LibGuides: Film Studies: Film Scripts, Screenplays & Images

Screenplays

In CLIO

There isn't a perfect search method for locating screenplays, especially of adaptations. In many cases, you can search the film's title or screenwriter name (NOT director) and browse the results for a screenplay. For popular titles, it may be more effective to conduct an advanced search and exclude the keyword videorecording. A subject search for Television scripts as well as Motion picture plays will show quite a few available in CLIO. A subject search for Motion Picture Plays > Bibliography or Television scripts > Bibliography leads to lists of published screenplays.

In Databases

Film Scripts Online
Searchable database of film scripts, most of which have never been published before, includes detailed indexing on scenes, characters, and people. Contains bibliographic and biographical information of directors and writers, along with the full text of the movies themselves, from the earliest silent films through to the present. Supports the study of popular culture, film, diversity and gender issues, language and linguistics, writing, American history, anthropology, sociology, and psychology.
Performing Arts Periodicals Database
Also indexes screenplays and has some excerpts. The best way to do this is to type in "screenplays" and choose "Subject" from the drop-down next to the search box. You can then type in a film title. This database also indexes some foreign language scripts. Most scripts are not online.

Freely Online

Free resources on scripts. While these are fairly reliable, the sites can have ads and authenticity/copyright are not as certain.

Simply Scripts
A free database (with lots of ads, so beware) of hundreds of downloadable scripts, movie scripts, screenplays, and transcripts of current, classic and maybe a few soon-to-be-released movies, television, anime, unproduced and radio shows.
Internet Movie Script Database
Another free script database with mostly contemporary film script drafts. Warning: the site does have multiple pop-up ads.
Motion Picture Scripts Database
This database details the film script holdings of eight Los Angeles area collections: the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences; the American Film Institute; the Frances Howard Goldwyn Hollywood Regional Library; the University of California, Los Angeles; the University of Southern California; the Writers Guild of America, West; the Warner Bros. Archives at University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts; and the California Institute of the Arts Library.
Drew's Script-O-Rama
Contains TV scripts and film transcripts up to about 2010.
Script City
A site that sells screenplays that have been produced. They do not sell scripts in development. The scripts are all photocopies of the original draft we stock. All screenplays they sell are for educational purposes only. No rights are given or implied
Script Fly
Another site selling scripts of produced films and tv episodes for educational purposes.

In Archives

NY State Archives Motion Picture Scripts Collection
The New York State Archives preserves the largest collection of film scripts in the world. These scripts can be used to research the history of censorship in New York State and trace the shifting of American attitudes toward sex, religion and morality over the period.

Film Images

In CLIO

Searching by subject "Motion Pictures Pictorial Works" brings up books with film stills in them at Columbia/Barnard.

Online

Motion Picture Stills Online (UCLA)
From Library Special Collections and the Digital Library Program. See growing collection of 10,000+ images from 1903 onward now available.
Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive: CineFiles
Contains scanned images of reviews, press kits, festival and showcase program notes, newspaper articles, and other documents from the PFA Library's extensive collection covering world cinema, past and present.
Film Stills from the NYPL Digital Collections
Film Stills from the New York Public Library's Digital Collections. Search for actor's names or film names to get more results.
The Reel Poster Gallery
Contains various posters from films across the world

ARTstor
ARTstor has many film stills, both from artists and from some classic films. Searching by film, artist (such as Cindy Sherman), or just searching "film still" will bring up results.