Old-school footage · new-school agents · free MCP

Every shot in 5,353 public-domain films. Searchable.

Describe the b-roll you need. Get back the exact shots, timestamped, and a cut MP4 for each, with the rights on record. Your agent can do it too.

Try a search Add to Claude

Now showing 16 shots from the library

5,353Films

1.2MShots indexed

2,140Hours of footage

$0No account

Pick a style

Twelve flavors of yesterday

Every loop below came out of the library, found and cut through the same MCP your agent will use. Tap one to search that style.

Live demo

Try it on the real index

Searches run against every shot in the library. Hover a frame to play it; open the clip to get the cut MP4.

Try:

Install

One line into your agent

It's a standard remote MCP server. The first connection opens a browser tab that closes itself. There's no account, key or credit card.

search_clips(query, mode, collection, decade) → timestamped shots with rights

get_clip(id, start, end) → download URL for a cut MP4, up to 60s

“Find three shots of 1950s kitchens, cut them with a second of handles, and drop them in ./broll.”

Run in your terminal, then type /mcp in Claude Code and choose Authenticate.

claude mcp add --transport http retro-broll "https://bedrock-agentcore.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/runtimes/arn%3Aaws%3Abedrock-agentcore%3Aus-east-1%3A023392223961%3Aruntime%2Fpd_clip_library_mcp-4KKuViDttE/invocations?qualifier=DEFAULT"

Settings → Connectors → Add custom connector
Name it Retro B-Roll and paste this URL
Click Connect

https://bedrock-agentcore.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/runtimes/arn%3Aaws%3Abedrock-agentcore%3Aus-east-1%3A023392223961%3Aruntime%2Fpd_clip_library_mcp-4KKuViDttE/invocations?qualifier=DEFAULT

Add to ~/.cursor/mcp.json:

{ "mcpServers": { "retro-broll": { "url": "https://bedrock-agentcore.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/runtimes/arn%3Aaws%3Abedrock-agentcore%3Aus-east-1%3A023392223961%3Aruntime%2Fpd_clip_library_mcp-4KKuViDttE/invocations?qualifier=DEFAULT" } } }

Every response includes one labeled sponsored message. That's what keeps it free. Limits: 30 calls/min, 30 clips/hour per connection.

How it works

Three scenes

Scene 1 · Index

Every shot, understood

Each film was split at its real cuts and embedded by TwelveLabs Marengo on AWS for how it looks, how it sounds and what's said.

Scene 2 · Search

Search by meaning

Describe a shot in plain words. Search matches the meaning across 1.2M shots and returns exact in and out points, not whole films.

Scene 3 · Cut

Frame-accurate MP4

Ask for a range and it's cut from the source on demand, re-encoded to H.264 and handed back with its rights entry.

The archive

Nine collections, mixed on purpose

Prelinger ephemeral films (ads, education, industry)1,870

FedFlix US government films786

NASA596

Universal Newsreels, 1929–1967594

Silent films493

Comedy films476

Classic TV247

Feature films207

Classic cartoons42

Rights

What “public domain” means here

On the record

Only films whose Internet Archive record carries an explicit public-domain license were indexed, plus US federal government films (public domain under 17 USC 105).
Every result and every clip carries its rights entry: the basis and the license URL from the source record.
License fields are set by the archive's uploaders. Treat them as a well-documented claim, not legal clearance. For commercial work, check trademarks, recognizable people and music.

Why it's free

One labeled ad, never in the results

Each response carries one sponsored message in its own clearly labeled field, separate from the results.
Ads describe; they never instruct your agent or ask it to do anything.
No accounts and no tracking cookies. Usage is counted per anonymous connection to stop abuse.