I’ve often sung the praises of Youtube for its prolific population of live performance music clips. Recently I’ve discovered that someone, over the past couple of years, has uploaded a plethora (yea verily, haply a surfeit) of full-length B-movies.

Those of us of a certain age will recall the days when things like the Charlie Chan series, Peter Lorre’s “Mr. Moto” collection, and even Boris Karloff’s incarnation as “Mr. Wong, Detective” populated our two- or three-channel TV universes outside of prime time and daytime. Along with mountains of Universal and Republic fluff from the 30s and 40s. How many grainy Sunday afternoons I spent in the company of Sidney Toler, Warner Oland, Roland Winters (yuk), Peter Lorre, Colin Clive, Lon Chaney Jr., Basil Rathbone & Nigel Bruce (whom I have never forgiven for turning Watson into a boob such as Doyle never had in mind).

It’s all on Youtube now, and bingeable whenever you need a break from Midsomer Murders or Frazier reruns (“Mad About You” is the latest around here, and if ever there was something to need a break from…)

DQ

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