When the Lumiere brothers invented the camera and screened their first film, The Arrival Of A Train, in Paris in 1895, they discarded the marvel of motion pictures to be a passing fad. And more than a 100 years later, one look into the National Film Archive of India (NFAI) library will reveal the huge number of films that have come since then and how it has become a part of our lives now.
NFAI, established by the ministry of information and broadcasting in February 1964, was founded with the very aim of preserving, documenting and disseminating film culture.
“The three major objectives of the archive is the acquisition, preservation and dissemination of cinema. The organisation also plays a central role in almost every film-related event that happens in the country,” said Prashant Pathrabe, director of NFAI.
Archiving of films isn’t as easy a task as it sounds. “We have more than a 1,000 films being made every year in the country and there is no way for us to know about the existence of certain films. Unlike the censor board, which has to be notified about every film, we always rely on someone to bring a film to our notice,” said Pathrabe.
Holding a lack of constitutional provision responsible for this unawareness, Pathrabe added, “We need a legal provision which makes it necessary for filmmakers to notify about the films they make to the archives and also provide a print of the same. That is the only way more and more films will be archived for the future.”
Over the past three years, the NFAI has undertaken a process to digitise their belongings to increase their shelf life. “Digitisation of ancillaries like posters, pamphlets and photographs is simple. But digitisation of films is an expensive and painstaking process. It requires nearly Rs10-12 lakh and about 2-3 months for one film to be restored and digitised,” said Pathrabe.
The archives have digitised 566 films in the past three years and have also restored 329 out of the lot.
“The film strip is plastic with chemicals on it. It has a good shelf life, but it starts deteriorating with time,” he said.
What makes the NFAI a sacred place is the fact that it represents the idea that films are precious works of art. “Films reflect the society. They are a great way to show future generations the times before them and there is a need to preserve such important material. It is good that our government realised this soon. Some countries still don’t have archival agencies,” said Pathrabe.
“The Europeans and Americans realised the value of cinema much earlier and set up agencies for preservation of their cinema. We, at NFAI, are doing the same so that good cinema remains for the world to watch, even decades after it is made,” he said.
‘House of Treasures’
The NFAI library, known as ‘The House of Treasures’ has 10,304 films, 14,768 books related to cinema, 214 film periodicals, many classic films’ posters and pamphlets, scripts, disc records and audio tapes of veterans speaking about their craft. NFAI aids in the screenings of these classical films at various festivals and allows cinema buffs to get a look at cinematic heritage left behind by these films.
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