How can I watch movies/shows without buying cable/satellite?

I am not a cable person and I don’t currently have a television but I would like to get one for watching movies and watching an occasional show online. What I have found is that a lot of the TV watching devices allow you to get content on your TV by paying monthly fees to HULU plus or Netflix – I just want my TV to act like a monitor and allow me to surf via mozilla or ie and watch any content I choose. Any ideas on the best way to do this (cost effectively too).