NFAI Acquires 162 Films Including Footage Of Mahatma Gandhi

September 14, 2017

Amidst the ongoing speculation on the possession of film reels, the National Film Archive of India (NFAI) has acquired 162 films from Famous Cine Laboratory, Mumbai.

The collection consists of more than 125 films in their original or dupe negative form. 44 of these films are black and white and 15 of them are unreleased. Consisting of a variety of genres and languages made in different eras, there are 34 Gujarati, 15 Marathi, six Bhojpuri, three Punjabi and one Nepali film in the collection.

Speaking at a press conference, Prakash Magdum, Director of NFAI, said, “This is one of the biggest acquisitions we’ve done, in one go. We have been in touch with the laboratory for the past five months for this. All the films are in a good and screenable condition. Each and every reel is important to us.”

The NFAI has also acquired a six-hour long documentary footage of Mahatma Gandhi that was shot by noted filmmaker and freedom fighter, Vitthal Jhaveri.

Of this collection, the oldest film is Sitara (1939) which was directed by Ezra Mir. Other films include Dilip Kumar starrer Kohinoor (1960), Saat Hindustani (1969), Amber (1952) which had Raj Kapoor and Nargis and Zindagi Aur Toofan (1975). To add to the documentary footage, the organisation has also acquired renowned Japanese filmmaker, Kon Ichikawa’s documentary of the 1964 Tokyo Summer Olympics, Tokyo Olympiad.

As part of the National Film Heritage Mission, these films will be digitised on a selective basis. “We are currently working with L’Immagine Ritrovata, the world’s leading film restoration agency in Italy to help us in the process. This is the same agency that restored Satyajit Ray’s Apu Trilogy. Right now, we are conducting an entire assessment of the films we have. 4000 films will be completely digitised by 2021. The reels in the archive are kept under perfect temperature control,” explains Magdum.

Commenting on the NFAI’s resolve to catalogue films, he adds, “We are trying to put in a system. Archiving films is a serious activity. We are currently in a transition phase. We are trying to adopt the best practises and standards.”