The cultural significance of the movies just added to the National Film Registry

Transcript

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Amna Nawaz: Today, the librarian of Congress, Carla Hayden, announced the 25 films for entry into the National Film Registry.

Geoff Bennett: The registry, which began back in 1989, now includes some 900 movies chosen for their cultural, historic and aesthetic importance to preserving the nation’s film heritage.

Our senior arts correspondent, Jeffrey Brown, has more for our arts and culture series, Canvas.

Patrick Swayze, Actor: Nobody puts Baby in the corner.

Jeffrey Brown: An iconic line from an ’80s romantic classic, a graphic and brutal scene that helped define the horror genre.

Actor: I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the Earth.

Jeffrey Brown: And the story of an American hero told in one of its seminal sports films.

Three of the 25 films chosen by a Library of Congress panel from the more than 6,700 nominated by the public for consideration this year. Led by University of Chicago cinema studies historian and Turner Classic Movies host Jacqueline Stewart, the panel worked to choose titles that demonstrate a wealth of films and genres.

The oldest name this year, “Annabelle Serpentine Dance,” made in 1895 by the Edison Manufacturing Company. From the dawn of cinema, the silent short is one of a series of recordings of popular dances performed by dancer and Actress Annabelle Moore.

The newest films, 2007’s “No Country For Old Men” and “The Social Network” from 2010.

Jesse Eisenberg, Actor: People want to go on the Internet and check out their friends, so why not build a Web site that offers that, friends, pictures, profiles, whatever you can visit, browse around?

Jeffrey Brown: The award-winning drama about Mark Zuckerberg’s creation of Facebook written by Aaron Sorkin and directed by David Fincher.

Other popular Hollywood hits include the 1984 comedy “Beverly Hills Cops.”

Eddie Murphy, Actor: You know, this is the cleanest and nicest police car I have ever been in my life.

Jeffrey Brown: And “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan,” starring William Shatner and Mexican-American Actor Ricardo Montalban.

Ricardo Montalban, Actor: Buried alive. Buried alive.

Jeffrey Brown: “The Wrath of Khan” is one of five films selected this year that include prominent Latino artists or themes. The others include 1995’s “Mi Familia.”

Actor: It was one of the greatest days in the history of my family.

Jeffrey Brown: And the 1970s counterculture classic “Up in Smoke.”

Cheech Marin, Actor: The level of improv that we brought to those movies is what gave it its spontaneity. And that’s why people thought they were happening for the first time, because in many instances it was happening for the first time.

Jeffrey Brown: The award-winning documentary “Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt” is a heartbreaking record of the 1980s AIDS epidemic told through the creation and exhibition of the AIDS Memorial Quilt on the National Mall.

Several films selected were made by Black directors, including “Compensation,” “Uptown Saturday Night,” and “Will” from 1981, widely considered to be the first independent feature-length film directed by a Black woman, the trailblazing cinematographer and director Jessie Maple.

Also included this year, “The Miracle Worker,” Arthur Penn’s biopic of Helen Keller and teacher Anne Sullivan, starring Patty Duke and Anne Bancroft.

Actress: Yes.

Actor: Can I have 10 hot dogs with lots of mustard and ketchup?

Jeffrey Brown: The selection group cited 1989’s “Powwow Highway” as one of the first indie classics to depart from long-perpetuated stereotypes and treat Native Americans as ordinary people.

Have a favorite movie you think should be named to the Library of Congress’ list in 2025? You can submit your nominations on the library’s Web site through August 15.

For the “PBS News Hour,” I’m Jeffrey Brown.

Geoff Bennett: What would you nominate?

Amna Nawaz: I mean, I’m just glad to see “Dirty Dancing” made it, finally, finally.

(Laughter)

Geoff Bennett: I got to say “Coming to America.”

Amna Nawaz: Oh, it’s a good one too.