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It's time to send the annual suggestions for the National Film Registry. To make your nominations known, you should write to Steve Leggett at [email protected]

You can find more information at http://www.loc.gov/film/vote.html

The films that are already on the Registry are at http://www.loc.gov/film/titles.html

And finally, the list of films nominated that haven't made it yet can be found at http://www.loc.gov/film/nfrpubvo.html

Thanks Matt. I had no idea the National Film Registry took suggestions from the general public. I'll be sure to draft a list tonight as, in my opinion, some of their choices over the years have been truly misguided. It still bugs me that a computer-generated film like Toy Story is perserved while thousands of silents and early sound films are neglected.

Highway 61 wrote: It still bugs me that a computer-generated film like Toy Story is perserved while thousands of silents and early sound films are neglected.

First the positives.

The National Film Registry highlights film and the need to protect it as a shared cultural heritage. Every year the registry brings to the fore many films that are now considered classic, as well as, films that have never really seen the light of a projector since their initial release.

The negatives.

The fact that these films are on this list mean absolutely nothing where it concerns the films long term preservation. It has been my experience that inclusion on this list merely means that the Library of Congress will acquire a print for their collection.

What does that mean?

Well a number films, particularly from the silent period, the Library of Congress have no copy. So they will seek out an archive/studio/rights holder to obtain a print. However, none of those entities are bound by law to provide a copy.

Due to volume I know they have accepted video, VHS, 3/4" U-Matic, DVD for the purposes of copyright registration. In this case they will contact the studio/archive/rights holder to obtain a film print. Which again is not obligated to provide a print.

In many cases the LOC already has a film print because the copyright holder deposited a film copy for the purposes of registration. The copyright holder is under no obligation to provide a print of "quality". In fact studios had a ‘knack' for pulling the worst of their distribution prints and sending that. Secondarily once the film is registered the rights holder could request the return of the material, which the LOC is obligated to do.

All that aside I would encourage everyone on this list to provide a list. This forum is a tremendously film literate group. One can look at the list and see the glut of Hollywood product. I know there are many on this forum that can see past that to a cinema history that exists outside the Hollywood sphere of influence. This is your call to arms!

If nothing else, the LoC is very good at publicizing their annual additions to the list, which may turn someone somewhere on to something they might have ignored otherwise. But yeah, it unfortunately doesn't mean much for the actual preservation of these films.

How would everyone feel about a going in on this together? If we decide on, well, it doesn't even have to be the full 50, but if we were to all select and submit a certain selection of films. Or even using our own list project as a guideline. If only to see if it has any influence.

Or we could all go with my favourites. (Munchausen, this is your year!) Anyone game?

Matt wrote:If nothing else, the LoC is very good at publicizing their annual additions to the list, which may turn someone somewhere on to something they might have ignored otherwise. But yeah, it unfortunately doesn't mean much for the actual preservation of these films.

I totally agree. I feel the list does more good than bad. I only wish that the registry was used for something than a glorified AFI Top Ten List. The Registry should be used as the jumping off point for a whole discuss about film/cinema/movies in America. It is sadly under utilized.

There's one thing that I have never understood about the NFT: Why are The Bridge on the River Kwai and Lawrence of Arabia in there? They weren't and aren't, American films.

Anyway, notable films that I was surprised not to find in the NFT:

The Scarecrow (1920)
One Week (1920)
Orphans of the Storm (1921)
Girl Shy (1924)
He Who Gets Slapped (1924)
Seven Chances (1925)
The Kid Brother (1927)
The Circus (1928)

Grand Hotel (1932)
Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)
A Day at the Races (1937)
You Can't Take It with You (1938)
On Borrowed Time (1939)
Midnight (1939)
Wuthering Heights (1939)
The Women (1939)

Rebecca (1940)
Arsenic and Old Lace (1944)
To Have and Have Not (1944)
Notorious (1946)
Nightmare Alley (1947)
Key Largo (1948)

Harvey (1950)
Strangers on a Train (1951)
Witness for the Prosecution (1957)
12 Angry Men (1957)
Anatomy of a Murder (1959)

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)
Titicut Follies (1967)
Rosemary's Baby (1968)

Deliverance (1972)
The Exorcist (1973)
The Man Who Would Be King (1975)
Dog Day Afternoon (1975)
All the President's Men (1976)

Doctor Sunshine wrote:How would everyone feel about a going in on this together? If we decide on, well, it doesn't even have to be the full 50, but if we were to all select and submit a certain selection of films. Or even using our own list project as a guideline. If only to see if it has any influence.

Or we could all go with my favourites. (Munchausen, this is your year!) Anyone game?

Sounds like a great idea to me. My knowledge of silent films is sorely lacking, so I'm sure others will offer more worthy titles, but here's what I'm thinking of off the top of my head.

-Early Lubitsch musicals: The Smiling Lieutenant, The Love Parade, The Merry Widow
-Ace in the Hole (anything to get Paramount to pay attention to this neglected masterpiece)
-John Huston's WWII documentaries: Let There Be Light, Report from the Aleutians, The Battle of San Pietro
-The other American Ophuls films: The Exile, Caught, The Reckless Moment

Forgive me if these choices are either too pedestrain or readily available.

Highway 61 wrote:-Ace in the Hole (anything to get Paramount to pay attention to this neglected masterpiece)

Well, they haven't forgotten about it - Film Forum is doing a one-week run of a new restoration of the film in mid-January(!)

The link to nominated films not yet selected was really interesting. There were plenty listed that I would have assumed had already achieved some sort of "graying eminence" - real no-brainers like

Barry Lyndon
The Big Heat
The Birds
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
McCabe and Mrs. Miller
Rosemary's Baby
and The Three Little Pigs

But did anybody else catch "For Your Thighs Only?"
Clearly the only Ron Jeremy film to be considered for the NFR.

Ok, since one person said yes I'm assuming Highway 61 was speaking on behalf of everybody. That said I've gone ahead and selected your choices for you. From the list project--thank you for all your hard work people who did that even though I didn't take part--and selected the first five eligible films from each decade, give or take. The Kubricks--except The Killing--are UK but I'm sure they'll get tired of people suggesting those and give in eventually. This is only 43 films so I'm allowing you to choose seven on your own--although I strongly suggest one of those floaters be The Adventures of Barron Munchausen.

The Kid (Chaplin, 1921)
Foolish Wives (von Stroheim, 1922)
The Circus (Chaplin, 1928)
Steamboat Bill, Jr. (Reisner, 1928)
Applause (Mamoulian, 1929)
Queen Kelly (von Stroheim, 1929)

The Scarlet Empress (von Sternberg, 1934)
Only Angels Have Wings (Hawks, 1939)
The Roaring Twenties (Walsh, 1939)

Notorious (Hitchcock, 1946)
To Have and Have Not (Hawks, 1944)
The Lady from Shanghai (Welles, 1947)
Monsieur Verdoux (Chaplin, 1947)

Rio Bravo (Hawks, 1959),
Strangers on a Train (Hitchcock, 1951)
The Killing (Kubrick, 1956)
In Lonely Place (Ray, 1950)
Johnny Guitar (Ray, 1954)

Once Upon a Time in the West (Leone, 1968)
Faces (Cassavetes, 1968)
The Birds (Hitchcock, 1963)
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (Ford, 1962)
Rosemary's Baby (Polanski, 1968)
Lolita (Kubrick, 1962)

Barry Lyndon (Kubrick, 1975)
A Clockwork Orange (Kubrick, 1971)
Days of Heaven (Malick, 1978)
McCabe & Mrs. Miller (Altman, 1971)
The Exorcist (Friedkin, 1973)
Grey Gardens (Maysles, 1975)
Gimme Shelter (Maysles, 1970)
Carrie (DePalma, 1976)

Blue Velvet (Lynch, 1986)
Brazil (Gilliam, 1985)
The Shining (Kubrick, 1980)
Crimes and Misdemeanors (Allen, 1989)
The Elephant Man (Lynch, 1980)
The Empire Strikes Back (Kershner, 1980)

Pulp Fiction (Tarantino, 1994)
Fargo (Coen, 1996)
Dead Man (Jarmusch, 1995)
Wild at Heart (Lynch, 1990)
Short Cuts (Altman, 1993)

This is manditory, but I'll thank you for your participation anyway. Thank you. That email address again is: [email protected]

I don't care to comb through the entire registry again, but from inspecting it last night I can tell you that at least H20, Letter From An Unknown Woman, and The Last Picture Show have already been chosen.

I was getting a little dopey towards the end. Thanks. Edited to reflect such.

My mission is a failure. Those are the films that are going to get into the list anyway. Everyone vote for Bottle Rocket and For Your Thighs Only and we'll see how much power we have.

Strange that they don't specify a voting deadline. Anyone know what it is?

If you miss the deadline, your vote will go for the next year's list...

Some interesting things on that list. Glad to see they've saved Groundhog Day and Fargo from the black hole of obscurity into which they might have disappeared forever.

Here are this year's selections:

Back to the Future (1985)
Bullitt (1968)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Dance, Girl, Dance (1940)
Dances With Wolves (1990)
Days of Heaven (1978)
Glimpse of the Garden (1957)
Grand Hotel (1932)
The House I Live In (1945)
In a Lonely Place (1950)
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)
Mighty Like a Moose (1926)
The Naked City (1948)
Now, Voyager (1942)
Oklahoma! (1955)
Our Day (1938)
Peege (1972)
The Sex Life of the Polyp (1928)
The Strong Man (1926)
Three Little Pigs (1933)
Tol'able David (1921)
Tom, Tom the Piper's Son (1969-71)
12 Angry Men (1957)
The Women (1939)
Wuthering Heights (1939)

Dances With Wolves!?!
ugh...
at least they've saved themselves with Days of Heaven.

(also, has anyone heard about their musical registry... apparently Sonic Youth's Daydream Nation was inducted last year)

miless wrote:(also, has anyone heard about their musical registry... apparently Sonic Youth's Daydream Nation was inducted last year)

I didn't know about it until Daydream was inducted. It is pretty much what you'd expect.

Here's this year's list, the press release, and a Hollywood Reporter article:

1) The Asphalt Jungle (1950)
2) Deliverance (1972)
3) Disneyland Dream (1956)
4) A Face in the Crowd (1957)
5) Flower Drum Song (1961)
6) Foolish Wives (1922)
7) Free Radicals (1979)
8) Hallelujah (1929)
9) In Cold Blood (1967)
10) The Invisible Man (1933)
11) Johnny Guitar (1954)
12) The Killers (1946)
13) The March (1964)
14) No Lies (1973)
15) On the Bowery (1957)
16) One Week (1920)
17) The Pawnbroker (1965)
18) The Perils of Pauline (1914)
19) Sergeant York (1941)
20) The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958)
21) So’s Your Old Man (1926)
22) George Stevens WW2 Footage (1943-46)
23) The Terminator (1984)
24) Water and Power (1989)
25) White Fawn’s Devotion (1910)

2009 list for the Library of Congress
Dog Day Afternoon (1975)
The Exiles (1961)
Heroes All (1920)
Hot Dogs for Gauguin (1972)
The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957)
Jezebel (1938)
The Jungle (1967)
The Lead Shoes (1949)
Little Nemo (1911)
Mabel's Blunder (1914)
The Mark of Zorro (1940)
Mrs. Miniver (1942)
The Muppet Movie (1979)
Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)
Pillow Talk (1959)
Precious Images (1986)
Quasi at the Quackadero (1975)
The Red Book (1994)
The Revenge of the Pancho Villa (1930-36)
Scratch and Crow (1995)
Stark Love (1927)
The Story of G.I. Joe (1945)
A Study in Reds (1932)
Thriller (1983)

2010 entries:

Airplane! (1980)
All the President's Men (1976)
The Bargain (1914)
Cry of Jazz (1959)
Electronic Labyrinth: THX 113B 4EB (1967)
The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
The Exorcist (1973)
The Front Page (1931)
Grey Gardens (1976)
I Am Joaquin (1969)
It's a Gift (1934)
Let There Be Light (1946)
Lonesome (1928)
Make Way for Tomorrow (1937)
Malcolm X (1992)
McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971)
Newark Athlete (1891)
Our Lady of the Sphere (1969)
The Pink Panther (1964)
Preservation of the Sign Language (1913)
Saturday Night Fever (1977)
Study of a River (1996)
Tarantella (1940)
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945)
A Trip Down Market Street (1906)

Cry of Jazz (1959) is on Youtube is 6 parts. It runs 34 minutes total.
Earnest political and music discussions punctuated by prime early Sun Ra and his Arkestra.
Interesting stuff.
I'd provide a link, but YouTube is barred in China, and I only have indirect proxy access (and links). A simple google will find it.