"Grease" is the word for the National Film Registry. Let's look at their 1978 collection...
Monday, December 14, 2020 at 7:30PM by Nathaniel R
Grease is the 9th film from 1978 to be selected by the Library of Congress
The Library of Congress has announced their annual 25 new additions to the National Film Registry. Works are selected for their cultural, historical or aesthetic importance. The list is now 800 titles long. Each year we think. 'Oh, we should do a series on the inductees' but then another year rolls around and the list grows ever more duanting. Here we are again. See anything you love on this list?
2020 INDUCTEES
- The Battle of the Century (1927) A classic Laurel and Hardy silent comedy short
- The Blues Brothers (1980) Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi star with musical cameos by legends like Cab Calloway, Ray Charles, James Brown, and Aretha Franklin.
- Bread (1918) a silent from Ida May Park
- Buena Vista Social Club (1999) Wim Wenders documentary
- Cabin in the Sky (1943) All black film musical and the directing debut of the legendary versatile director Vincente Minnelli
- A Clockwork Orange (1971) Stanley Kubrick's controversial dystopian adaptation
- The Dark Knight (2008) The superhero blockbuster
- The Devil Never Sleeps (1994) which they call "a key film by a Latina filmmaker"
- Freedom Riders (2010) a documentary about civil rights protesters against segregration in 1961
- Grease (1978) The beloved 50s-nostalgia musical
- The Ground (1993-2001) films by Robert Beavers
- The Hurt Locker (2008) The Oscar winning war drama by Kathryn Bigelow
- Illusions (1982) This was Julie Dash's MFA thesis short
- The Joy Luck Club (1993) Wayne Wang's historic Asian-American drama
- Kid Auto Races at Venice (1914) the debut of Charlie Chaplin's "tramp"
- Lilies of the Field (1963) Sidney Poitier's Best Actor winning drama
- Losing Ground (1982) one of the first films directed by an African American woman. Her name was Kathleen Collins
- The Man with the Golden Arm (1955) Drug addiction drama with Frank Sinatra and Kim Novak
- Mauna Kea: Temple Under Siege (2006) a documentary about a dormant volcano in Hawaii
- Outrage (1950) Ida Lupino directs this movie about the post traumatic effects of a rape
- Shrek (2001) Dreamwork's animated blockbuster and the first winner of the Oscar to Best Animated Feature
- Suspense (1913) Lois Weber, an early silent pioneer, directed this one
- Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song (1971) Melvin Van Peebles's influential classic
- Wattsax (1973) often referred to as 'the Black Woodstock' it's about the 1972 LA Memorial Coliseum concert
- With Car and Camera Around the World (1929) a documentary about the first woman to travel the world by car. She did it in a caravan of Ford Model T's in dozens of countries.
For fun because Grease, Shrek, and The Dark Knight are the biggest blockbusters on this list, let's look at how those film years are represented in the National Film Registry and the order in which they wre inducted.
1978
- The Deer Hunter
- Powers of Ten
- Animal House
- Halloween
- Days of Heaven
- Superman
- Girlfriends
- The Last Waltz
- Grease
OTHER FAMOUS AMERICAN FILMS FROM 1978 THAT ARE NOT ON THEIR LIST: Hal Ashby's Best Picture vietnam war era nominee Coming Home, the Best Picture nominated feminist drama An Unmarried Woman, Woody Allen's Bergman homage Interiors, All black musical The Wiz, Child prostitute drama Pretty Baby with Susan Sarandon and Brooke Shields, Ralph Bakshi's animated take on The Lord of the Rings, the animated adaptation of Watership Down, Cheech & Chong's stoner comedy Up in Smoke, the Clint Eastwood and orangutan buddy comedy Every Which Way But Loose, the all-star whodunnit Death on the Nile, the remakes Heaven Can Wait and Invasion of the Body Snatchers, the thriller The Eyes of Laura Mars, cult flick Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, the Oscar winning prison documentary Scared Straight!, and horror films Dawn of the Dead and I Spit On Your Grave. We assume Best Picture nominee Midnight Express is too British for the list but we might be wrong.
If you had to make a guess what do you think they'll select next from 1978? To be honest I'm surprised that Coming Home, The Wiz, and An Unmarried Woman aren't already on the list. Obviously a strong case could be made for many of those titles listed above. It's about historic importance, cultural impact, and aesthetic value and you don't have to have all three to be chosen.
2001 and 2008
Oops. Those years were empty in the Registry until just now. Yes, Shrek is the first and only film from 2001 elected by the Library of Congress for this list. We were going to vomit that they didn't choose Moulin Rouge! first until talking ourselves down that perhaps they considered it an Australian picture first and foremost? Other 2001 pictures will surely follow but they're clearly not in a hurry with that film year. Pity though that the ugly fad Shrek was honored before, say, Mulholland Drive or Hedwig and the Angry Inch or The Royal Tenenbaums.
2008's absence in the list (but with two titles this year) is very understandable since films have to be at least 10 years old to be selected so it's only been eligible for two cycles now.
What would you select next from 2001 and 2008?
Reader Comments (20)
I’d assume if Midnight Express would be considered ‘too british’ then so would A Clockwork Orange - inducted this year.
A lot of the shine seems to have come off M.E. over the years due to its problematic cultural depictions, but I think it deserves to be remembered for the towering performances of Brad Davis and John Hurt.
How was Davis not nominated that year?
Also my pick for 2008:
- WALL-E
Still Pixar’s most towering achievement in my opinion.
2008: Rachel Getting Married
2001: Yeah, Mullholland Drive makes sense.
As a bonus, from 1978: Girlfriends, just out on Criterion.
if, like me, you'd never heard of 'powers of ten' until today, it's a nine minute short available on youtube
[what a random inclusion]
Several, I'm surprised to say.
Donnie Darko, Gosford Park, In the Bedroom, Legally Blonde, Monster's Ball, Ocean's 11, The Royal Tenenbaums, Wet Hot American SummerIn Bruges, Milk, Iron Man, WALL-E, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Next Pick From 2001: Fellowship of the Ring. And before anyone tries to say "But too...not American..."? If you didn't know that film's team was from New Zealand, would you REALLY assume the adaptational changes of Lord of the Rings (generally: Cut the folksy songs, pump up the action even harder, adaptational decisions that The Hobbit really just turbo charged to tasteless extremes) WEREN'T made by a team of Americans? Add in it being US money funding it, and...yeah. They belong in America's registry.
1978 Straight Time
2001 Memento
2008 Burn After Reading
ken s: Memento is already in.
2008: Milk, though Slumdog Millionaire really should be there
2001: MR! of course, with my runner up being Memento
1978: Death on the Nile (but I'd consider California Suite because Smith and Caine are so incredible in it)
Shrek?!
If Memento's already in, then I'll go for The Royal Tenenbaums
2001: Moulin Rouge!, Mulholland Drive, Hedwig and the Angry inch, Ghost World, & The Royal Tenenbaums, In the Bedroom, Gosford Park, Legally Blonde...anything but Shrek.
2008: Rachel Getting Married, Ballast, The Wrestler.
1978: An Unmarried Woman, Interiors, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, The Driver, and The Mafu Cage. I'm very pleasantly surprised to see that Girlfriends (a recent discovery for me) is already on there!
Losing Ground and Illusions are the 2020 inductees that make me the happiest. I recommend everyone seek them out. Both are on the Criterion Channel at the moment!
People who are surprised to see Shrek on the list- WOW, some of y'all must either be too young to remember or weren't born yet or didn't really notice, but Shrek was really well-received upon its release! Like, it appeared in multiple Top 10 lists, the Producer's Guild nominated it for Best Film at their awards AND there was talk about how it could potentially get a Best Picture nomination at that year's Oscars.
CAL -- i remember that well. i was very fearful that it was going to get a Best Picture nomination. people were *obsessed*
Ken & Volvagia -- if Memento is already in they must have it listed it under 2000 (perhaps it had a festival premiere in 2000?) because Shrek is the only 2001 title on the list.
Since we'll go American, I'll exclude foreign films for these lists:
From 1978: Killer of Sheep, The Driver, The Fury, Interiors, The Buddy Holly Story, I Wanna Hold Your Hand, and Filming Othello.
2001: Ghost World, Mulholland Dr., Dogtown & Z-Boys, Hedwig & the Angry Inch, Moulin Rouge!, Donnie Darko, Lovely & Amazing, The Royal Tenenbaums, Waking Life, Monsters, Inc., Wet Hot American Summer, and Zoolander.
2008: WALL-E, The Wrestler, Wendy & Lucy, Rachel Getting Married, Goodbye Solo, Milk, Step Brothers, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Synecdoche, New York, Tyson, Me and Orson Welles, Sugar, and Iron Man.
Nathaniel - how interesting, Memento’s international year of release is 2000 (debuted in cinemas to a paying public in France and UK). This is how I assign a year to a film for my own lists (theatrical release anywhere in the world, so long as it’s to the general public and not a festival) but you’d assume this body would go off USA release... which is 2001 for Memento...
The Lord of the Rings, the animated adaptation of Watership Down, Cheech & Chong's stoner comedy Up in Smoke
It's not only "Interiors" but the last time I checked not a single film from Woody Allen was included there which I find shocking. It's hard to see them getting included but at the very least 5 films should be there.
I meant "It's hard to see them getting included now".
The Hurt Locker was released in the US in 2009 (June 26, 2009 was the limited release) so the year must be first release date since it was released in Italy October 10, 2008 or they use the imdb year.
Personal choice for each year
1978: Fingers
2001: The Fellowship of the Ring
2008: Paranoid Park