Home Alone, Nightmare Before Christmas and 12 Years a Slave Among 25 Films Selected for National Film Registry

Macaulay Culkin and Jack Skellington are making their way to the National Film Registry.

On Wednesday, the Library of Congress announced that holiday classics Home Alone (1990) and The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) are among the 25 movies selected as 2023's entries into the National Film Registry.

Members of the public submitted a total of 6,875 movies for consideration this year; Home Alone and James Cameron's Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) "drew significant support" from public submissions, according to a press release.

Other films selected for preservation include Academy Award winners like 12 Years a Slave (2013), Apollo 13 (1995) and Fame (1980), as well as the classic Disney animated film Lady and the Tramp (1955) and Gina Prince-Bythewood's Love & Basketball (2000).

In an interview with the Library of Congress, 12 Years a Slave director Steve McQueen said slavery "was a subject matter that hadn't been given enough recognition within the narrative of cinema history" when he set out to make the film, an adaptation of author Solomon Northup's 1853 memoir.

"I wanted to address it for that reason, but also because it was a subject which had so much to do with how we live now. It wasn't just something which was dated," McQueen said. "It was something which is living and breathing, because you see the evidence of slavery today.”

The movie starred Chiwetel Ejiofor and marked a breakout role for Lupita Nyong'o, who won Best Supporting Actress at the 86th Oscars in 2014. 12 Years a Slave also won Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay that year.

Love & Basketball director Prince-Bythewood told the Library of Congress her movie's success was "incredibly humbling."

"It absolutely set the tone for my career.... It told the industry who I was as a filmmaker, and that film has led to every film after that,” she said. “It’s a beautiful thing.”

The Library of Congress selects 25 films each year to preserve in the National Film Registry in recognition of "their cultural, historic or aesthetic importance to preserve the nation’s film heritage," per a press release. This year's entrees range from films released in 1921 (A Movie Trip Through Filmland) to 2013's Oscar-winning documentary 20 Feet from Stardom.

Home Alone's entry into the film registry comes after the film's star Culkin, now 43, recently received a star on Los Angeles' Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Anyone interested in nominating films to the registry can do so on the Library of Congress' website until Aug. 15, 2024.