Showing posts with label movies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label movies. Show all posts

Tuesday, January 6, 2026

My audio and video bookmarks (2026 update)

This blog entry is an update of an earlier one that I wrote way back in 2021 containing links to audio and video channels that I tend to enjoy. The list is basically for my own use, to have a lot of my favorite links stored in one easy-to-find location.  A lot has changed since 2021, which required removing several defunct links and rewriting certain sections below. However I've decided not to delete the earlier blog post -- even though this new post replaces it -- in the interests of not deleting my own history.  (This page last updated on January 7, 2026.)

So, here are some audio and video links that I've found useful:

PLUTO TV:
This site's "live TV" section is free, supported by occasional commercial interruptions like broadcast television, and has a gazillion channels.  It's a lot like watching regular TV, but each channel will sometimes focus on just one show.  Here are direct links to some of Pluto TV's channels. Note that when you visit the links below, the default setting on the site is for the sound off.  You must click the red "Unmute" button in the bottom left corner of the screen to hear the audio of the program.

ABC NEWS LIVE:
This channel can also be watched on YouTube here.

BBC NEWS:
This channel can also be watched on the BBC website here.

BRITBOX MYSTERIES:

CBS NEWS 24/7:
CBS News 24-hour live news channel. This channel can also be watched on YouTube here. 
There are also numerous local CBSN channels for various cities located in the "Local Channels" section of the site.  For example, CBSN NEW YORK can be found on PlutoTV here.

DOCTOR WHO:
This used to be my favorite Pluto TV channel, but nowadays I can just watch classic "Doctor Who" channels on the official YouTube channel instead. I have a blog post about the YouTube channel's offerings. 

CLASSICA (classical music):

THE LONE RANGER:

MTV SPANKIN' NEW:
Does MTV still play music videos?  Yep, there are numerous music video channels on PlutoTV, including this one which focuses on newer artists.

NBC NEWS NOW:
This channel can also be watched on YouTube here.

NEWS 12 NEW YORK:


TUBI TV
Like Pluto TV, Tubi TV has a large selection of "live TV" channels -- some of which are the same ones that Pluto has, but also ones that Pluto doesn't.  (Personally I find the viewing experience on Tubi to be less glitchy, when watching on my laptop, than Pluto.) You can scroll through their live TV offerings at the link below: 

CBC News (Canada) highlights:

Tubi TV also has free video on demand, where users can watch specific episodes of a series by selecting the episode that they want to watch.  There are a ton of series to view on here, so a good way to find shows is to simply browse the site.  The links below provide some highlights.

Silent movies:

Old TV shows:
This page shows various old TV series that are available to watch on demand.  Click the titles to view the programs.  Some of my favorites are:

THE AVENGERS (1960s British TV series):

DARK SHADOWS (1960s gothic soap opera):

DENNIS THE MENACE (1950s/60s sitcom):

FATHER KNOWS BEST (1950s sitcom): 

KAMEN RIDER (classic Japanese superhero TV series):

MUTANT X:

THE PRISONER starring Patrick McGoohan:

THE SAINT (1960s series starring Roger Moore):

SECRET AGENT (a.k.a. DANGER MAN) starring Patrick McGoohan:

SPACE 1999 (1970s series):

THE ROKU CHANNEL:
https://therokuchannel.roku.com/
This is a site similar to Tubi TV which has numerous video-on-demand episodes and movies, but also some live TV streaming channels, including NBC News Now and ABC News Live.  (ABC's website also has a live stream of ABC News.) Simply use the search bar on the site or follow the links to browse the available content.  Some of the available dramas include classic British TV series like Kavanagh QC, Peak Practice and The Darling Buds of May.


The CW:
The site offers free on-demand movies and TV shows, as well as live streaming of various channels.


PBS:
On the PBS website, one can watch live streams of local PBS channels as well as watch video-on-demand episodes.


PUFFER TV:
This site allows views to watch network TV channels (ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS) without having to use an antenna.  The available channels are limited to the California area (stations such as KPIX, KNTV, KTVU, KQED, KRON and KGO) which broadcast programs according to the Pacific time zone.  

Some TV channels provide a live stream of their locally-produced over-the-air content on the websites, such as my local Detroit Fox affiliate:


FILMON:
The above link goes to a live video feed of British TV. Unfortunately, the site only allows visitors to view less than a minute of some British TV for free; paid subscribers to the service are able to view it uninterrupted.  However, if you don't want to pay, just keep refreshing the page before the free minutes is up, to view more of the channel.  To see the BBC One TV schedule, click here.  Generally BBC live TV is not available outside the UK.  The BBC's page for Doctor Who can be found here.

FilmOn also has a Silent Cinema live TV channel which allows viewers to see two minutes of the channel for free.  (Again, just keep refreshing the page if you don't want to pay.)

FilmOn does have some free live TV channels (no refreshing required), such as the EuroTrash channel (of old foreign B-movies).  Click the "Live TV" tab at the top left of the screen to browse the available TV channels; the "free" ones are indicated next to the title of the channel.


FREEINTERTV:
This site has a variety of international TV channels available to watch.

GALXY TV:
This is another site that has live channels that can be viewed online.

GIA TV:
This site has many streaming channels, including Throwback Television (consisting of old TV shows).


YOUTUBE:
This site, of course, has some TV episodes, radio episodes, and movies for free, as well as user-generated content of interest.  

YouTube channels devoted to old movies include Moviecraft, Inc., Silent Film House, I Demand Complete Silents and more. 

YouTube channels showing British TV shows include BBC Archive, Classic British Telly, Play for Forever and Soap Reupload.  

Kamen Rider and other Japanese live-action action shows can be found on the TokuSHOUTsu YouTube channel. 

You can also find here the live feeds for ABC News Live, NBC News Now, and the U.K. channel Sky News.


VIMEO:
This site is like YouTube, where users have uploaded various video content.  For example, here is a reconstruction of the silent film version of The Phantom of the Opera:


RUMBLE:
Rumble is a conservative alternative to YouTube, but also features some videos unrelated to politics. For example, the channel Subtitle Translator has uploaded many old silent movies of interest.


THE INTERNET ARCHIVE:
This site has literally millions of old video and audio to enjoy, including pages to listen to Old Time Radio as well as classic TV and silent movies to watch.


MARIAVISION:
Live TV feed of the Catholic TV channel.


AMERICAN ARCHIVE OF PUBLIC BROADCASTING:
This website contains thousands of archived videos, including episodes of the MacNeil-Lehrer NewsHour dating back to 1975 (up to the present), as well as William F. Buckley's Firing Line.  (When going to the pages for those particular series, click the red "View the collection" button to be taken to the page where you can view the episodes.)


iSPOT:
Have you seen a commercial recently on TV and want to watch it again or know more about it (who was the actor, what the plot description was, etc.)?  The above site provides data about new commercials.


-- AUDIO FILES:--

AUDIO VISUALS (1990s Doctor Who fan-made audio dramas):


BBC RADIO:
Until recently, there would be no problem listening to BBC radio shows for free over the internet anywhere in the world via the BBC website. However the BBC has recently moved to limit listening to those in the UK, although the links below still work for me to "listen live" to the most popular channels:  

Some shows can be listened to for a much longer period, and some can also be downloaded as MP3 files so that you can save them permanently on your computer in case the site ever removes the content.  (That link generally not available outside the UK, but can be viewed if you stop the page before it redirects to an error page.)  For example, the page of "In Our Time" podcasts can be found here.

To view lists of BBC radio schedules, click here.  

(BBC Radio 4 is the channel that plays the most original new radio drama.  (Those two links are also generally not available outside the U.K.)  BBC Radio 4 Extra [formerly known as BBC Radio 7] airs a lot of classic radio drama and comedy episodes.)

The BBC Radio 4 Extra page for Sherlock Holmes radio dramas is here.  In the past, listeners outside the U.K. were allowed to hear the shows listed there, but that changed in 2024.  My own favorites were the ones from the 1950s and 1960s starring Carleton Hobbs.  An alternative to hearing those episodes on the BBC website is YouTube, although many of the episodes uploaded there suffer from inferior sound quality. (An exception are those posted by Brodie Vickers.)

DRAMA OF THE WEEK:
The BBC's "Drama of the Week" page highlights a particular radio drama that aired in the past week and makes it available for download.  The episodes are generally only available for 14 days, so it pays to check the page at least once a week to download the available content.  There is also the Comedy of the Week, which is available to download for 30 days.
  

CBC RADIO (Canada):
The live streams of CBC Radio One (talk) and CBC Music [formerly CBC Radio Two] stations can be heard here.


CRNTalk radio:
The live streams of the various channels of CRN radio (which airs conservative talk radio programs) can be heard here. The Michael Medved Show airs weekdays around 4-5 pm EST on CRN1.  


Detroit FM radio stations:
My blog post above from 2023 contains links to the websites of the FM radio stations in the Detroit area, where you can listen live to many of them.  


Earthcam:
Abbey Road crossing 24/7 webcam:


FABCAST (Beatles podcast):


TUNE IN:
I don't have cable TV, but I frequently listen to the live audio feed of CNN on the Tune In website.  You can hear a live feed of MSNow on there as well.  There are numerous radio stations that can be heard on the site.  Local radio stations can be listened to on Tune In, or by visiting each station's website to see if a live audio stream is available.  For example, the local WDTK "The Answer" (formerly "The Patriot") 92.7 FM Detroit channel (which plays conservative talk radio shows) can be heard here and WJR 760 AM Detroit can be heard here.  


MyTuner Radio:
This site also lets you listen live to various radio stations.


The World of Doctor Who: Panel to Panel:
Podcast about Doctor Who comics hosted by Jeremy Bement. This is a continuation of his archived podcast Doctor Who: Panel to Panel that ended in 2024.


Zoomer Radio:
This Canadian radio station airs an hourlong block of old-time radio every weeknight at 10pm EST on the "Theater of the Mind" program, which can be heard online via the "Listen Live" button on the website.


OLD-TIME RADIO:
Many old-time radio episodes can be heard on the aforementioned YouTube and Internet Archive.  For example, the YouTube channels of Brodie Vickers (British radio) and Michael Degen.


Here are a few more pages where OTR files can be downloaded:

Old Time Radio Researchers Group Library:
The Ted Davenport Collection can be found here:
The "Certified" series can be found here:
The OTRR page at the Internet Archive:

Old Time Radio Downloads:

Jerry Haendiges' OTR page:

Old Time Radio Lover:

Old Time Radio Shows on MP3:

Radio Echoes:

The Gildersleeve Project:

jfyuga's Internet Archive uploads:

The Joe Hehn Memorial Collection:

Rand's Esoteric OTR:

Ray Bradbury radio shows:

The Suspense Project:

The Theatre 5 Project:

Well, that should keep you busy watching and listening for now!  :-)
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Sunday, September 15, 2013

Silent Movies and Me

A couple days ago, I happened to stumble upon a blog run by Jessica Keaton called "Silence is Platinum," which is all about the stars of the silent movie era.  I'm surprised that I hadn't stumbled upon it earlier, since Jessica's blog contains entries on several silent stars with whom I've long been fascinated, and about whom I still know little, even after all these years.

Given that Jessica has written around 200 entries, I thought it would be a good idea to organize the information into alphabetical order, so that any visitor could easily see at a glance what topics and individuals have been covered already.  (I seem to have a habit of thinking this way.  Back in the early 1990s, when I discovered that a Doctor Who program guide I had was lacking an index at the back, I compiled one myself.  Fortunately computers have made such indexing a lot easier!)

So, I spent yesterday putting together an alphabetical index of every entry on Jessica's blog.  That way, if you want to see who has been written about (or who hasn't yet been written about), it's simpler to find out: just see if their name is on the list.  I compiled this index for my own benefit, so I could go immediately to the entries that I was most interested in; but Jessica's blog is so well-done that you will find yourself becoming interested in some actors that you had never heard of before.

Two of my favorite blog entries that Jessica has written are her photographic travels to see the grave sites of deceased stars of the silent era.  In the posts titled "Grave hunting" (Sept. 2010) and "Grave Pictures" (June 2012), she visited the final resting places of such notables as Buster Keaton, Marion Davies, Clara Bow and Valentino, as well as less well-known names (but perhaps even more fascinating to me) like Pola Negri and Maude Fealy.  It may sound morbid, but such pilgrimages to these graves do allow the person of today to get about as close to the stars of yesterday as possible. And sadly some of the people who were involved in the early days of film have been forgotten, so it's great to see their names being recognized and appreciated by someone.

There are many other fascinating entries on Jessica's blog, offering tributes to a large number of people (both the famous and the forgotten), so check out my index for the A to Z list of them!

BECOMING A SILENT MOVIE FAN

Although I was curious during my early teen years about science fiction/fantasy silents like Metropolis (used by Queen in their "Radio Gaga" music video) and Nosferatu, it wasn't until my late teens that I became a fan of silent film in general.  One of the first things to get my attention was seeing a photo of Clara Bow in a book about movies that was in my high school library.  The stark B&W photo made her almost look like a goth idol like Siouxsie Sioux, a refreshingly hard-edged alternative to the bland, pastel-colored visuals that were prevalent in the mid-to-late 1980s.  

I subsequently saw a postcard of the famous photo (at right) of Louise Brooks holding a string of pearls, much of her figure concealed by darkness, and I was hooked.  I got and read Barry Paris' biography of Brooks (as well as her autobiography Lulu in Hollywood, and the very first book about Brooks, Portrait of an anti-Star) and became fascinated with this early era of film history. I told a friend at the time that reading the Barry Paris book, following the story of her life from beginning to the end, felt like having a lifelong affair with another person, being with them as they went through the ups and downs of life.

In the early 1990s, I acquired one of my all-time favorite books: A Pictorial History of the Silent Screen by Daniel Blum, which was released in 1953 (a few years before serious interest in the artistry of the silent film era had gained acceptance).  What this book may lack in quality (since much of it consists of rows of tiny photos printed on non-slick paper), it more than makes up for in quantity!  One can really get lost in the past just by looking through this book, seeing stills from early films that in many instances no longer exist.

It was particularly cool to see photo stills that looked more modern than I had expected -- or conversely, a fashion trend that seemed bizarre to modern eyes.  Most of the leading men would be clean-shaven, even back then, but supporting character types would often appear with wild bushy whiskers on their faces.  (Whenever I see a film today that takes place during that period, such as Murdoch Mysteries, I often think that there would be a lot more whiskery men walking around.) 

The rise of the vamp in the mid-to-late 'Teens, most notably Theda Bara, was a vivid example of this -- a fashion or trend that dominated the scene but then disappeared, never to return in quite the same way.  Yes, there were other femme fatales later on, but usually not depicted in the fantastic, literally vampiric style of those early vamps.  When I saw a photo (not the one of her shown at left) in the Blum book of Valeska Suratt,  she was wearing a veil that was designed like a huge spider web, and I remember thinking it odd: "Is this what was considered sexy back in 1917?"  (Of course, in recent years, when I saw Lady Gaga's fashions, my first thought was "Ah, she's bringing the vamp back in style!")  Sadly none of Valeska Suratt's films survive today.

Back in the early 1990s, it was a little more difficult to see an old silent movie than it is today (with the advent of YouTube, etc.) and my viewings of them were limited to what aired on TV or what I bought or rented on videotape.  There were also mail-order dealers whose catalogs were filled with tapes for sale, but limited funds prevented me from pursuing that opportunity.  (Today, magazines like Classic Images are still published which contain numerous ads for such dealers.)  Fortunately, American Movie Classics (AMC) still played old movies back then, from whence I taped Clara Bow's 1927 film Wings, and Lillian Gish's 1928 film The Wind (which was preceded by a new introduction from Gish herself that you can watch here).  On Sunday morning, Comedy Central would air "Dead Comics Society," hosted by comedian Robert Klein, which would air (with commercial interruptions, alas) silent shorts by Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Harry Langdon, among others, as well as later (talking) shorts by Charley Chase and Edgar Kennedy.  And of course Turner Classic Movies (TCM) would play silent movies each week, especially in their Sunday night at midnight slot.  I recall commandeering the family TV to see Erich von Stroheim's Greed one evening and watching it on the couch with my mom (not a silent movie buff)!

The appeal of silent movies to me initially lay with the simple fascination of being able to witness history -- things that had happened before recorded sound itself was a staple of the moviegoing experience.  But the more I watched, the more I realized that silent movies could touch the heart in a way that sound films often didn't, through the use of gestures that expressed feelings that words couldn't convey.  I recall first noticing this in the aforementioned Wings, when one of the pilots brings to a grieving mother the tiny good-luck bear that she had given her son.  I saw this as well in the modern sequence of Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments (the silent version) where two friends are in love with the same girl, and when she chooses one over the other, he gently squeezes the hand of his crestfallen friend in sympathy at his heartbreak.  Even some of the comedies, such as those of Chaplin and Langdon, were known to tug at the heart strings, utilizing the silent films' strength in stirring depth of feeling.

However, most of the silent comedies specialized in another strength: the humor of watching clever bits of business being perfectly played out on screen.  Physical comedians like Keaton and Harold Lloyd drew laughs for the zany pitfalls that befell their characters, somehow surviving to the last reel.  Although lines of dialogue can often help carry a gag over with the audience, too much can get in the way of the joke.  A simple title card sufficed to add a line here or there, to complement rather than slow down the symphonic movement of the figures.  One of my favorite silent film comedy sequences is one from a 1926 Charley Chase short called "Dog Shy" where he misunderstands an order to give "The Duke" (a dog) a bath, and proceeds to force a visiting dignitary into the tub.  The scene works on a few different levels: the humiliation of the Duke (and the undermining of his earlier boastings of his valor as he is dragged off by Charley) and the way in which Charley's behavior is presented as normal in his own mind (he was ordered to give him a bath) and lunacy in his victim's.  It's a slight entertainment, but the simple purity of the scenario still makes me laugh.

A happy medium between reading a book about silent movies and actually seeing a silent movie is when one can watch a well-made documentary on the subject.  In the 1990s, I used to love whenever PBS would air one of the British documentaries about silent film, such as "The Unknown Chaplin" "Buster Keaton, A Hard Act to Follow" or "Harold Lloyd, The Third Genius."  These and several other documentaries were written and produced by the great film historian Kevin Brownlow, whose work is essential reading for anyone with a serious interest in the silents.   Brownlow is best known for his book on the subject, The Parade's Gone By... (1968), but my favorite may be Behind the Mask of Innocence (1990) which looks at silent films in a sociological way, especially ones which were produced for that purpose.  My one regret is that I have none of Brownlow's books on my own bookshelf, having always borrowed them from the library!

At the other end of the spectrum, we have Kenneth Anger's two volumes of Hollywood Babylon.  While they have a very poor reputation (Jessica Keaton refers to it as "trash" more than once on her blog), and shouldn't be relied on for historical accuracy, they helped fuel my interest as I first became a fan of silent movies.  If you know someone who thinks silent movies are boring, Hollywood Babylon may change their mind.  (Especially the first volume, which is more amusingly-written.)  However, they are to silent film history what Perez Hilton and TMZ are to modern cinema: a fun, guilty pleasure but not to be mistaken for actual scholarship.

THE EVER PRESENT PAST

One of the great things about being alive right now is that we have access to materials at our fingertips that many researchers and fans of the past may not have had.  As more and more items from the past are scanned or uploaded to the net, our base of knowledge about the topic increases.  Information that has been buried in movie magazines from a hundred years ago can now be read anew with the click of a button.  Case in point: The poem shown above was published in the May 1915 issue of Photoplay magazine, credited to one "M. C. Davies."  Could this have been actress Marion Davies, before she was famous? According to Wikipedia, she made her film debut in late 1916. IMDB's earliest film for her is from 1917. And her middle name? Cecelia. 

How did I get access to a 1915 issue of Photoplay?  It's available online.  There are other websites which contain a numerous amount of magazines and newspapers that can be viewed on your computer.  And it seems that the more sites that pop up, the more information about (and photos of!) stars of the past become available, too.



One silent movie actress that hasn't yet been featured on Jessica Keaton's Silence is Platimum blog is one about whom I knew nearly nothing for over 20 years, but (thanks to the internet) have recently learned a great deal more about.  I first heard of (and saw a couple photos of) Valda Valkyrien in Daniel Blum's A Pictorial History of the Silent Screen book.  She appeared in a couple tiny photos therein, and that was pretty much it as to the information about her -- that I ever ran across, anyway.  However, since more old magazines have been scanned and uploaded to the net, more information is now available about her than I'd ever seen in print before.  (Although maybe I wasn't paying enough attention to the right publications.)  Since the old magazines can be read online, it's no longer necessary to have someone else filtering that material to the reader; the original magazine articles can be read for oneself.  On the other hand, not everything that appeared in the old magazines was the truth either, so the critical skills of a researcher and historian are still needed to sift through the data and find if the oft-told tales match the known facts.  



Fans can also use the internet to obtain books and magazines (the physical objects, not just downloads) about silent movies more easily than they might have done in the past.  I remember in the early 1990s at a B. Dalton bookstore seeing a new book about Natacha Rambova (who I knew about from Hollywood Babylon) titled Madam Valentino, but I didn't have enough money to get the book at that time -- and never saw it again.  In recent years, I saw that it was available on eBay, but again for more than I was able to pay for it.  Biding my time, I would search for it on eBay every now and then, until finally I found it from a seller for ten bucks and nabbed it.  The seller also had a book about Nazimova for around the same price and I bought that as well.  Of course I could have visited a well-stocked used bookstore and perhaps found them there as well (emphasis on "perhaps") but it was nice to be able to "shop around" for an item that is (or was) fairly obscure (as most items relating to silent film history are likely to be).  Old movie magazines can sometimes be hot items on eBay, though.  Last May, I was surprised to see a 1931 movie magazine sell there for $160, when the starting bid had been $25.00.

Perhaps that demonstrates a possible future: where these once-obscure, neglected things become more well-known, partly through the internet, and they become not-so-forgotten after all.  However, part of the appeal of silent movies (and other neglected artforms like radio drama) is that they offer an alternative to the prevailing tastes of today.  Both silent movies and radio demand a certain level of engagement on the part of the audience, so that it's likely they will never again enjoy widespread popularity as they had in the past.  No worries, though!  The fact that silent movies continue to be appreciated by new generations of fans (however small their number) bodes well for their survival in the years ahead.
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