Watching silent films on Netflix

Or not.

Well, like most other movies and shows on Netflix, the silent movies they off get rotated out of play. They used to have a number of silents in their queue "The Mark of Zorro" and "The Thief of Bagdhad" with Douglas Fairbanks. Until a few days ago, two versions of "A Trip to the Moon" by Georges Méliès were available for viewing.

As of today, though, they are down to two films: "Wings" with Clara Bow and Buddy Rogers, and the Fritz Lang classic "Metropolis." Two great movies, no doubt, but just two isn't enough.

Fortunately, there are other places online where people can watch silent films and get a good look at the history of film as we know it today.

• OpenCulture.com offers "101 Free Silent Films: The Great Classics"

• Fandor.com has a number of silent films

• Archive.com has a lot of films, including some by Thanhouser, Mack Sennett and D.W. Griffith, and others featuring Florence La Badie, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Florence Lawrence, Lillian Gish, Mae Marsh, Martha Mansfield, Rudolph Valentino and many more

• BlackAndWhiteMovies.org offers a variety of silent and talkie films

• SilentMovies.info gives information about the films and lets you click right through to watch them; if you thought that the only versions of the following films were the Technicolor talkies, check out this site to see: "The Ten Commandments" (1923), "Alice in Wonderland" (1915), "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" (1923), "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" (1916) and "Ben Hur" (1925).

• Public Domain Comedy Video has a bunch of Charlie Chaplin films plus many others

• OVGuide.com

If you check out any of these silent films on these sites or have a site to add to the list, let me know! I'm all about resurrecting the silents and helping people rediscover this forgotten part of film history and the people who made it.

Minda