LibGuides: Library Support for Transitioning to Online Teaching: Streaming Films

Streaming Films

Films on Demand

Films on Demand is a paid subscription service that includes outstanding documentaries, award-winning educational films, independent films, and helpful instructional videos from producers HBO, BBC, Frontline, PBS and more. Creating a personal account will allow you to manipulate films.

Personal Account Features

Create and share playlists
Save favorites
Prepare videos prior to class
Quickly display during class period

Embedding Films in Canvas

Step by step instructions here.

Free Streaming Resources

American Experience
Films about American History from the Public Broadcasting System (PBS).
American Indian Film Gallery
Vintage films of Native Americans. Being from archival footage, some are incomplete or of poor video quality, but are valuable for their depictions.
American Memory Collection (Motion Picture and Television Reading Room)
Historical films from the Library of Congress.
Annenberg Learner
Videos free for streaming for educational purposes only. Can use menus to browse by discipline and grade level.
Civil Rights Digital Library
Features a collection of unedited news film from the WSB (Atlanta) and WALB (Albany, Ga.) television archives documenting America's struggle for racial equality.
Folkstreams
A national preserve of documentary films about American roots cultures.
FORA.tv
Collection of unmediated video drawn from top conferences, universities, and public forums. Some 'premium' (that is, not free) content as well.
Forum Network
Free Online Lectures from PBS and NPR stations.
FRONTLINE
Documentary film series from PBS.
Internet Archive: Cultural & Academic Films
This library of academic and cultural films features collections from the Academic Film Archive and the Media Burn Independent Film Archive, as well as a selection of documentaries created by Dorothy Fadiman. In addition, films from the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archeology and Anthropology are presented including those by Watson Kintner who used film to document his world travels, and the popular television show from the 1950s: “What in the World?”
KnowledgeStream.org
Local talks on all manner of topics, recorded and streamed by WGTE, the Toledo public broadcasting station.
National Film Board of Canada
Enjoy documentaries, animations, alternative dramas and interactive productions on the web.
NOVA
Science programing from PBS.
POV (Point of View)
Documentary film series from PBS.
SnagFilms
Watch free documentaries online.
TED: Ideas worth spreading
Short educational and inspirational talks by current experts.
EVIA Digital Archive Project
A digital archive of ethnographic field video for use by scholars and instructors.
Open Video Project
Open collection of documentary and historical films from a variety of sources.
Foreign Language Video Instruction
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Collection of video clips in which native speakers elaborate on a wide variety of topics about their culture, family, daily life, and more. Each video clip is accompanied by a description of its contents, the country of the speaker, and additional grammar and vocabulary notes. Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), French, German, Russian, Spanish, Swahili. In OhioLINK Digital Resource Center.

Documentary Heaven

Pulls documentaries from a variety of websites and arranges them by subject category, etc.

SnagFilms
Provides access to full-length documentary films from established distributors and first-time filmmakers. The Snag Films library includes more than 850 films. Filmmakers and distributors submit titles to SnagFilms for curatorial review. The site organizes titles by broad Topics (such as Arts, Environment, Health, History, Women's Issues, etc.) and by Channels (including well-established film companies such as Alive Mind, Icarus, Fanlight, PBS, and National Geographic). The SnagFilms website encourages donating to causes by linking each film to a specific charity. Brief commercials precede and are interspersed through the video playback.

UC Berkeley Media Resources Center Online Media

Provides access to videos from major content publishers like CBS, ABC, WB, MTV Networks, ESPN, Sony/BMG and Lions Gate, other video sites like YouTube and Hulu, as well as independent filmmakers and content producers.

List created by University of Toledo Libraries

Temporarily Free

The following vendors are making some of their streaming content available for free for a short period of time.

Vision Maker Media
A collection of 40 American Indian focused streaming films made available for academic institutions through mid-May.

Women Make Movies
This online festival began to commemorate International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month and highlight new releases in our transnational feminist film collection. However, with the evolving news of the rapid spread of COVID-19 globally and the ensuing physical distancing, the festival has become a means of bridging virtual distance. We’re exploring how we can expand the model as well as the content so as to best meet the needs of attendees, filmmakers, and educators. Through May 31st, you will have free access to select films by women filmmakers from around the globe. New films will be added each week.