This year’s list of 25 films to be added to the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry should be announced in the next few days. And while the National Film Registry has many obvious classics – not to mention more than a few oddities – there are still a surprisingly high number of landmark works that have yet to be enshrined within its ranks.
For what it’s worth, I would like to offer my list of 10 films that are long overdue inclusion on the National Film Registry’s list of “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant films.”
Admiral Cigarette (1897). This Thomas Edison-produced for the National Cigarette and Tobacco Company is widely recognized as the first filmed advertisement. While that is clearly significant on its own terms, the content of this one-minute film is fascinating. Four men – an Irishman with thick mutton chops, an American Indian in a war bonnet, an elderly man wearing a beret and some kind of uniform (some sources identify him as either a soldier or a clergyman) and Uncle Sam. Opposite of the men is a giant Admiral Cigarette box. A lovely young lady wearing a mix of nautical and showgirl attire emerges from the box and happily hands out cigarettes, which everyone smokes – a very rare display of ethnic, racial and gender parity from an intolerant era.
Frankenstein (1910). Another Edison production, this is considered the first American-produced horror film and the first cinematic adaptation of the Mary Shelley classic. For many years, the film was considered lost and was among the most sought-after missing movie. Mercifully, the film survives extant and it provides a fascinating riff on a story that has been told endlessly over the decades. To be frank, this is the oddest continued omission from the National Film Registry.
The Einstein Theory of Relativity (1923). An unlikely but intriguing production from the Fleischer Studios, this silent animated film offered a user-friendly explanation of Albert Einstein’s landmark physics theory. The film incorporated footage from an earlier film on the same subject, the 1922 German documentary “Die Grundlagen der Einsteinschen Relativitäts-Theorie” – that film is now lost, which makes the Fleischers’ work even more compelling. As an example of using animated film for educational purposes, this production is more than worthy of National Film Registry consideration.
Rio Rita (1929). This Pre-Code musical is based on the 1927 Broadway extravaganza produced by Florenz Ziegfeld, who co-produced the film. The film is historically significant for its fidelity to the legendary Ziegfeld theatrical style and for introducing film audiences to the comedy team of Bert Wheeler and Robert Woolsey, who went on to success for a popular string of ribald comedy films for RKO Radio Pictures. “Rio Rita” also calls attention to the critical need for film preservation – the original 141-minute production is considered lost, and the surviving work clocks in at 103 minutes.
Odor in the Court (1934). Another comedy team whose work is conspicuously absent from the National Film Registry is Bobby Clark and Paul McCullough, who starred in a series of short films for Fox Film Corporation and RKO Radio Pictures from the late 1920s through the mid-1930s. Most of their Fox work is considered lost, but their RKO work survives and “Odor in the Court” offers the duo at their peak in a zany, fast-moving romp where they play shyster lawyers who turn the legal system upside-down with wild courtroom antics.
Killer Diller (1948). In recent years, the National Film Registry went out of its way to recognize films focused on demographics that were historically marginalized by Hollywood. While the list includes a few all-Black “race films” among its titles, it’s a shame that it has yet to recognize “Killer Diller,” a jolly musical-comedy romp that featured an impressive slate of Black talent – Nat “King” Cole, Moms Mabley, Dusty Fletcher and Butterfly McQueen were part of the cast. It’s a charming celebration of Black talent and one of the most entertaining works of its genre.
It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963). One of the most obvious long-term omissions from the National Film Registry is Stanley Kramer’s all-star slapstick epic. While the film has detractors, it also has a considerable base of supporters who cherish its zany excesses and celebrate the extraordinary creative and technical aspects of its production. And when you consider some of the comedy films that made it to the National Film Registry, the absence of the Kramer work is truly puzzling.
To Be Alive! (1964). This short film was far ahead of its time for its sincere celebration of the diversity across global cultures, and its premiere occurred in the most unlikely setting – the Johnson Wax Pavilion of the 1964/65 New York World’s Fair in a unique multi-screen presentation. “To Be Alive!” won a special award in 1964 from the New York Film Critics Circle – the first and only time that a non-theatrical production was feted by that group – and won an Academy Award in 1965 as Best Documentary Short when the multi-screen presentation was reconfigured into a single-screen 70mm film. While the single-screen version is available online, the way to enjoy the film in the original multi-screen format is by visiting the Golden Rondelle Theater at the S.C. Johnson headquarters in Racine, Wisconsin.
Mad Monster Party (1967). This Rankin-Bass stop-action animated feature is one of the wittiest horror-comedy films of all time. The great monsters of the big screen gather for a convention hosted by a mad scientist that resembles Boris Karloff – and Karloff does a fine voice performance in a charming self-parody. The film features an invigorating screenplay full of inventive jokes, a music soundtrack of lively tunes (with Gale Garnett offering some memorable vocalizing), and some of the most inventive stop-motion puppetry ever captured on film. Really, why is this not on the National Film Registry?
The Patterson-Gimlin Film (1967). The sole reason that Bigfoot is a pop culture icon and the word “Sasquatch” is part of the vocabulary is due to this grainy, shaky clip that supposedly provides cinematic evidence that the legendary creature was not a figment of the imagination. Or was it? Even as late as today, this film fuels the endless debate on whether Bigfoot is real or a hoax. And in case you’re wondering how this 59-second film made its way before the public, allow me to shamelessly promote my book “The Weirdest Movie Ever Made: The Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot Film.”