“Give them pleasure,” Alfred Hitchcock famously said. “The same pleasure they have when they wake up from a nightmare.” That’s the driving force behind FilmOn’s latest addition of new content to its free streaming service, ShockMasters. The channel acts as a permanent movie marathon devoted to Hitchcock and other legendary horror directors he influenced.
ShockMasters will feature 20 movies by Hitchcock, including Murder, The Manxman and Number 17 — it’s especially strong on his rarely seen early British films. It will also show the complete run of his TV series Suspicion and Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and rare documentaries by and about the master. The channel was forged by FilmOn CEO and Founder Alki David in partnership with CineBx archives. (TV Mix is owned by FilmOn.)
“We haven’t created the channel just because Hitchcock is the best known, most influential and imitated film director in history,” said FilmOn Founder and CEO Alki David. “We wanted to offer our audiences free access to an extraordinary collection of content by one of the world’s greatest impresarios, never before available on one streaming TV channel.”
ShockMasters will also feature Hitchcock’s best documentary works from the end of WWII, when the director traveled to Europe to film the horrors being revealed during the liberation of Dachau, Buchenwald, and six other camps. Despite the seeming departure of these documentaries, he rarely changed his style. Hitchcock understood the power of his influence, and he himself borrowed from the reservoir of these early films. “Self-plagiarism is style,” he said.
FilmOn will debut an original documentary about Hitchcock, Masters of Fear, it produced in conjunction with Biografilm on Feb. 1, 2014. And rounding out the programming on ShockMasters will be works by those most influenced by Hitchcock including Carol Reed (The Third Man), Stanley Donen (Singin’ in the Rain) and many of Hollywood’s other A list directors. This will also allow fans to compare all the remakes — such as The Lodger vs Maurice Elvey’s Phantom Fiend — and the many satirical reinterpretations.
Meanwhile, FilmOn’s Living History Channel, which launched last month with incredible and rarely seen documentary footage of President John F. Kennedy, is now featuring a tribute to Nelson Mandela. The programming includes Mandela, A Documentary, with rare footage from when Mandela was still imprisoned — featuring Winnie Mandela’s harrowing account of her own time in solitary confinement. FilmOn’s tribute also includes the Danny Glover and Alfre Woodward TV Movie Mandela from 1987. The powerful film focuses on the freedom fighter’s early years and personal life.
Living History Channe — which was also created in partnership with CineBx — is ending the year with 20 film documentary series on the Korean War to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the end of armed conflict in the region. The vicious North Korean regime is examined in a documentary called Crime In Korea.
Living History is streaming original archival footage round the clock. Check listings HERE.
ShockMasters, a non-stop movie marathon of Hitchcockian horror and suspense is streaming free via FilmOn.
