Each movie has a one-in-three chance to march into American Film Institute history. Here are a dozen, in chronological order, which seem likely bets:

	Sally Field in "Norma Rae." Click photo for larger image.

"The Pride of the Yankees" (1942) -- He was Lou Gehrig, and he considered himself "the luckiest man on the face of the Earth" even though he was dying from a rare disease that now bears his name. Gary Cooper plays the noble New York Yankee.

"The Best Years of Our Lives" (1946) -- Harold Russell, who learned to use prosthetic, articulated hooks after a devastating D-Day explosion, plays a sailor coping with the loss of his hands from a torpedo explosion. He won two Academy Awards, for supporting actor and for "bringing hope and courage to his fellow veterans."

"It's a Wonderful Life" (1946) -- Jimmy Stewart's George Bailey calls anchor chains, plane motors and train whistles the three most exciting sounds in the world. But he sacrifices his wanderlust, and his honeymoon, for his hometown of Bedford Falls and becomes a man rich in respect and friends.

"To Kill a Mockingbird" (1962) -- Gregory Peck's principled attorney, Atticus Finch, was No. 1 on the AFI list of top heroes, so this seems like a shoo-in. His widowed Southern lawyer is the picture of decency and quiet courage as he represents a black man wrongly accused of beating and raping a white woman.

"Rocky" (1976) -- Yo, Adrian, watch tourists run up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum just like Rocky Balboa, raise their arms and hum their own music. Even more rousing is the back story: Sylvester Stallone would only sell his script if he got to star in it -- not Burt Reynolds, James Caan or Ryan O'Neal, all floated as the fighter.

"Norma Rae" (1979) -- The real Norma Rae groused about the film version of her life but this movie's signature scene -- Sally Field, scrawling "Union" on a piece of cardboard and holding it aloft in that noisy, sweaty textile factory -- is a pure shot of inspiration.

"Gandhi" (1982) -- When Ben Kingsley accepted his Best Actor Oscar, one of eight statuettes the movie won including Best Picture, he said it was for "vision, for courage, for acting and for peace." Hard to trump that.

"Hoosiers" (1986) -- A little basketball team that could. The story was inspired by a tiny Indiana team that won the state championship in the early 1950s. Not only does Gene Hackman find redemption in a town so small it's not on most maps but he discovers love and helps drinker Dennis Hopper dry out.

"Schindler's List" (1993) -- What a timeless, beautiful message: "Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire." Oskar Schindler, in saving 1,100 Jews, proved that one man can make a difference when faced with the enormity of evil.

"Saving Private Ryan" (1998) -- A woman looks out her kitchen window, sees a car chugging toward her farm house and learns three of her four sons have been killed in battle during World War II. Her knees buckle, she slides to the floor and our hearts go out at the sacrifice her family has made.

"Hotel Rwanda" (2004) -- In 1994, Paul Rusesabagina turned a four-star hotel in Kigali, Rwanda, into a haven, saving the lives of 1,200 countrymen. More than one observer has compared the hotel manager, a man of courage, cunning, dignity and kindness, to Schindler.

"Miracle" (2004) -- "Do you believe in miracles?" You bet, especially when they come amid national malaise in 1980 when American amateur hockey players are pitted against heavily favored Soviet veterans in the Winter Olympics. Coach Herb Brooks didn't live to see the movie's release, but Kurt Russell did him proud.