The New York Times – The astonishment of riches includes up-close looks at our history in hundreds of films. And they’re all free. “…The biggest library in the world, it has an extraordinary trove of online offerings — more than 7,000 videos — that includes hundreds of old (and really old) movies. With one click, you can watch Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show parade down Fifth Avenue in 1902; click again to giggle at Krazy Kat and Ignatz Mouse in a 1916 cartoon. And while the library is temporarily closed to the public, its virtual doors remain open. It remains one of my favorite places to get lost in… The aesthetic quality of the titles varies, but that’s to the point of the library’s democratic mandate. Not all the films on deposit are exemplars of the art — although greatness abounds here — but they nevertheless have cultural and historical value. Some are flat-out weird and wonderful, while others seem like souvenirs from a distant land. That’s true of “Television,” a 1939 curio that opens with an audience seated in the dark before a tiny glowing screen that abruptly grows larger, a stark encapsulation of TV’s challenge to moviegoing. “Television now takes its place,” the narrator promises (threatens!), “as a new American art and industry.”

One of the library’s best YouTube playlists gathers together a small selection of titles from the National Film Registry. The registry is part of the library and new titles are added to it annually with the help of the National Film Preservation Board, an advisory body. The library also invites the public to nominate titles for the registry, so if you’d like to endorse Robert Aldrich’s 1964 freakout “Hush … Hush, Sweet Charlotte” you have until Sept. 15. To be eligible, a movie must be at least 10 years (so hold off on nominating “The Last Jedi”) and be “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant.”…”