With cinema, home video and VOD releases always trying to make you part with you cash, it’s sometimes easy to forget that there is a whole library of free to view films out there waiting. Here are five of the best.
1. Nosferatu
Fritz’s Lang’s 1922 masterpiece has the distinction of being the first film adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, albeit an extremely loose adaptation. Max Shreck stars as Count Orlock (they didn’t have the rights to the Dracula name), a Dracula imitation who, despite appearing to be so frail that the slightest gust of wind would bow him over, somehow manages to be more terrifying than all other screen portrayals of Dracula combined. Well, as we learn in the 2000 movie Shadow of the Vampire, Shreck really was an undead monster, so that explains a lot.
Similalry, the film is actually a far more faithful adaptation of Stoker’s novel than many of the subsequent films. Also considered to be one of the finest horror films of the silent period, this is a must see for any self respecting horror fan.
2. M
If Nosferatu left you with a craving for more of the works of Fritz Lang, then check out his creepy as hell fact based thriller M, about the killer dubbed The Vampire of Dusseldorf, here played by future horror legend Peter Lorre.
Being in the public domain means that the George A. Romero’s 1968 that invented the modern zombie genre has been re-released, re-cut, re-shot, remade, rebooted and been subjected to just about every other word starting with re. Don’t let the abuse that it suffered spoil your appetite however, (especially if that appetite is for human flesh) and enjoy the film that paved the way for The Walking Dead, WWZ and just about anything else related to zombies.
The title says it all really. Abel Ferrara would go on to be the man known for classics such as Bad Lieutenant and Body Snatchers, but when he was still finding his feet this 1979 video nasty that the BBFC, who were going through a difficult phase when it came to horror at the time, gave a hard deal.
5. The Last Man of Earth
Before it was butcher by Francis Lawrence and Will Smith, Richard Matheson’s post apocalyptic novel was adapted into a hugely superior movie with a tragic, heartbreaking performance from the usually whimsical Vincent price.
