It’s movie night, bro: ‘Top Gun,’ ‘Shawshank’ bring male bonding to National Film Registry

Tom Cruise portrayed Lieutenant Pete Mitchell, a young Naval aviator aboard the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise, in the 1986 film “Top Gun.” (Facebook photo)

WASHINGTON – It’s a bro-centric year for movies added to the prestigious National Film Registry.

The Library of Congress announced Wednesday that “Top Gun” and “The Shawshank Redemption,” two of the most popular male-bonding movies of all time, have been tapped for preservation.

They’ll be joined by an all-male quartet that’s about to get an all-female reboot – the gang from “Ghostbusters.”

Each year, the library picks 25 movies to preserve for their cultural, historic or artistic importance. The list is always eclectic and, as usual, includes some titles that are much older, experimental or otherwise obscure.

And then there are the crowd-pleasers. “The Shawshank Redemption” is a mainstay atop the Internet Movie Database poll of the top 250 movies of all time.