‘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 archives around the world, and is able to include a few early shorts of Albanian’s day-to-day lives from the 1910s and 1920s in her programmes.
Burkart is currently participating in the restoration of TANA (1958), the first entirely homegrown production of Albania. Heaven helps those who help themselves again, extra film materials were found from Germany to complete the restoration, and it will be available soon!
Further readings:
‘Albanian Cinema Project’ and An overview of Albania film history
https://www.thealbaniancinemaproject.org/albanian-history.html
Programme on Albanian films in the Filmarchiv Austria
https://www.filmarchiv.at/en/program/retrospective/geheimnisvolles-albanien/
Photo credit: the restoration of TANA from Arkivi Qendror Shteteror i Filmit
