Many educational film distributors provide the option to purchase physical or streaming content with the public performance rights (PPR) that allow showing the film outside the classroom. The cost to purchase the film with PPR is generally several hundred dollars more than the film without PPR.
There are several licensing companies that have either purchased rights or will negotiate rights and will work with colleges to license commercial films. The cost for licensing commercial films ranges from $100 to several thousand dollars depending on the work and copyright owner. Some common licensing companies are:
You can also ask the copyright owner for permission to show the content for free or at a reduced rate. The copyright owner is most often the United States distributor of the film. To discover who this is, go to the Internet Movie Database (IMDb), search for the film or tv show, select the Company Credits page, and locate the US distributor.