India’s forgotten films are getting a second act

In a remarkable twist, an outdated Indian film will grace the screen alongside renowned masterpieces at the Venice Film Festival in September. Dev Benegal's English, August (1994) joins the prestigious Venice Classics lineup, alongside works by influential filmmakers such as Luis Buñuel, Roberto Rossellini, and Andrzej Wajda. Later, as the film festival circuit travels to Canada, Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) will showcase John Abraham's Amma Ariyan (1986) in the Toronto Classics section.

For the first time in history, restored Indian films have made appearances at the top four international film festivals—Cannes, Venice, Berlin, and Toronto—marking a significant milestone for Indian cinema. Earlier, Pradip Krishen's in Which Annie Gives It Those Ones (1989), starring Arundhati Roy in a dual role, was showcased at the Berlinale Classics at the Berlin Film Festival. Similarly, Amma Ariyan made a significant impact at the Cannes Film Festival's Cannes Classics in May.

While the rare opportunity for restored Indian movies to be selected to the biggest festivals is a momentous occasion, it also sheds light on the urgent need for conserving thousands of films that risk being lost forever. Over the past half-century, film restoration has gained traction globally, with the industry now valued in the multi-billion dollar range.

However, Indian classics have long suffered due to neglect and poor maintenance, with prints of decades-old movies deteriorating due to various factors like fire, flood, humidity, and sheer neglect. Shivendra Singh Dungarpur, whose Mumbai-based Film Heritage Foundation has restored Amma Ariyan and English, August, emphasizes the fragility of film and the dire state of many Indian classics.

A significant setback occurred when a massive nitrate fire ravaged Henderson's lab in 1993, burning precious classics, including Satyajit Ray's Apu Trilogy. The Academy Film Archive initiated a desperate attempt to salvage Ray's films. Engineers from Italy's L'Immagine Ritrovata, a world-class film restoration lab, spent thousands of hours rescuing the remains.

In 2015, the restored Apu's Trilogy premiered at New York's Museum of Modern Art. Mughal-e-Azam (1960) was the first Indian film digitally restored for a theatrical rerelease in 2004, followed by Uday Shankar's Kalpana (1948) in 2019, restored and screened for a global audience.