Generally, when you see a YouTube video promising a full movie, shenanigans are going on. It’s only “free” until someone notices and takes it down. Enterprising pirates have come up with various ways to beat the takedown filters — flipping the film, running it in a box as part of other motion, uploading it in 240p… but Warner Bros. doesn’t have to do all that.
Well done, Warner Bros.
Warner Bros., the motion picture giant, has spent months uploading a free selection of its films onto the largest video streaming platform in the world. Unusually, the majority of these are available to South African users. Usually, some sort of geo-block (looking at you, Paramount) prevents us from accessing similar freebies. Well, not this time. Except for four titles that we aren’t allowed to watch. Licensing issues, unless we miss our guess.
Maybe don’t get your hopes up too high, however. Warner might have some excellent films under its belt but folks are still winning to pay to access those. You’d expect that the films available for free would be of lesser quality and you’d be entirely right. Some titles will pique South African viewers’ interests, though.
Titles like Mr Nice Guy, a B-grade Jackie Chan film set in Australia. Then there’s American Ninja V, which somehow manages to be worse than the four Michael Dudikoff films that preceded it. There’s Dungeons and Dragons. The first one, not the new one. And there is also a selection of authentic classics.
Films like Mutiny on the Bounty, from before Marlon Brando decided to cosplay as Jabba the Hut full-time. You’ll also find The Year of Living Dangerously, The Bonfire of the Vanities, and several others that immediately register in our brains as ‘possibly worth watching’. But the list also includes Hot to Trot, so tread carefully.
Warner Bros.’s entire playlist can be found here.
