Snagfilms: Watch Free Documentaries Online

Published by Jeff Leins on: October 28th, 2009

Last week there was talk of the conglomerates behind Hulu turning the typically free product into a subscriber-based system. While we’re still crossing our fingers that “The Office” — or worse, our beloved “General Hospital”* — doesn’t go behind a pay wall, what about other sources for free movies online?

Check out Snagfilms.com, a website dedicated to providing free streaming full-length and short documentaries.

The site has a library of 950 different films to choose from, but there are a few gems I’ve seen and personally recommend.  Morgan Spurlock’s Super Size Me is a must see movie about one man’s crusade to expose McDonald’s and America’s unhealthy addiction to fast food.  There’s also Darkon, a fascinating look at the fantasy world of live-action role playing.  Plus Confessions of a Superhero that chronicles the lives and motivations for the comic book characters posing for pictures on Hollywood Blvd.  Or What Would Jesus Buy?, an eccentric little film about consumerism in America seen through the eyes of Reverend Billy and his Church of Stop Shopping.

You can watch these videos and more directly on the Snagfilms website or click the play button on IMDB for some.  There are also options to “snag” the films: embed the streaming video player into other websites or share links through various social networking outlets.  I especially liked that you could resume from a previous spot if you were watching a film earlier, which came in handy when my web browser crashed.

There are brief, intermittent ads on occasion — which made for an amusing few seconds during What Would Jesus Buy — but overall you can’t argue with free full-length films.

*I don’t watch “General Hospital.”