On September 29, 1965, according to congress.gov, U.S. Senate Bill S.1483 was signed into law as the National Foundation on the Arts and Humanities Act of 1965 by the 36th U.S. President
Lyndon B. Johnson; it established the
American Film Institute (AFI), as well as the
National Endowment for the Arts and the
National Endowment for the Humanities. As there was no existing listings of films of the past—making preservation an immediate concern—the Bill obliged the AFI to build a new "catalog" of
feature films that would protect
cultural history from being lost in obscurity or disappearing entirely.
Hardcover publications The Catalog began as a series of
hardcover books known as
The American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures, published by the
University of California Press (excluding vol. A) from 1971 to 1993. The print version comprises seven volumes documenting all films produced in the United States from 1892 to 1970. The publication of the hardcover volumes was suspended due to budgetary reasons after volume F4 (1941–50) in 1997. Feature films released from 1951 to 1960 and from 1971 to 1993 have been cataloged only in the online database. The project estimates that additional years will be cataloged at six-month intervals. Film school students are offered the opportunity to provide plot synopses and original research, but input from other, experienced film researchers is not encouraged. The project will also eventually catalog short films (beyond 1910) and
newsreels. ==See also==