Every year, the U.S. National Film Preservation Bureau selects a batch of local films to enjoy the treatment of national treasure-level cultural works and permanently collect them in the Library of Congress to help them last forever. On December 15th, local time, the list of 25 American films that enjoyed this honor was released. The biggest highlight is the selection of "Iron Man". This is the first time that a Marvel movie has been included in the ranks of "national treasures", marking the full recognition of it by experts in American film history.
Iron Man (2008) poster
The selection of "Iron Man" may make the great director Martin Scorsese feel a little embarrassed. In 2019, he publicly stated that Marvel movies are just "theme parks" and not really movies. And Scorsese was one of the filmmakers who first proposed to the U.S. Congress to establish this film protection list. He himself has "Mean Streets", "Taxi Driver", "The Last Waltz", "Raging Bull" and "Theft". There are also Tao" five films have been selected for protection list.
In addition, on this year's list, the Disney animated film "The Little Mermaid", the horror film "Carrie" based on Stephen King's novel, and the Hitchcock-style suspense film "Carrie" starring Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn. A Mystery Within a Mystery and the romantic love classic When Harry Met Sally are also on the list.
Compared with the list of previous years, there are relatively few early silent films in this year's selected films, and the earliest production date is the news documentary "Mardi Gras Carnival" (Mardi Gras Carnival) shot in 1898. The two-minute black-and-white short film recorded the grand occasion of the New Orleans Carnival at that time, and it was just recently recovered from the archives of the Film Museum in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The so-called Shrove Tuesday (Mardi Gras) is a traditional festival for Christian believers. Carnivals, masquerade parties and grand parades will be held in many places to celebrate. Among them, the Shrove Tuesday Carnival in New Orleans, USA is the most famous. The newsreel captures not only the earliest footage of the event, but possibly the earliest footage of the city of New Orleans.
As for the most recent work selected this year, it is "The Untouchables" released in 2011-only films that have been released for more than ten years are eligible to be selected as "National Treasures". The film is executive produced by Spike Lee. It is the debut feature film of the black female director Dee Rees. She won the Best Cinematography Award at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. Youth Stories of Black Sexual Minorities.
Untouchables (2011) poster
In recent years, the U.S. National Film Preservation Bureau has also followed the general trend of American society. When absorbing these 25 classic works at the end of the year, it especially focuses on films involving African, Asian, Hispanic and other ethnic minorities, and this year is no exception. Among the 25 new films on the list this time, in addition to "The Untouchables", the award-winning documentary "Mingus" about the music life of the black jazz master Charles Mingus, from the black jazz singer Cabo Calloway ( Cabell "Cab" Calloway III)'s private collection of home videos, the indie drama "Mother Bush," the documentary "Tongue Untied," "Life Story" and the black-and-white short "The Good Guys, The Bad Guys," and the black-exploitation masterpiece " "Superfly", all in line with this spirit.
The western film "Gedas's Runaway Song", adapted from real events, focuses on the injustice and bullying suffered by Mexican laborers on the Texas border; the documentary "We Are the Hopi" focuses on the tragic situation of the Native American Hopi people; "Manzanar" created by Japanese-American documentary director Robert Nakamura uses the lens to reproduce the gray memories of his youth in the Japanese-American internment camp.
Among the films selected this year, there are quite a number of documentaries. In addition to the above-mentioned ones, Master Wiseman's masterpiece "Titika Disorder" and the early work " "Union Maid" is also impressively listed. In addition, the documentary "Attica" explored the prisoner riots in the Attica Prison in New York in 1971 in a real-life way, focusing on the stubborn racial antagonism in American society.
Since the establishment of the Film Protection Bureau in 1988 and the first agreement on the list of protected films in 1989, as of this year, 850 films have been included in its protection scope. There is no limit to the length of the selected films, and it does not matter whether they have been released or not. The only requirement is that the film must be completed for more than ten years. In accordance with the usual requirements for screening and protection of films, the twenty-five films selected this year are all "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant", and the selection process is the same as before: firstly, film experts and ordinary audiences give nomination lists ( The public can log on to the official website of the Library of Congress to submit the list. This year, more than 7,000 films have been nominated by the public). Fifteen works.
Complete List of Selected Works in 2022 (in chronological order)
1. Mardi Gras Carnival (1898)
2. Cab Calloway Home Movies (1948-1951)
3. Cyrano de Bergerac (1950)
4. Charade (1963)
5. Scorpio Rising (1963)
6. Behind Every Good Man (1967)
7. "Titicut Follies" (Titicut Follies, 1967)
8. Mingus (1968)
9. Manzanar (1971)
10. Betty Tells Her Story (1972)
11. Super Fly (1972)
12. Attica (1974)
13. Carrie (1976)
14. Union Maids (1976)
15. Word is Out: Stories of Our Lives (1977)
16. Bush Mama (1979)
17. The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez (1982)
18. We Are the Hopi (Itam Hakim, Hopiit, 1984)
19. Hairspray (1988)
20. The Little Mermaid (1989)
21. Tongues Untied (1989)
22. When Harry Met Sally (1989)
23. House Party (1990)
24. Iron Man (2008)
25. The Untouchables (Pariah, 2011)
