Opening Up the Hitchcock and Lang Archives

What silent film has to do with sci-fi classics and the democratization of media.

The film careers of Fritz Lang and Alfred Hitchcock moved down parallel paths. As the British Film Institute rightly points out, the two directors started working in film around the same time and “thrived in silent film, but easily adjusted to sound. Both also moved from Europe to America and recreated their genius in a new culture.” By the 1950s, the Cahiers du cinéma placed Hitchcock and Lang in their pantheon of cinematic greats, and now you can watch a good selection of their films online — for free.

Vintage films keep slipping into the public domain, and they’re gradually finding their way onto the Internet Archive, Brewster Kahle’s non-profit website dedicated to preserving cultural artifacts in digital form. The Archive’s feature films collection houses movies by Howard Hawks, Frank Capra, Elia Kazan, John Ford, and, to be sure, Hitchcock and Lang too. From the silent era, you will find Lang’s German expressionist sci-fi classic Metropolis (1927) sitting alongside Hitchcock’s first critically and commercially successful film, The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog (1926). Then come their 1930 “talking” films: Lang ultimately considered his first sound movie – M (1931) – his finest work overall. And many rank The 39 Steps (1935) as Hitchcock’s best early film. Plus you can watch his very first sound movie, Blackmail, from 1929.

All together, the Internet Archive houses at least 15 Hitchcock films, and 4 Lang films from the 1920s and 1930s, and you can find them listed in Open Culture’s collection of Free Movies. But things start to thin out once we hit the 1940s, when Hitchcock and Lang launched their Hollywood careers. Copyright law helps explain the dearth of available films. But, don’t despair, the Archive still offers up some worthwhile movies: on the one hand, Scarlet Street, Lang’s contribution to the film noir canon; and on the other hand, Hitchcock’s Bon Voyage and Aventure Malgache, two French language propaganda films that he directed to support the Allied forces during World War II. Open Culture has previously surveyed the contributions made by other great directors during war time, and today we’ll point you to a free online archive of Andrei Tarkovsky’s films.

Dan Colman edits Open Culture, which brings you the best free educational media available on the web — free online courses, audio books, movies and more. By day, he directs the Continuing Studies Program at Stanford University, and you can also find him on Twitter.

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Retro Revival: Vintage Posters for Modern Movies

Helvetica, Hitchcock and what Saul Bass can teach J.J. Abrams about mystery.

The retro revival design trend has been around for a while, but over the past few months we’ve seen one particularly interesting and wonderful niche manifestation — vintage-inspired, retrostalgic posters for modern television and film. Here are seven of our favorites, plus some extras.

HEXAGONALL

A few days ago, we tweeted a delightful what-if: Spanish digital creative Hexagonall‘s vision for what Tron and Lost opening sequences would’ve looked like if the iconic Saul Bass had designed them.

It gets better: Hexagonall has an entire poster series under the Tron vs. Saul Bass umbrella — and they’re all fantastic.

And despite curmudgeonly remarks disputing whether Saul Bass would approve of these, we think what’s important here, and what Bass would certainly approve of, is the fact that almost half a century after his heyday, his visual heritage is still being celebrated and is still a force of inspiration. What more could a creator ask for?

TY MATTSON

Speaking of Lost and past Twitter raves, these fab vintagey Lost posters by designer Ty Mattson are an absolute treat.

Our favorite: This distinctly Saul Bassean hand.

OLLY MOSS

Count on one of our favorite illustrators, Olly Moss, to reimagine iconic film posters with brilliant vintage-inspired minimalism.

His Films in Black and Red series is a piece of quiet genius.

Bonus points for the mandatory Helvetica overuse.

NICK TASSONE

In another bout of brilliant minimalism, designer Nick Tassone reimagines his 10 favorite Stephen King films.

The only downside: All this slick and stylish designerliness makes the films appear considerably less creepy, which makes them technically counterproductive.

TAVIS COBURN

After BAFTA (the British Academy for Film and Television Arts) announced this year’s nominees, London-based designer Tavis Coburn set out to illustrate each of the films as unspeakably gorgeous vintage-inspired posters.

Needless to say, we’re back to the age-old question of why everything is better in Britain.

BRANDON SCHAEFER

Designer Brandon Schaefer may be only 25, but he’s got a knack for the vintage aesthetic that he employs brilliantly in his retrofied posters for modern movies.

The collection also includes Schaefer’s reenvisionings for older, iconic movies, like Rear Window and Star Wars.

TOM WHALEN

Tom Whalen has some classically vintage renditions of contemporary horror and scifi films, in a style that’s both recognizably retro and distinctly his own.

BONUS

Also of note: Penney Design reimagines modern movies as vintage games; the brilliant I Can Read Movies has been around for some time now, but it never ceases to amaze and amuse with its assortment of vintagey film-based mock book covers; Ibraheem Youssef’s has a delightfully vintage-minimalist take on Quentin Tarantino movies; though not designed as posters, these typographic covers for the new digitally remastered box set of Hitchcock films are just as indulgent; speaking of, British designer Matt Needle’s Modern Hitchcock series is utterly fabulous.

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