Film fraternity gives full support for setting up film archive

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The film fraternity of the state has extended its wholehearted cooperation to the National Film Archive of India (NFAI) for accomplishing a National Film Heritage Mission aimed at preventive conservation of film reels, digitization, restoration and preservation of about one thousand feature films and one thousand short films in next five years.
The stakeholder meeting for the mission convened by the NFAI here on Friday witnessed a number of suggestions in this regard including from the representatives of Malayalam film industry including film makers, producers , production bodies, content owners and various trade bodies associated with cinema.
Film makers including Adoor Gopalakrishnan, K R Mohanan, Shyama Prasad and representatives of Kerala State Film Development Corporation (KSFDC), Chalachithra Academy, Kerala Film Chamber and noted film historians participated in the deliberations.
NFAI director Prakash Magdum said that all help will be provided to states for the preservation and restoration of regional cinema. He said the NFAI would extend all possible assistance including technical to establish state of the art facilities for this at the regional level and added that out of the 565 films already digitized by the NFAI, about 300 have been restored in 2K standards.
He appealed to film lovers and enthusiasts to help NFAI in tracing and acquiring rare film footages and other materials like film posters, song booklets, still photographs etc., so that they can be preserved for posterity. The Centre had allocated about Rs 600 crore for the project. Prakash Magdum said as part of the ongoing consultations with the stakeholders of film industry, the next round of meetings will be held in Hyderabad, Kolkata, Guwahati and New Delhi. So far the NFAI had completed such meetings in Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore.