Silence Of The Lambs Added To US National Film Registry

Every year the US Library of Congress picks 25 films to join its National Film Registry, which it believes are culturally and artistically important enough to be specially archived for posterity, with the idea being that even if the rest of the world blew up, at least these movies would survive (or something like that anyway).

Each year the list tends to be a mix of populist entertainment and more unusual offerings that have been judged to have particular cultural importance and are therefore worth protecting. The 25 movies picked for this year have now been announced, and it’s a suitably eclectic mix.

Movies chosen include modern Best Picture winners The Silence Of The Lambs (which has been included despite its depiction of a transgender person still being controversial) and Forrest Gump, but also stretch back into the silent era with The Cry Of The Children, A Cure For Pokeritis and Charlie Chaplin’s The Kid. One of the more unusual inclusions is the Nicholas Brothers Family Home Movies, which were shot in the 1930s and 1940s. These were judged worthy of inclusion because Fayard and Harold Nicholas not only made a rare document of African-American middle class life during that period, but as they were renowned dancers, their footage also covers Broadway and Hollywood during that period, including the only known footage of shows such as Babes In Arms.

Take a look below for the full list:
Allures (1961)
Bambi (1942)
The Big Heat (1953)
A Computer Animated Hand (1972)
Crisis: Behind a Presidential Commitment (1963)
The Cry of the Children (1912)
A Cure for Pokeritis (1912)
El Mariachi (1992)
Faces (1968)
Fake Fruit Factory (1986)
Forrest Gump (1994)
Growing Up Female (1971)
Hester Street (1975)
I, An Actress (1977)
The Iron Horse (1924)
The Kid (1921)
The Lost Weekend (1945)
The Negro Soldier (1944)
Nicholas Brothers Family Home Movies (1930s-40s)
Norma Rae (1979)
Porgy and Bess (1959)
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Stand and Deliver (1988)
Twentieth Century (1934)
The War of the Worlds (1953)

General movie news courtesy of Movie Muser