Free Republic

In an age when Roe v. Wade is under attack and sweeping, severe anti-abortion laws and bills are being passed in Alabama, Georgia, and Missouri, it’s interesting to look back on the pro-choice subplot of Fast Times at Ridgemont High, which caused little stir in 1982. Sitting at Yahoo Entertainment with David Crosby to promote his latest film project, the documentary David Crosby: Remember My Name, Cameron Crowe — whose book about his experience as an undercover reporter at a Southern California high school inspired the classic teen comedy — acknowledges that those scenes would be received very differently today....

EDITOR’S NOTE: In his new book, Rendezvous with Destiny: Ronald Reagan and the Campaign That Changed America (ISI Books), Craig Shirley provides the first inside look at the historic 1980 election, a race that even as late as election day was judged “too close to call.” In this excerpt, Shirley shows how close Reagan’s campaign came to collapsing in the Republican primaries — and how the candidate turned things around.The thirty-five days between the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary during the 1980 presidential campaign were the most important time in Ronald Reagan’s political life. And the pivotal moment...

The documentary Hoop Dreams and footage of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake are among the 25 movies picked this year for the National Film Registry, a compilation of significant films being preserved by the Library of Congress in Washington. Fictional films chosen by Librarian of Congress James H. Billington range from the Buster Keaton comedy The Cameraman to the Christmas classic Miracle on 34th Street to the 1982 teen comedy Fast Times at Ridgemont High. The 2005 selections bring to 425 the total number of films being preserved by the Library of Congress or other institutions involved in the project....