NFPF News

“Amazing Tales from the Archives” This Week!

Jimmy Aubrey will do anything to get out of the house and into mischief in A Musical Mixup (1928).

Come out and see a presentation on a wonderful film funded through a grant from the National Film Preservation Foundation. Thursday, May 7 sees the return of “Amazing Tales from the Archives” at the San Francisco Silent Festival. This free annual program, begun in 2006, brings together archivists from around the world to present reports on recent preservation projects. This year audiences will enjoy four presentations (with musical accompaniment by Stephen Horne) from leading archivists and scholars. 

Among them is Kyle Westphal, co-founder of the Chicago Film Society, who will present A Musical Mixup (1928) and the saga of its preservation. This two-reel comedy shows what happens when two friends (Jimmy Aubrey and Bud Duncan) connive to attend the … Read more

NFPF Treasures To Save and Project

A pre-preservation film strip from Elijah Pierce: Woodcarver (1974). The newly preserved print that will screen has been color-corrected to restore its original vibrancy.

Attention New Yorkers! Twelve films preserved through NFPF grants will be playing at “To Save and Project,” the Museum of Modern Art’s annual festival of newly restored films from archives worldwide, held January 9-30.

Eight of the films mae up a program devoted to Chicago-based experimental filmmaker Heather McAdams, whose works, dating from 1980 to 1995, are primarily assembled from found footage and view the detritus of American culture through an antic feminist lens. The films were preserved by the Chicago Film Society through a 2021 NFPF Federal Grant and a 2022 Avant-Garde Masters Grant (awarded in conjunction with The Film Foundation, with funding provided by the Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation).

… Read more

The NFPF teams with Alamo Drafthouse on Silent Movie Day to screen Clash of the Wolves

Master-of-disguise Rin-Tin-Tin dons a false beard to avoid detection in Clash of the Wolves (1925), screening at four Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas on Sept. 29th.

To celebrate silent film history and raise funds for film preservation, the National Film Preservation Foundation and Silent Movie Day are joining forces to present a special screening of Clash of the Wolves (1925), a star vehicle for the legendary canine Rin-Tin-Tin. The film screens on Sunday, September 29th, at four Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas around the country. Proceeds from the screening will go to support the NFPF’s preservation efforts. You can donate to the NFPF directly by clicking here.

Inducted into the National Film Registry in 2004, Clash of the Wolves was the ninth feature to star the most successful animal in film history. At the height of his fame, Rin-Tin-Tin (1918–32) … Read more

THE RED MARK at the San Francisco Silent Film Festival

The fastest way out of the penal colony of Nouméa, as seen in The Red Mark (1928), preserved by and screening at the San Francisco Silent Festival.

On Sunday, April 14th the San Francisco Silent Film Festival will the premiere the new restoration of The Red Mark (1928), a prison-set potboiler preserved with NFPF support.

Directed by James Cruze, best known for epics The Covered Wagon (1923) and Old Ironsides (1926), the film is a set on the South Seas prison island of Nouméa. Its governor is De Nou (Gustav von Seyffertitz), who loves nothing more than sending a inmate to the guillotine. Pickpocket Bibi Ri (Gaston Glass) has won his freedom and refuses to leave the island without his girl (Nina Quartero), but she has caught the creepy, jealous eye of De Nou...

"A powerful story, though not a pretty one," was the judgment of Motion Picture … Read more

Catch MAN AND WIFE at the UCLA Festival of Preservation

Norma Shearer goes mad in Man and Wife (1923), preserved by UCLA Film & Television Archive.

Early April brings the return of the biennial UCLA Festival of Preservation, showcasing UCLA Film & Television Archive's latest preservation and restoration projects on the big screen. All screenings are free, and on April 7 attendees will have the opportunity to see the short feature Man and Wife (1923), preserved through a Roger Mayer Legacy Grant administered by the National Film Preservation Foundation.

Directed by John L. McCutcheon and starring Norma Shearer and Maurice Costello, Man and Wife was an independent production filmed in Fort Lee, New Jersey, known in the silent era as “Hollywood on the Hudson.” The film’s exuberantly melodramatic plot, involving secret identities, a character returning from the dead, insanity, and bigamy, caused … Read more