Preserving Cinematic History

February 17, 2021 12:52 AM

Driven to create amidst war and chaos, Afghan filmmakers gave birth to an extraordinary national cinema. Driven to destroy, Taliban extremists set out to torch that legacy. Using newly restored images from the Afghan Films Archive, Afghan-Canadian director Ariel Nasr tells the story of Afghanistan's fearless and visionary filmmakers including "Engineer" Latif Ahmadi and Siddiq Barmak. -Youtube, TVO Website. If you are not able to watch yet due to region-restrictions, this WP podcast tells a moving aspect of this story.

These links offer an interesting written component to documenting these restoration and preservation efforts.
The Montreal mission to restore once hidden, forbidden Afghan films

Thousands of hours of footage hidden from the Taliban in Afghanistan will be digitised, introducing young Afghans to their country's rich past.

Restoring Afghanistan’s lost era of film

TVO Original The Forbidden Reel takes viewers inside the bullet-scarred building where a group of artists risked their lives by hiding the nation’s films from the Taliban. Nasr, an Afghan-Canadian, brings these stories to light in a dramatic feature-length documentary that affirms cinema’s power to sustain culture through even the most challenging circumstances.

With unprecedented access to Afghanistan's national film archive, and 16 mm recreations shot in Afghanistan, The Forbidden Reel reveals a fresh perspective on the Cold War and the rise of extremism. Writer-director Nasr incorporates newly restored images from the Afghan Films Archive to highlight the heroic efforts by filmmakers like “Engineer” Latif Ahmadi (The Immigrant Birds) and Siddiq Barmak (Osama) to save a cinematic legacy.

posted by infinite intimation (2 comments total)

I'm in Ontario and this was broadcast a few weeks ago. TVO shows excellent documentaries and I scan the schedule every week and record whatever looks interesting. Unfortunately, this one didn't live up to my expectations. It focused too much on Afghanistan's history and not enough on the art. Politics and conflicts are definitely important parts of this story, but I was more interested in learning about their industry and film culture. There's interesting clips and interviews with key film makers for sure, but I ended up fast forwarding to the end after about the 3/4 mark.
posted by PatchesPal at 9:06 AM on February 17, 2021

Thank you for posting this! Looking forward to digging into the links.
posted by Ahmad Khani at 10:57 AM on February 17, 2021