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The first generation of Nakamura Ganjiro’s footages were rediscovered The cultural and artistic significance of non-feature films can be seen in the case where the first generation of Nakamura Ganjiro's footages were rediscovered recently. Nakamura Ganjiro is a very important ‘Myoseki’ in the Japanese Kabuki world (that is, a stage name passed down from generation to generation for one’s performance style and specialised plays). The first generation of Ganjiro is…

The first Korean feature-length animation film Hong Gil-dong The first Korean feature-length animation film Hong Gil-dong was restored in 4K! The film was directed by Shin Dong-heon, who adapted his younger brother’s famous comic series, Lucky Adventurer, Hong Gil-dong from 1965, and released it in Korea two years later.The lost original negative was made from military giant celluloid films. Korean Film Archive (KFA) collected a Japanese version of 16mm film from a…

Finding a cult film, London After Midnight London After Midnight (1927), a cult film starring Lon Chaney as a detective and a vampire, is considered one of the most sought-after pieces of film history. The film was lost after a fire in MGM studios in 1965. Rob Murphy, head film projectionist at the Sun Theatre in Yarraville, Australia, believes the print could exist there, as Australia was at the end…

Fujiko A’s TV animation Futa-kun Manga artist Fujiko A. Fujio's early work Futa-kun was serialised in a manga magazine from 1964 to 1967. At that time, he still cooperated with his partner Fujiko F. Fujio (as the writing duo Fujiko Fujio). Because of the popularity of Little Ghost Q-Taro TV animation, a TV station planned to launch Futa-kun in 1967. Later, there were rumours that several pilot episodes were shown…

Albanian Cinema Project ‘Albanian Cinema Project’ aims to bring a 'new' national cinema to international screens by carrying out restoration projects and filling in the missing pieces of Albanian cinema. It led to many other screenings and exchanges, such as the series of retrospectives of Albanian films curated by independent programmer Louise Burkart from the Deutsches Filminstitut & Filmmuseum. She has been looking for film materials related to Albania from…

Citizen Kane Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane (1941) has long been widespread acclaimed. The original camera negative was presumed lost in a vault fire in the 1970s. But during the release of the newly restored version last year, the American writer Nicolas Falacci said there is another story. Falacci, who had been checking and selecting the films frame by frame in the preparation of the restoration in 1991, revealed on his…

The long lost American silent film The First Degree was found! The long lost American silent film The First Degree (1923) was digitised and screened with its original score last year. The story started 16 years ago: Chicago filmmaker Stephen Parry drove down to a house in Peoria to look through a film collection in hopes of finding footage for his documentary, where boxes of highly flammable nitrate film reels…

a story of lost and found behind Summer of Soul There is also a story of lost and found behind Summer of Soul (Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised)(2021), the winner of 2022 EE British Academy Film Awards' documentary this year. In the summer of 1969, the Harlem Cultural Festival celebrated African American culture and to promote the continued politics of black pride through music. TV director Hal…

Household Saints It may seem that films are now more accessible than ever because of the establishment of streaming services, yet many films have already been lost and are not available in any form in anywhere. They are not just some films in the silent era but could also be some of those produced in the 1980s and 1990s. And the reason is not just that the film materials are…