'Harvey Milk,' Other LGBT Films Receive National Honor

The Times of Harvey Milk,the Academy Award-winning documentary about the slain civil rights activist, was a very welcome addition to the 25 movies selected by the Library of Congress to be added to the National Film Registry. Rob Epstein's stirring look at San Francisco's first elected official became one of the first LGBT-themed films to receive the honor. The Washington Postreports the film's distributor Dennis Doros, of Milestone Film & Video, as offering gratitude to President Obama and Vice President Biden for the recognition.

"Thank you, Joe Biden," he says. "I suspect that the tide of the country has changed, and that the acceptance by the vice president and the president of gay rights might have sent a message to the entire government, not just the Library of Congress. I'm happy that one of the great documentaries of all time has been accepted. It further legitimizes [the National Film Registry] as the most important list of films in the country for educators, librarians, and the public."

Other films of LGBT interest which received the same honor include Hours for Jerome: Parts 1 and 2, an experimental documentary by gay filmmaker Nathaniel Dorsky; the melancholy comedy Breakfast at Tiffany's, adapted (although largely de-gayed) from the novella by Truman Capote; A League of Their Own, about the formation of an all-female baseball team that co-starred Madonna and Rosie O'Donnell; and The Matrix, the popular sci-fi adventure from the Wachowski siblings.

The complete list of this year's honorees is below:

3:10 to Yuma (1957)
Anatomy of a Murder (1959)
The Augustas (1930s-1950s)
Born Yesterday (1950)
Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)
A Christmas Story (1983)
The Corbett-Fitzsimmons Title Fight (1897)
Dirty Harry (1971)
Hours for Jerome: Parts 1 and 2 (1980-82)
The Kidnappers Foil (1930s-1950s)
Kodachrome Color Motion Picture Tests (1922)
A League of Their Own (1992)
The Matrix (1999)
The Middleton Family at the New York World's Fair (1939)
One Survivor Remembers (1995)
Parable (1964)
Samsara: Death and Rebirth in Cambodia (1990)
Slacker (1991)
Sons of the Desert (1933)
The Spook Who Sat by the Door (1973)
They Call It Pro Football (1967)
The Times of Harvey Milk (1984)
Two-Lane Blacktop (1971)
Uncle Tom's Cabin (1914)
The Wishing Ring; An Idyll of Old England (1914)