Post by Prem Rogue on Sept 8, 2014 4:36:36 GMT
Now, Study How to Preserve Movies for Future Generations
By P K Balachandran Published: 08th September 2014 06:00 AM Last Updated: 08th September 2014 12:43 AM
COLOMBO: Passionately committed to film preservation, Shivendra Singh Dungarpur of the Mumbai-based Film Heritage Foundation (FHF) will be spreading his wings across South Asia by organising the first-ever course in film preservation for Indian and South Asian film buffs in February next year.
To be held at Mumbai from February 22 to 28, the course’s faculty will have experts from Martin Scorsese’s Film Foundation, Cineteca di Bologna and L’Immagine Ritrovata, Dungarpur told Express. “The 45 participants from India, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Nepal will be given practical training in current restoration and archival practices,” he said.
Stressing the dire need for film preservation, he said that by 1950, India had lost 80 per cent of the films made earlier because, till 1951, film stock used the highly inflammable cellulose nitrate.
Dadasaheb Phalke’s epoch-making Raja Harishchandra was lost in 1917 when it caught fire due to heat while being transported in a bullock cart! In 1940, most films made by New Theatres were lost in a fire at the studios. In 2002, 45 original camera negatives and prints of Indian classics stored at the Film and Television Institute in Pune went up in flames. In July 2014, a fire at the Bombay Talkies office in Mumbai destroyed several old films made by the iconic production house.
Among the old Indian films lost are: Alam Ara India’s first talkie (1931); Sairandhri, the first color film (1933); and Seeta (1934), the first Indian film to be shown at an international film festival (Venice) and also the first to bag an international award.
While India’s hot and humid climate had been primarily responsible for the loss of films, its commercial-minded film makers also did not consider it worthwhile to preserve them. Films were sold to dealers in silver, who extracted silver from cellulose nitrate. Colour films were sold to makers of ladies’ handbags and bangles, he said. “Films are judged by their box office collections, and for governments, they are primarily a source of revenue. But films are chronicles, a part of our heritage, because they reflect the concerns and conditions of society of a given period,” he argued.
By P K Balachandran Published: 08th September 2014 06:00 AM Last Updated: 08th September 2014 12:43 AM
COLOMBO: Passionately committed to film preservation, Shivendra Singh Dungarpur of the Mumbai-based Film Heritage Foundation (FHF) will be spreading his wings across South Asia by organising the first-ever course in film preservation for Indian and South Asian film buffs in February next year.
To be held at Mumbai from February 22 to 28, the course’s faculty will have experts from Martin Scorsese’s Film Foundation, Cineteca di Bologna and L’Immagine Ritrovata, Dungarpur told Express. “The 45 participants from India, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Nepal will be given practical training in current restoration and archival practices,” he said.
Stressing the dire need for film preservation, he said that by 1950, India had lost 80 per cent of the films made earlier because, till 1951, film stock used the highly inflammable cellulose nitrate.
Dadasaheb Phalke’s epoch-making Raja Harishchandra was lost in 1917 when it caught fire due to heat while being transported in a bullock cart! In 1940, most films made by New Theatres were lost in a fire at the studios. In 2002, 45 original camera negatives and prints of Indian classics stored at the Film and Television Institute in Pune went up in flames. In July 2014, a fire at the Bombay Talkies office in Mumbai destroyed several old films made by the iconic production house.
Among the old Indian films lost are: Alam Ara India’s first talkie (1931); Sairandhri, the first color film (1933); and Seeta (1934), the first Indian film to be shown at an international film festival (Venice) and also the first to bag an international award.
While India’s hot and humid climate had been primarily responsible for the loss of films, its commercial-minded film makers also did not consider it worthwhile to preserve them. Films were sold to dealers in silver, who extracted silver from cellulose nitrate. Colour films were sold to makers of ladies’ handbags and bangles, he said. “Films are judged by their box office collections, and for governments, they are primarily a source of revenue. But films are chronicles, a part of our heritage, because they reflect the concerns and conditions of society of a given period,” he argued.