The Race to Save Film Classics
Martin Scorsese is not just the most avid cinephile, but also a passionate film preservationist. Three years ago Scorsese started the World Cinema Foundation to rescue neglected films from various corners of the world. And a year ago The Auteurs was bestowed with the honor of being a distribution partner for the foundation and offers four of the restored films for free in an online cinema. This growing interest and urgency in saving film has recently been covered by CNN.com’s The Screening Room in their article “Scorsese and friends race to save film classics from destruction”:
“Film preservation is always an uphill battle. There’s never enough time,” Scorsese said at Cannes last year.
“One has to think of history in the past 3,000 years, how much literature was lost. So, whatever we can do now, we’re going to save something.”
On a Scorsese related note be sure to check out our Martin Scorsese Mini-Retrospective: Music & Redemption.
