Films featuring Libraries and Librarians

 In honor of National Library Week, check out a movie about libraries!  Below are some famous movies featuring libraries and librarians:

The Time Traveler's Wife (2010):  Based off the Audrey Niffenegger weeper, this movie follows the tortured but passionate romance of artist Claire and librarian Henry.  Personally, I'd recommend reading the book over watching this movie, but Rachel McAdams and Eric Bana do look fantastic!
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The Hollywood Librarian (2009):  This documentary looks that different images of librarians and libraries in American movies.
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The Station Agent (2004):  The so-hot-right-now Peter Dinklage made his big break in this indie sleeper.  Michelle Williams plays his love interest, a local librarian who is unhappily pregnant by her good-for-nothing boyfriend.
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Miranda (2003):   John Simms (from the British miniseries State of Play) plays a librarian who falls for a mysterious but comely library patron (Christina Ricci). 
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The Mummy (1999):  In this action thriller,  Rachel Weisz plays a beautiful but clumsy librarian at the library of Alexandra.
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Wings of Desire (1987):  This Wim Wenders masterpiece features one of the most famous library scenes ever in  the Berlin State Libary (Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin). For the angels in the film, who can hear humans' thoughts, the library is one of the loudest places in the city.  This is a spectacularly beautiful film, highly recommended!
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Breakfast Club (1985):  What's a fate worth than death for a high school student?  Having to spend Saturday in the school library!  Check out this John Hughes classic and have Simple Minds stuck in your head all day.
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Ghostbusters (1984):  This classic 80s sci-fi comedy has lots of great scenes in the New York Public Library, including a librarian ghost who mysteriously stacks books!
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The Music Man (1962):  Featuring Marian the Librarian, queen of all librarian stereotypes.  She shushes, wears her hair up in a bun, and has spiffy glasses.  But when she takes down her hair, she's a total babe!
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Desk Set (1957):  Watch the sparks fly between Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy in this romance set in television reference library!
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It's a Wonderful Life (1956):  Without George Bailey around, Mary Hatch (Donna Reed) is forced to live her life as a librarian.  The horror!  The horror!
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For further celebration, check out some fiction and non-fiction books featuring libraries and librarians!

Library scenes on film and TV

New Directions members get their glee on in the stacks.

In honor of National Library Week, I compiled more library scenes to add to last year's list. I think my favorite fictional library enthusiasts are Rory Gilmore (Gilmore Girls), Brick Heck (The Middle), Jesse St. James (Glee), and the characters on Community.

Beauty and the Beast (1991)
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Belle is imprisoned in the Beast's castle after offering herself to be held captive in place of her ailing father. Seeing the way Belle misses her home and how lonely she is, the Beast shows her his lavish library, and tells her that she has her pick from the thousands of volumes.

Before search boxes, you had to search card catalog drawers.

Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)
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After Paul (George Peppard) and Holly (Audrey Hepburn) enter the library she asks him, "What is this place?" Yes, Holly Golightly has never been inside a library. Paul explains how each card is either a book or an author (what about subjects, Paul?). They look under his last name, Varjack, to find the card with his book, Nine Lives. They have to bring the card to one librarian and then wait until their number is called at a different desk. The librarian helping them at that desk is uninterested in the fact that Paul wrote the book. Holly informs her, "It's Varjack, Paul in person!" The librarian is quite annoyed with them, tells them to be quiet, and becomes upset when Holly encourages Paul to sign the library's copy of his book. That provides Holly's cue to go: "I don't think this place is half as nice as Tiffany's."

Community (2009-present)
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Jeff (Joel McHale), Britta (Gillian Jacobs), Annie (Alison Brie), Shirley (Yvette Nicole Brown), Troy (Donald Glover), Abed (Danny Pudi) and Pierce (Chevy Chase) form a Spanish study group and every episode is set at least partially in the library, since that is their meeting place. I wanted to highlight a recent season 2 episode, because it demonstrates why Abed and Troy are among my favorite characters on TV and also have one of the best friendships on TV, in addition to the fact that the episode involves a librarian-centric plotline.

If only the librarian would notice them...

Season 2, episode 15: "Early 21st Century Romanticism"
Best friends Troy and Abed both want to ask the same librarian to the Valentine's Dance. They watch her from their study room and hope that if they're too loud she'll shush them, so they yell, "BOOKS!" and then pretend to sleep when she actually does look in their direction. When they finally do approach her, they suggest that she hang out at the dance with both of them, so she can get to know them before she makes her choice.

Troy: Why does being a librarian make her even hotter?
Abed: They're keepers of knowledge. She holds the answers to all of our questions, like "Will you marry me?" and "Why are there still libraries?"

Eastbound & Down (2009-present)
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Former baseball pitcher Kenny Powers (Danny McBride) now teaches gym at a junior high school, where his high school girlfriend April (Katy Mixon) also teaches. In a season 1 episode, he goes to talk to her in the library, where two girls get into a fight. Powers breaks them apart and yells, "If you're gonna fight, do it in a parking lot somewhere, not in a library, surrounded by books!"

Gilmore Girls (2000-2007)
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Season 2, episode 15: "Lost and Found"
Rory's (Alexis Bledel) boyfriend, Dean (Jared Padelecki), can hardly hide his boredom as he sits next to two piles of books she has already selected to buy from the library's Buy a Book! fundraiser. After over two hours of perusing the sale, Rory is still going strong and has yet to look at the astronomy section.

National Library Week: Libraries and Librarians in the Movies

Don't think that there's anything too exciting about libraries, just a bunch of people reading and studying?  Libraries can be places of action and adventure; after all, treasure hunters have to go somewhere to do their research!  In honor of National Library Week, here's a list of movies featuring libraries and librarians: 

The Breakfast Club (1985).  Five students are forced to spend their Saturday in detention at the school library.  Though they all represent different high school stereotypes (i.e. the jock, the nerd, etc.), they bond over hating their parents, their lives, and their school.  Written and directed by John Hughes and filmed locally in Des Plaines.  For a modern spin on the Breakfast Club set at a community college, check out Community on NBC (Thursdays at 7 P.M.)
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Desk Set (1957).  Set in the reference library of broadcasting network, Katherine Hepburn plays Bunny Watson,  a super capable reference librarian.  When computer engineer and efficiency expert Richard Sumner (Spencer Tracy) starts poking his nose around the library, Bunny and the other librarians are afraid they'll be replaced by the computer he invented.  But of course, the computer proves to be no match for Kate Hepburn.  
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Ghostbusters (1984).  Shushing from the grave?  Peter Venkman and crew check out the ghost of a librarian haunting the New York Public Library.  Seems she can't handle the messy shelves:

     Dr. Ray Stantz: Symmetrical book stacking. Just like the Philadelphia mass turbulence of 1947.
     Dr. Peter Veckman:  You're right, no human being would stack books like this.
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