It’s very fortunate in this day in age that film preservation exists. A huge library of different movies can be viewed right now thanks to the work of people who preserve the film itself and keep it in suitable conditions for viewing However, it was a much different story back in the earlier days of cinema.
Lost films are films that are no longer known to exist. A majority of these lost films were movies made during the silent and early talkie era (1894 to 1930). The only evidence for their existence can usually be found in production stills, photographs, books, short surviving clips (in which they become partially lost films), and witness testimony. Since they are “no longer known to exist” many people go on the hunt to find any trace of the whole surviving film or just partial bits and pieces. Some films deemed lost at one time were found because they were found either in archives, museums, or in a private collectors collection. So, how did we lose so many of these important films? It can be said that it was by accident, which most of the time it was, but for a good half of these films, they were lost intentionally.
In general, one copy of the film was made and was to be sent to the Library of Congress as part of copyright law and registration. However, the films were never kept and could have been returned to the person who sent in the film. The film would then be shown and the film would be kept in a vault until the next time it needed to be released. Because the Library of Congress didn’t have its own copy of the films, this would set the stage for losing film.
Before we get to how we lost these films intentionally, let’s look at how we lost them by accident. Films made before 1952 were made of nitrate and were printed onto 35mm negatives and prints. Nitrate is a very flammable substance, so when stored in very poor conditions or improperly the film bursts into flames. Two vault fires, one in 1937 and one in 1965 were responsible for destroying a huge amount of film. Nitrate also decays over time and becomes unusable, it either turns into dust or a sticky blob. Sometimes nitrate can survive for a very long time, other times the film doesn’t last 20 years. It usually depends on the condition in which the film is kept. A nonflammable 35mm film stock was introduced in 1909 as a nice alternative. However, the plasticizers used to make the film flexible evaporated quickly and made the film dry and brittle so everyone just stuck to using regular 35mm film stock.
Now let’s look at how movies got purposely lost. Back in the silent and early talkie era, people didn’t have much foresight about preserving movies for the future. When a movie finished its theatrical run, it just ended. Home video didn’t exist at the time so having it preserved there was not an option and television wasn’t invented yet so having them be shown as reruns was not possible. When talkies came around, many saw the silent films as worthless and were junked in favor of just remaking the movie as a talkie film. Large amounts of films were thrown away by studios because they needed to make room for more films. Housing the materials was expensive so it was easier just to junk them rather than to pay the money for something that was seen at the time as having no worth. Films also got destroyed when studios became defunct. Plenty of them got thrown away when studios refused to take the film back. Some got sold to scrap dealers. Charlie Chaplin destroyed one of his films as a tax write off. There was no thought put into the fate of these movies and thus, tons and tons of film were carelessly destroyed and no one even flinched
So the next time you and your friends decide to watch a movie at night, be thankful that you are able to watch it with complete confidence that it will never go away. Be thankful that preservationists work their hardest to save the films we do have available to us. Let’s be hopeful that some day, a piece of media once considered lost may resurface for people to enjoy. Because films are not made to last and at some point a time a film you know and love could disappear forever and it may not be a simple mistake.
