill for it, while Blake is aided by a Parisian tour guide (Geraldine Brooks) and a parish priest (Cedric Hardwicke). Shot on location in postwar Paris and the south of France, the film mixes heist thriller and travelogue. Also known as The White Road and Gauntlet. It is in the public domain.

Crime · Mystery

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

What Makes Us Tick is a 1952 animated educational short produced by John Sutherland Productions for the New York Stock Exchange. Through the everyman figure of John Q. Public, the cartoon explains how corporations raise capital by selling shares, how stocks are bought and sold on the exchange, and why ordinary Americans might choose to invest. It is a polished example of the sponsored "fun and facts about business" films Sutherland's studio made for corporate clients in the postwar years — the same shop that produced A Is for Atom for General Electric. The film is in the public domain.

Animation · Educational

A Is for Atom is a 1953 animated educational short directed by Carl Urbano for John Sutherland Productions, sponsored by General Electric. The film explains what an atom is, how nuclear energy is released from certain kinds of atoms, the peacetime uses of nuclear power, and the by-products of nuclear fission. The periodic table is represented as "Element Town," with each element depicted in a distinctive shape. The short ends with a majestic atomic giant straddling the earth as the narrator declares that our future "depends on man's wisdom, on his firmness in the use of that power." The film won the Second Grand Award for science films at the Venice Film Festival in 1954 and was seen by more than twelve million people in its first three years. The film is in the public domain.

Animation · Educational

A group of stranded swindlers in an Italian port wait for a ship to East Africa, where they plan to corner the uranium market. Humphrey Bogart leads an international cast through John Huston's sly parody of the caper films he helped invent, with a script shaped by Truman Capote. The film lapsed into the public domain through non-renewal.

Comedy · Crime · Adventure

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

A 1953 feature film edited from the 1939 Universal serial Buck Rogers, re-released for theatrical distribution. A 20th-century pilot named Buck Rogers (Buster Crabbe) and his young friend Buddy Wade awaken from 500 years in suspended animation to find the world has been taken over by the outlaw army of Killer Kane. Buck joins the hidden resistance forces to defeat Kane and restore freedom. The original serial was directed by Saul A. Goodkind and Ford Beebe. The film entered the public domain via non-renewal of its copyright.

Sci-Fi · Action · Adventure

Four soldiers stranded behind enemy lines in an unnamed war make their way toward a river and escape, killing an enemy officer and a peasant girl along the way. Stanley Kubrick's first feature, made on a tiny budget with a crew of friends; he later disowned it and tried to suppress it. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

War · Drama

A 1953 Jack the Ripper mystery directed by Hugo Fregonese, the third adaptation of Marie Belloc Lowndes' novel The Lodger. In gaslit 1880s London, a series of brutal murders terrorizes the city just as the brooding, enigmatic Slade (Jack Palance) takes a room in the Harley family's attic. When the Harleys' niece Lily (Constance Smith), a music-hall performer, takes an interest in their mysterious lodger, her family — and Scotland Yard — begin to suspect he may be the Ripper himself. Frances Bavier, later Aunt Bee on The Andy Griffith Show, plays the suspicious landlady. The film is in the public domain.

Horror · Thriller

A 1953 independent drama produced and directed by Hal R. Makelim. John Agar stars as Ray Compton, the son of self-made industrial tycoon J.R. Compton (Edward Arnold, in one of his final roles). Raised on his father's ruthless creed that a man must be hard to succeed, Ray returns home torn between the ruthless empire he's expected to inherit and his conscience — a conflict that comes to a head over his father's treatment of workers and the woman Ray loves. A modest, earnest postwar drama about power and principle, the film is in the public domain.

Drama

A mad scientist named Dr. Aranya (Jackie Coogan) conducts experiments on Zarpa Mesa in Mexico, injecting women with spider enzymes to create an army of spider women and dwarfs. When a group of survivors escapes the mesa, their pilot must recount the horrors to a doctor who doubts his story. Coogan — best known as Uncle Fester on The Addams Family — gives a memorably strange performance in this notorious low-budget production from Ron Ormond and Herbert Tevos. Frequently cited among the worst films ever made, it later appeared on Mystery Science Theater 3000. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal of copyright.

Horror · Science Fiction

A 1953 science fiction film directed by W. Lee Wilder, brother of Billy Wilder. An alien spacecraft lands in Santa Monica, and when the visitor's spacesuit makes it look menacing, it kills two people who attack it — then removes the suit and becomes invisible while being pursued by federal agents. A group of scientists races to communicate with the creature before the military destroys it. A quintessential low-budget 1950s invader picture, notable for its early use of an "invisible alien" premise and its downbeat ending. The film is in the public domain.

Sci-Fi · Horror

Two friends on a fishing trip in Mexico pick up a hitchhiker who turns out to be a wanted killer on the run. He forces them to drive him toward the border and lets them know that as soon as they stop being useful he will kill them. The hitchhiker has a paralyzed eye that never closes, even when he sleeps, so the two men can never tell when it is safe to try an escape. The film is based on the real-life case of Billy Cook, who killed several people on a similar spree. Ida Lupino directed, one of the few women directing Hollywood features at the time, and she keeps the film tight and tense, almost entirely inside the car. The film is a lean, real-time thriller about men trapped with someone who has nothing to lose. The film entered the public domain due to non-renewal of its copyright.

Noir · Thriller

A biographical drama tracing the life of heavyweight champion Joe Louis, from his Detroit youth to his title reign and the racial pressures he bore as a Black sports hero. Coley Wallace portrays Louis in staged fight sequences. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Biography · Drama · Sport

A 1953 British film noir directed by Cy Endfield — one of several crime pictures he made in Britain before Zulu (1964). American veteran Frank Prior (Lloyd Bridges) returns to London to rekindle a wartime romance with actress Pauline French (Moira Lister), only to watch the man standing beside him get shot dead by a sniper on the airport tarmac. Drawn into the investigation, Frank discovers his old flame is entangled in blackmail and murder, and the killer — a marksman who walks with a limp — is still out there. The film ends with one of the most infamous rug-pull endings in B-movie history. It is in the public domain.

Crime · Mystery · Thriller

Popeye is overjoyed about marrying Olive tomorrow, but she dreams of their future twin sons running wild and gives him a frosty reception the next morning. A Famous Studios Popeye cartoon directed by Izzy Sparber. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy · Family

A tour through a topsy-turvy town where fish swim in the fire hydrants, babies deliver their own stork, and the laws of physics are suggestions at best. A Famous Studios Noveltoon directed by Izzy Sparber. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy

A young man gets involved with a criminal who forces him to participate in a robbery. Things go wrong, and the criminal uses a plastic surgeon to change his face. Ed Wood's first feature film, made before the movies that made him infamous. Steve Reeves, who would later become a Hercules star, appears in a supporting role. The film was registered for copyright in 1954 and never renewed, which is why it entered the public domain on January 1, 1983. It is a competent low-budget crime picture, more straightforward than the science fiction and horror films Wood would become known for.

Crime · Drama

A 1954 American science fiction film directed by W. Lee Wilder, brother of Billy Wilder. Peter Graves plays atomic scientist Doug Martin, who is presumed dead after his plane crashes on a reconnaissance flight following a nuclear test — then turns up alive, telling a story nobody believes: he was captured by aliens who plan to conquer Earth with an army of giant mutated insects and reptiles. Famous for its bug-eyed aliens (created with ping-pong balls) and liberal use of stock footage, the film features an uncredited early appearance by Coleman Francis. Its copyright was never renewed, and it has become a drive-in staple of public domain sci-fi collections.

Sci-Fi · Horror

Cooking with Gags is a 1954 Popeye cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by I. Sparber and distributed by Paramount Pictures. On April Fool's Day, Bluto plays a series of practical jokes on Popeye and Olive Oyl — including a prank picnic that goes wrong for the prankster. Jack Mercer, Mae Questel, and Jackson Beck voice Popeye, Olive, and Bluto. The cartoon is in the public domain through non-renewal of copyright.

Animation · Comedy

Floor Flusher is a 1954 Popeye cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Izzy Sparber and distributed by Paramount Pictures. Olive Oyl's kitchen sink won't stop running, so Popeye volunteers to fix the plumbing — but rival plumber Bluto is determined to sabotage the job and flood the house in the process. The escalating water damage builds to the usual spinach-powered showdown, with Jack Mercer, Mae Questel, and Jackson Beck supplying the classic voices. It is in the public domain in the United States.

Animation · Comedy

Gopher Spinach is a 1954 Popeye cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Seymour Kneitel and distributed by Paramount Pictures. Popeye plants his spinach bed, only to discover a gopher stealing his baby plants. What follows is a battle of wits between Popeye and the resourceful rodent. The cartoon was the first entry of the 1954-55 film season. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy

Popeye's four nephews — Pipeye, Peepeye, Poopeye, and Pupeye — refuse to eat their spinach, so Popeye tells them the story of his great Uncle Hercules, the legendary strongman of ancient Greece. In the flashback, Hercules battles the Bluto-like Brutus in a series of mythological contests, powered by a can of "spinachus." A Famous Studios Popeye cartoon directed by Seymour Kneitel and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal of copyright.

Animation · Comedy

Popeye and Bluto run rival taxi services and race across the city to pick up fares, wrecking each other's cabs at every turn. When both drivers compete for the same passenger — Olive Oyl — the feud escalates until spinach decides the outcome. A Famous Studios Popeye cartoon directed by Seymour Kneitel and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal of copyright.

Animation · Comedy

A landmark of independent American cinema, Salt of the Earth was made by three blacklisted filmmakers — director Herbert J. Biberman, producer Paul Jarrico, and writer Michael Wilson — entirely outside the Hollywood studio system. Based on the 1951 Empire Zinc strike in Grant County, New Mexico, the film tells the story of Mexican-American miners and their wives fighting for equality. Mexican actress Rosaura Revueltas stars as Esperanza, the wife who emerges as a leader when the men are enjoined from picketing and the women take over the picket line. Many of the supporting roles were played by real miners and their families from Mine-Mill Local 890. The film was suppressed upon release, denounced as communist propaganda, and effectively banned from theaters. It was rediscovered decades later and is now recognized as a seminal work of social realism and one of the first American films to present a Mexican-American community from within. The producers placed the film in the public domain.

Drama

George Reeves stars as Superman in this special eighteen-minute short produced for the U.S. Department of the Treasury to promote school savings stamp programs to children. When a blackout strikes Metropolis, Superman visits a classroom and teaches the students — including a boy named Blinky — about buying U.S. Savings Stamps. The film was donated to the Treasury and never aired commercially, making it the only Adventures of Superman production in the public domain. It features the series' regular cast including Noel Neill, Jack Larson, and John Hamilton.

Fantasy · Science Fiction

A professional assassin and his men take over a quiet house in the small town of Suddenly, California, planning to shoot the President of the United States when his train stops there. The family living in the house becomes hostages, and the town sheriff, who is sweet on the daughter, stumbles into the trap and has to find a way to stop it. Frank Sinatra plays the killer as a jittery, sneering psychopath who genuinely enjoys the prospect of murder, a long way from his usual smooth persona. Sterling Hayden is the upright sheriff who matches wits with him. The whole film plays out almost entirely inside one house, which keeps the tension coiled. The film entered the public domain due to non-renewal of its copyright. It is one of the more tense and compact crime thrillers of the 1950s, and Sinatra's performance is the reason it is still watched.

Crime · Noir · Thriller

A young American journalist stays in Paris after the liberation and marries into a charming, troubled family, as the optimism of victory gives way to postwar disappointment and a failing marriage. Elizabeth Taylor and Van Johnson star in this loose adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's story "Babylon Revisited." The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Drama · Romance

A Hitch in Time is a 1955 animated short directed by Chuck Jones for Warner Bros., commissioned by the United States Air Force to promote re-enlistment. The cartoon follows John McRogers, a character closely modeled on Private Snafu, who dreams about his future after four years in the Air Force. He is guided by Grogan, Technical Gremlin First Class — a reworking of the Technical Fairy from the original Snafu series — who explains the advantages of staying in the service versus returning to civilian life. As a U.S. government work, the film is in the public domain.

Animation · Comedy · War

Ed Wood's belated follow-up to Glen or Glenda, and the closest he came to a conventional horror film. Bela Lugosi, in one of his final roles, plays Dr. Eric Vornoff, a mad scientist experimenting with atomic energy in a swamp-side laboratory, attempting to create a race of superhumans with the help of his brutish assistant Lobo (Tor Johnson). When a nosy reporter (Loretta King) investigates, she becomes Vornoff's next subject. The film features Wood's trademark blend of earnest ambition and staggering incompetence: a rubber octopus prop with visible wires, mismatched day-for-night footage, and dialogue that defies logic. Yet Lugosi gives it his all, delivering lines like "Home? I have no home. Hunted... despised... living like an animal!" with genuine pathos. The film is in the public domain.

Horror · Sci-Fi

A federal agent goes undercover to bring down the Reno brothers' gang of train robbers in post-Civil War Indiana, only to find the local townspeople and officials are in the gang's pocket. Randolph Scott and Forrest Tucker star in this fact-based western. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Western

A celebrated film noir directed by Joseph H. Lewis and photographed by the legendary cinematographer John Alton. Cornel Wilde plays Police Lieutenant Leonard Diamond, who obsessively pursues the sadistic gang boss Mr. Brown (Richard Conte) while harboring an infatuation with Brown's girlfriend Susan Lowell (Jean Wallace). The supporting cast includes Brian Donlevy, Lee Van Cleef, and Earl Holliman as Brown's enforcers. Alton's high-contrast chiaroscuro lighting has made the film a touchstone of noir visual style. The U.S. Copyright Office rejected the film's copyright notice in 2007, leaving it in the public domain.

Crime · Thriller

A 1955 American crime drama produced by Roger Corman and co-directed by John Ireland and Edward Sampson. Ireland stars as Frank Webster, a man framed for murder who breaks out of jail and takes a rich woman's Jaguar at gunpoint, with the woman, Connie Adair (Dorothy Malone), still inside. As she tries to escape numerous times, the two soon develop feelings for each other and enter a road race that ends in Mexico. Made on a budget of just $50,000, the film was one of Corman's early productions and was distributed by American Releasing Corporation, the precursor to American International Pictures. The film is in the public domain.

Crime · Drama · Action

A card-dealing junkie fresh out of prison tries to go straight as a drummer, but his wheelchair-bound wife and old dealer pull him back toward heroin. Otto Preminger fought the Production Code to release the film, which broke the taboo on depicting drug addiction. Frank Sinatra gives one of his most serious performances. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Drama · Noir

Atomic-age creature feature from the dawn of AIP. Bodies are washing up on a California beach, glowing with radiation, and oceanographer Dr. Ted Stevens (Kent Taylor) goes undercover to find out why. The trail leads to Professor King's coastal lab, a stolen stash of uranium on the seabed — and the scaly, glowing-eyed mutant that radiation has spawned to guard it. Made by the Milner brothers for pennies and released by the fledgling American Releasing Corporation, it is quintessential 1950s drive-in sci-fi: stiff dialogue, rubbery monster, and a curiously effective finale. Its copyright was not renewed; it is in the public domain in the United States.

Sci-Fi · Horror

A 1955 independent production directed by R. John Hugh. In the closing days of the Civil War, five Confederate deserters — branded "yellownecks" — flee into the Florida Everglades, hoping to reach the coast and a boat to Cuba. The swamp itself becomes the enemy: snakes, alligators, disease, and Seminole pursuers pick the men off one by one. Shot on location in the Everglades and around Orlando before Disney existed, the production famously filmed its storm sequence during a real hurricane and borrowed its snakes from a local tourist attraction. A grim, unusual survival Western, the film is in the public domain.

Drama · War · Western

90 Day Wondering is a 1956 animated short directed by Chuck Jones for Warner Bros., commissioned by the United States Army to encourage discharged soldiers to re-enlist. The cartoon follows Ralph Phillips, who is overjoyed to be a civilian again after his discharge, but finds civilian life less glamorous than expected. Two pixies named Pete and Re-Pete act as his conscience, debating whether he should stay out or re-enlist. As a U.S. government work, the film is in the public domain.

Animation · Comedy · War

A 1956 American Western co-directed by Albert C. Gannaway and Ismael Rodríguez, shot in Mexico and released through Republic Pictures. Bruce Bennett stars as Daniel Boone, leading a wagon train of settlers into Kentucky while fending off Shawnee warriors stirred up by the French renegade Simon Girty. Lon Chaney Jr. plays the Shawnee chief Blackfish, and country singer Faron Young appears as a settler — one of several Gannaway productions to cast Nashville stars. The film is in the public domain after its copyright went unrenewed, and it has been a fixture of budget western compilations ever since.

Western · Adventure

An American International Pictures western directed by Edward L. Cahn, the prolific B-movie workhorse who also made It! The Terror from Beyond Space. John Agar plays a young cowboy tracking the gunman who killed his twin brother, teaming up with a hard-drinking ex-convict gunfighter (Mike Connors, still billing himself as "Touch" Connors) and an Indian woman called Yellow Hawk. Marla English, AIP's resident noir-vixen of the mid-fifties, plays the saloon girl caught between them. Shot fast and cheap like everything on the AIP slate, but the vengeance plot has a grim little edge to it. The film entered the public domain after its copyright was not renewed.

Western

A 1956 unaired television pilot directed by Duke Goldstone, intended as a spin-off of the 1954 film Tobor the Great. Tobor ("robot" spelled backwards) is a nine-foot-tall robot controlled telepathically by Tommy Adams, a boy genius with one of the highest ESP quotients ever recorded. In the pilot episode "Tobor and the Atomic Submarine," Professor Adams and Tobor help the U.S. Navy find a missing nuclear submarine. Tobor flies in a rocket, recovers the submarine, and fights a gang of pirates. The series was not picked up, and only the pilot was filmed. The credits famously read "Tobor played by Tobor."

Sci-Fi

A convicted killer known as "the Butcher" is executed in the gas chamber, but his body is sold to a scientist who accidentally revives him with an experimental serum, making him nearly indestructible and impervious to bullets. He sets out to take revenge on the partners who betrayed him. Lon Chaney Jr., in the late, diminished stretch of his career, plays the mute, brooding creature with almost no dialogue, stalking through Los Angeles landmarks like Angels Flight and the Bradbury Building. The film is a low-budget crime-horror hybrid that plays like a rough remake of Chaney's earlier Man Made Monster. It entered the public domain because its copyright was not renewed.

Horror · Sci-Fi

Popeye battles an army of hungry insects that descends on his vegetable garden, using his spinach-fueled strength to save his harvest. A Famous Studios Popeye cartoon directed by Morey Reden and Dave Tendlar. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy

A 1956 film noir directed by Peter Godfrey, starring Raymond Burr and Angela Lansbury. Attorney Craig Carlson (Burr) falls in love with Myra Leeds (Lansbury), the wife of his best friend Joe (Dick Foran). When Myra asks Craig to defend her after she shoots Joe dead, claiming self-defense, he wins her acquittal — only to learn she manipulated him and planned the murder all along. Trapped by attorney-client privilege and his own guilt, Carlson devises a desperate plan to force Myra to murder again: him. Told largely in flashback with Burr's characteristic gravitas and a memorably cold Lansbury performance, it is a compact, twisty courtroom noir. The film is in the public domain.

Crime · Thriller

Parlez Vous Woo is a 1956 Popeye cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Izzy Sparber and distributed by Paramount Pictures. Olive Oyl has fallen for "The International," a suave, romantic television personality — who turns out to be Bluto in disguise. When the smooth-talking rival invites Olive to his penthouse for dinner, a jealous Popeye follows to expose the phony, and the evening erupts into the usual spinach-fueled brawl. One of the later entries in the long-running series, it features the classic voice trio of Jack Mercer, Mae Questel, and Jackson Beck. It is in the public domain in the United States.

Animation · Comedy

A 1956 musical drama film directed by Will Price, conceived and co-produced by Milton Subotsky. An early jukebox musical featuring performances by established rock and roll singers of the era, including Chuck Berry, LaVern Baker, Teddy Randazzo, the Moonglows, the Flamingos, and the Teenagers with Frankie Lymon as lead singer. Famed disc jockey Alan Freed appears as himself. The thin plot follows teenager Dori Graham (Tuesday Weld, in her feature film debut at age 13), who is trying to get together enough money to buy a strapless gown for the school prom after her father cuts off her allowance. Connie Francis provided Dori's singing voice. The film was not included in the Copyright Catalog, placing it in the public domain. Subotsky later co-founded Amicus Productions, the rival to Hammer Films.

Musical · Drama

The first feature directed by Roger Corman. Undercover police officer Lee Hampton (Carole Mathews) infiltrates a women's prison, befriends a trio of convicts led by the hard-boiled Josie Nardo (Marie Windsor), and engineers their escape — all part of a plan to recover a cache of stolen diamonds hidden deep in the Louisiana swamps. Beverly Garland, Mike "Touch" Connors, and Corman regulars Jonathan Haze and Ed Nelson round out the cast of this swampy girls-behind-bars crime picture, shot on location in Louisiana. Also released as "Swamp Diamonds" and "Cruel Swamp," it is in the public domain.

Crime · Thriller

The Violent Years is a 1956 American exploitation film directed by William Morgan from a screenplay by Edward D. Wood Jr., who went uncredited. Jean Moorhead, a Playboy Playmate, stars as Paula Parkins, the bored, wealthy leader of a gang of juvenile delinquent high school girls who commit robberies and assault men for thrills. The film follows the gang's escalating crimes and Paula's eventual downfall, framed as a cautionary tale about bad parenting and teenage rebellion. It was the most financially successful film with creative input from Ed Wood, released on a double bill by Headliner Productions. The film is in the public domain.

Crime · Exploitation · Drama

A 1956 film noir directed by, produced by, and starring Mark Stevens. After $500,000 is stolen in a meticulously planned train robbery, insurance investigator Charlie Norman (Stevens) is forced to postpone a vacation with his wife to help railroad detective Joe Armstrong (King Calder) track the thieves. The trail leads through Mexico and into a web of compromised alibis — and gradually reveals that the man investigating the crime knows far more about it than he should. Shot in a lean, semi-documentary style with an early supporting turn by Jack Klugman, Time Table is one of the better-regarded B-noirs of the 1950s. The film is in the public domain.

Crime · Thriller

A 1956 animated industrial short directed by Carl Urbano for John Sutherland Productions, made on commission for the New York Stock Exchange. Mr. Finchly has just received a sixty-dollar raise and wants to know the best way to invest it, prompting a brisk lesson in how everyday Americans can buy shares and put their money to work. One of the many glossy sponsored cartoons Sutherland's studio produced for corporate clients in the 1950s, it is a charming artifact of postwar consumer-capitalist optimism — and, like the rest of the studio's industrial output, it is in the public domain.

Animation · Documentary

Colonel Bleep, the extraterrestrial envoy from the planet Futura, arrives on a remote Earth island to establish his headquarters alongside his friends Squeak the puppet boy and Scratch the caveman. An episode of the first color cartoon series made for television. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Sci-Fi · Family

Colonel Bleep, an envoy from the planet Futura, receives his first assignment on Earth and sets up his island headquarters with the help of Squeak the puppet boy and Scratch the caveman. The debut episode of the first color cartoon series made for television. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Sci-Fi · Family

Colonel Bleep, Squeak, and Scratch dive to the ocean-covered planet Aqualand, where the villainous Dr. Destructo and his giant octopus Octo have stolen the priceless pearls of the Frog Men. A Colonel Bleep episode directed by Jack Schleh. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Sci-Fi · Family

Colonel Bleep and his companions find their holiday turned perilous when danger threatens their island base, testing the futuristic envoy's futomic powers. A Colonel Bleep episode directed by Jack Schleh. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Sci-Fi · Family

A 1957 American South Seas adventure directed by Lee Sholem and Elmo Williams, starring Jon Hall — who also produced and narrated — alongside John Carradine, Peter Lorre, and Mike Mazurki. Captain Jim Knight sails the South Sea Islands and discovers a criminal gang that has seized a small island, forcing the native pearl divers to work beyond safe limits. After Knight captures the gang, they escape en route to Tahiti and a corrupt French magistrate joins them when a native boy locates a sunken ship carrying a Burmese king's treasure. The film was compiled from Knight of the South Seas, an unsold 1955 television pilot, and gave Hall ample opportunity to show off the underwater diving footage he loved. It is in the public domain.

Adventure · Action

Knight of Death is a 1957 Colonel Bleep cartoon from Soundac Studios, directed by Jack Schleh. From their earth headquarters on Zero Zero Island, Colonel Bleep, Squeak the puppet boy, and Scratch the caveman battle intergalactic villains — in this episode facing the Black Knight. Colonel Bleep was the first color cartoon series produced for television. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Sci-Fi · Family

Man Hunt on the Moon is a 1957 Colonel Bleep cartoon from Soundac Studios, directed by Jack Schleh. From their earth headquarters on Zero Zero Island, Colonel Bleep, Squeak the puppet boy, and Scratch the caveman pursue villains across the solar system. Colonel Bleep was the first color cartoon series produced for television. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Sci-Fi · Family

Nightmare is a 1957 Colonel Bleep cartoon from Soundac Studios, directed by Jack Schleh. From their earth headquarters on Zero Zero Island, Colonel Bleep, Squeak the puppet boy, and Scratch the caveman face a terrifying dream adventure. Colonel Bleep was the first color cartoon series produced for television. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Sci-Fi · Family

Pest Pupil is a 1957 Noveltoons cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Dave Tendlar and distributed by Paramount Pictures. The short features Baby Huey, the oversized and dimwitted duckling, who causes chaos on his first day of school. Baby Huey was one of the most popular characters in the Noveltoons series, debuting in 1950's Quack-a-Doodle-Doo. The film is in the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy

Spree Lunch is a 1957 Popeye cartoon from Famous Studios, directed by Seymour Kneitel from a story by Jack Mercer and distributed by Paramount Pictures. Popeye and Bluto run rival restaurants and compete aggressively for the patronage of Wimpy, whose legendary appetite for hamburgers — and reluctance to pay for them — makes him a challenging customer. The short is notable as the final theatrical film appearance of both Bluto and Wimpy before the Popeye series moved to television. It is in the public domain in the United States.

Animation · Comedy

A 1957 American Western directed by Albert C. Gannaway and released by Republic Pictures, notable for its cast of Grand Ole Opry stars. Faron Young plays a young marshal and Marty Robbins a fellow lawman, while Jim Davis plays the villainous ex-cavalry officer Angus McKane, who is trying to force Mexican landowners off their grants after the Mexican American War. Lee Van Cleef appears as McKane's henchman Damon Pardee. More famous for its country music casting than its craft, the film fell into the public domain when its copyright was not renewed and remains a curiosity for fans of both westerns and classic country.

Western · Drama

A 1957 American Western directed by Carl K. Hittleman and distributed by United Artists. Patricia Medina plays Angela Medley, a frontier gambler who supports her hard-drinking father "Doc" Medley (Henry Hull) while running with the gunslinger Slinger (Gerald Mohr). When the new town physician Dr. Bruce Merritt (Richard Denning) arrives, Angela falls for him, setting up an inevitable showdown between the outlaw and the respectable life she wants. A compact, unpretentious B-western carried by Medina's sympathetic lead performance, it circulated widely on television and fell into the public domain when its copyright was not renewed.

Western

A 1957 made-for-television musical directed by Bretaigne Windust and broadcast on NBC as a color spectacular. Van Johnson stars as the Pied Piper (and his alter ego Truson), with Claude Rains as the Mayor of Hamelin, plus Lori Nelson, Jim Backus, and Kay Starr. Adapted from the Robert Browning poem, the story follows the piper who rids Hamelin of its rats, then leads away the town's children when the mayor refuses to pay. Aired once and then rerun for years, the film's copyright was never renewed, making it one of the most widely circulated public domain musicals and a staple of holiday broadcasts on local stations.

Musical · Fantasy · Comedy

A hapless hound dog's pursuit of a clever bird leads him through a gauntlet of slapstick mishaps in this late Famous Studios Noveltoon. One of the last Noveltoons before the studio was reorganized as Paramount Cartoon Studios. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy

An early Roger Corman quickie shot in Hawaii for American International Pictures. Two brothers on the run after a robbery — wanted man Chris (Bill Cord) and his younger brother Jim (Don Durant) — are shipwrecked on a remote island colony of pearl-diving women, whose queenly keeper (Lisa Montell) answers to a shark god with a taste for human sacrifice. Barely over an hour long, it's a shaggy tropical pulp adventure typical of Corman's late-50s output. The film is in the public domain.

Adventure · Drama

The first episode of the 1958 Felix the Cat television series, created by Joe Oriolo. Felix strolls through the countryside carrying his Magic Bag of Tricks, a shape-shifting satchel that can become anything he needs—an escalator, a canoe, a picnic table. The Professor, watching from his laboratory, becomes obsessed with stealing the bag and uses a shrink ray to reduce Felix to miniature size. But the bag has a mind of its own, and Felix's ingenuity proves more than a match for the Professor's gadgets. The episode introduced the Magic Bag concept that would define the series across its 260 episodes, with Jack Mercer providing Felix's voice. The series is in the public domain.

Animation · Family · Comedy

A newlywed woman moves into her husband's estate, the home he shared with his first wife, who drowned on the grounds. Soon she begins seeing a skull that rolls toward her and hearing screams no one else can hear, and she starts to wonder whether she is losing her mind or whether the dead wife is reaching out from the grave. The Screaming Skull is a low-budget black-and-white horror film that builds its scares from atmosphere and suggestion rather than effects. The opening famously warns the audience that the film is so frightening the producers will pay for a burial coffin if anyone dies of fright while watching. It entered the public domain and later found a second life through Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Horror · Mystery

Walter Paisley is a awkward busboy at a Bohemian coffeehouse who longs to be accepted by the beatnik artists and poets who hang out there. When he accidentally kills his landlady's cat, he covers the body in clay and passes it off as a sculpture, and the café's crowd hails him as a genius. Pressured to produce more work, he graduates from dead cats to dead people. Roger Corman shot the film in five days on a $50,000 budget using leftover sets, and Charles B. Griffith's script turns the pretensions of the art world into a sharp black comedy. Dick Miller, a character actor who spent decades in small parts, gets a rare lead and carries it. The film is a companion piece to The Little Shop of Horrors, made the next year by the same team. It entered the public domain due to a missing copyright notice.

Comedy · Horror

People begin disappearing in a backwoods swamp, and a game warden and a local doctor discover that giant, slug-like leeches are responsible. The creatures drag their victims down into the water and keep them alive to feed on slowly. Produced by Gene Corman for American International Pictures and released on a double bill with A Bucket of Blood, Attack of the Giant Leeches is a tight little creature feature that gets its mileage out of the swamp atmosphere and the underwater scenes of the leeches at work. The monsters are men in rubber suits, which is part of the charm. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal of its copyright.

Horror · Sci-Fi

A low-budget juvenile delinquency film written and directed by Joel Rapp and released by Roger Corman's Filmgroup. Tom Pittman, in his final film role before his death in a car crash at age 26, plays Marv Grant, a bright high school student manipulated by a popular girl (Virginia Aldridge) into writing her term paper, then driven to plan a million-dollar robbery to win her back. The film was not copyrighted at the time of its release and is in the public domain.

Crime · Drama

Vincent Price plays an eccentric millionaire who offers five people ten thousand dollars each to spend the night in a haunted house. He locks them in and the scares begin. William Castle was famous for his gimmicks; for this film he arranged for a plastic skeleton to fly over the audience at a key moment. The film is a tight, atmospheric haunted house picture that works on its own without the gimmick. Price is in top form, clearly enjoying himself. The film has a twist ending that holds up. It was remade in 1999, but the original is better.

Horror · Thriller

Ed Wood's spiritual sequel to Bride of the Monster, also known as Revenge of the Dead. The Amazing Criswell introduces the story from a coffin, narrating the tale of Dr. Acula (Kenne Duncan), a phony medium who runs a fake seance operation out of the old Willows Lake house where Bela Lugosi's character died in Bride of the Monster. But the ghosts of the dead are real, and they have come for Dr. Acula. Tor Johnson reprises his role as the lumbering Lobo, now scarred from the lab fire, and Paul Marco returns as the hapless Officer Kelton. Shot in 1958 but shelved for decades because Wood couldn't afford the lab fees to get the prints, the film was finally released in 1984. The film is in the public domain.

Horror

Aliens resurrect the dead to stop humanity from developing a doomsday weapon. Bela Lugosi appears in a few minutes of footage shot before he died; the rest of his scenes are played by a taller man holding a cape over his face. Often cited as the worst film ever made, which is unfair. It is cheap and incoherent, but also earnest and fast-paced. Ed Wood wrote, produced, and directed it in a few days on a tiny budget. The film was not released until two years after it was made, and it was a commercial failure. It found its audience through television reruns in the 1980s.

Sci-Fi · Horror

René Cardona's wildly strange Mexican Christmas fantasy. Santa lives not at the North Pole but in a castle in the sky, where he watches Earth's children through a spyglass eye and fights off the demon Pitch, sent by Lucifer to turn the kids of the world bad — starting with a poor girl who just wants a doll. The English dub distributed by K. Gordon Murray became a staple of American holiday television and a Mystery Science Theater 3000 favorite. The film is in the public domain in the United States.

Fantasy · Family · Comedy

An alien youth sent ahead of an invasion fleet to prepare Earth for colonization turns against his mission after experiencing human kindness, and tries to stop the giant lobsters his people intend to unleash. Tom Graeff wrote, directed, produced, edited, and scored this micro-budget curio. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Sci-Fi · Horror

A 1959 American crime-mystery thriller directed by Crane Wilbur, starring Vincent Price and Agnes Moorehead. Mystery novelist Cornelia van Gorder (Moorehead) rents a country mansion for the summer, only to find herself in the middle of a killing spree by a mysterious murderer known as "The Bat," who wears all black and slashes his victims' throats. Meanwhile, a million dollars has gone missing from the local bank, and the bank president has disappeared. As the bodies pile up in the mansion's secret passages, Dr. Malcolm Wells (Price) may hold the key to the mystery. Based on the 1908 novel The Circular Staircase by Mary Roberts Rinehart and the 1920 play The Bat, this is the fourth film adaptation of the story. Written and directed by Crane Wilbur, who also wrote House of Wax (1953).

Mystery · Thriller · Horror

A teensploitation crime film written and directed by Paul Frees, better known as a prolific voice actor. Tony Travis stars as Eddy Crane, a young singer discovered by a television producer whose chance at fame is threatened by his hoodlum pals, who drag him back into a world of petty crime and violence. The film was featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000. It is in the public domain.

Crime · Drama

Bucky and Pepito, a young boy and his Mexican sidekick, try to catch a wily coyote in the Old West in this early television cartoon. An episode of the infamously low-budget Bucky and Pepito series produced by Sam Singer. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Animation · Comedy · Western

A giant lizard terrorizes a rural Texas community, and a hot-rod-building teenager becomes the town's unlikely hero when the adults fail to stop the creature. The Giant Gila Monster was shot in Texas on a tiny budget and released on a double bill with The Killer Shrews, produced by the same team. The monster is played by a real Gila monster filmed on a miniature set, which gives the film a different texture from the men-in-suits creature features of the era. Don Sullivan, as the singing, car-fixing hero, performs a couple of songs along the way. The film entered the public domain and became a television staple.

Horror · Sci-Fi

John Carradine, whose entire role consists of narrating from a chair and never meeting the rest of the cast, sends four scientists down in a diving bell that snaps its cable and sinks into a subterranean cavern — a glowing "petrified world" where the survivors bicker, pair off, and dodge stock footage until they find a volcanic vent to ride back to the surface. Made by Jerry Warren, one of the true minors of 1950s exploitation, from a script padded out around underwater footage shot in Santa Catalina's real submarine gardens. It is exactly as slow and threadbare as that sounds, which is why it remains a fixture of public domain sci-fi collections and late-night movie marathons. The film is in the public domain.

Sci-Fi · Horror · Adventure

A boat captain delivering supplies to an isolated island is trapped there by a hurricane and finds a group of scientists holed up in a compound. Their experiments to shrink humans and solve world hunger have instead produced giant, venomous shrews that are eating through their supplies and closing in. The Killer Shrews is a compact creature feature from the late 1950s, shot on a small budget with the giant shrews played by dogs in shrew costumes. It was double-billed with The Giant Gila Monster and became a staple of television and later Mystery Science Theater 3000. The film entered the public domain through non-renewal of its copyright.

Horror · Sci-Fi

An educational animated cartoon directed by Denis Gilpin, written by P.D. Eastman, and produced by Ed Cullen for the Equitable Life Assurance Society. The film uses an owl and a human character named Fred Jones to teach lessons about financial responsibility and planning, in the sponsored-film tradition of the 1950s when insurance companies and corporations produced educational content for schools and community groups. P.D. Eastman, later famous for children's books like Are You My Mother?, brought his character design sensibility to the animation. The film is in the public domain.

Animation · Short · Family

A 1959 American heist film directed by Charles Guggenheim and John Stix, starring Steve McQueen early in his career. Based on an actual 1953 bank robbery in St. Louis, the film follows aging criminal mastermind John Egan (Crahan Denton) as he plans to rob the Southwest Bank and retire to Mexico. His crew includes Gino (David Clarke), an ex-convict terrified of returning to prison, and Willie, a longtime minion. When the gang needs a getaway driver, Gino recruits his sister's old boyfriend George Fowler (McQueen), a former college football star with no criminal record. The film meticulously details the planning and rehearsal of the heist before the robbery goes violently wrong. Shot on location in East St. Louis with a gritty, documentary-like realism. Marked Public Domain on Archive.org.

Crime · Thriller