Perhaps you don't care about movies from the early 1900s, and if you wanted to dig into film history, you'd use something other than Netflix. Okay, good luck with that, but it's a fair point that not everybody cares about movies made before 1954.
How many movies do you suppose Netflix carries from before 2000?
Wednesday, August 30, 2023, I checked and found 149. I remember noting that the run of Airport movies were there, starting with the Burt Lancaster original "Airport" in 1970, but also "Airport 1975," "Airport '77," and "The Concorde: Airport '79." None of those are there now, though, and yet the total number of movies from 1900-1999 is now 153.
https://www.justwatch.com/us/provider/netflix/movies?release_year_until=1999&sort_by=release_year
Of those 153 movies, roughly 61 are not in English, most in Hindi, but also a few others. That leaves roughly 92 English-language movies from prior to 2000, from White Christmas to Stuart Little. That's it!
@pwinn It wouldn't be such a big deal if the content continued to be available via some avenue, but it seems like the streaming services are moving away from buying up rights to works in order to have some sort of depth of catalog advantage. Instead, you see companies burying their old stuff because they want everyone watching their new stuff and talking about their new stuff.
Streaming is morphing into what Blockbuster did with their video stores, just one big *New Releases!* section.
The list changing from three weeks ago makes me think I should note what's there now, for when it gets better or worse. So...
White Christmas
FTA (documentary)
Earthquake
Jaws
The Great Waldo Pepper
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Midway
Rocky
Hitler: A Career (documentary)
Slap Shot
Jaws 2
The Deer Hunter
The Wiz
The Jerk
Richard Pryor Live In Concert (Standup)
Monty Python's Life of Brian
Rocky II
The Electric Horseman
Fast Times at Ridgemont High
Conan the Barbarian
Rocky III
Dune
The Karate Kid
Rocky IV
The Breakfast Club
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
The Karate Kid Part II
Stand By Me
The Money Pit
Adam: His Song Continues
Dragnet
Jaws: the Revenge
The Secret of my Success
Strange Voices
Quiet Victory
A Stoning in Fulham County
Too Young the Hero
Midnight Run
Hard Lessons
Coming to America
Uncle Buck
The Very Best of Monty Python's Flying Circus
The Ryan White Story
Steel Magnolias
The Karate Kid Part III
Field of Dreams
Heartstopper
Unspeakable Acts
Rocky V
In Defense of a Married Man
Out of Life
Hook
Victim of Beauty
Triumph of the Heart
A League of Their Own
Reservoir Dogs
In the Line of Fire
Sankofa
Cliffhanger
Groundhog Day
Sinbad: Afros & Bellbottoms (Standup)
Clear and Present Danger
Leon
Legends of the Fall
Heavy
Jumanji
Heat
Kicking and Screaming
Sinbad: Son of a Preacher Man (Standup)
Matilda
The Cable Guy
Sinbad: Nothin' But the Funk (Standup)
Donnie Brasco
Liar Liar
Titanic
Starship Troopers
The Devil's Own
The Negotiator
Vampires
Monty Python Live at Aspen
One Last Shot
Jerry Seinfeld Live on Broadway (Standup)
The Last Days (documentary)
Blue Streak
Girl Interrupted
Stuart Little
I count 85 English-language movies now that I've gone through them more carefully, rather than just skimming the list. That's all Netflix carries for 1902-1999.
Plus another 68 movies not in English. Some of which are really good! But I'm trying to avoid being tricked by Netflix "stuffing" their numbers by loading a back-catalog of Hindi movies to offset their ever-dwindling collection of English-language movies.