The Film Foundation (TFF), established in 1990 by Martin Scorsese, is a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation and restoration of motion picture history. Working in partnership with various archives and studios, the foundation has helped restore over 1,100 films to date. The Mission and Collaborative Impact
The foundation's primary goal is to ensure that films survive for future generations to experience as they were originally intended. This mission is shared by a distinguished board of directors, including legendary filmmakers like Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola, George Lucas, and Christopher Nolan. films restored by the film foundation
The restoration process is both technical and curatorial. It involves: The Art of Restoration with The Film Foundation | WB100 The Film Foundation (TFF), established in 1990 by
Renoir’s first color film was shot in India using early Eastmancolor, a notoriously unstable stock. By the 1990s, the film had turned completely magenta. TFF’s restoration involved scanning the faded negatives and digitally recoloring each shot based on Renoir’s original notes and paint samples. The result is a luminous, dreamlike vision of India that looked lost forever. The River (1951) – Jean Renoir (France/India) Renoir’s
Perhaps the foundation’s most celebrated restoration. For decades, the original Technicolor negatives for this ballet masterpiece had faded to a muddy pink and magenta. TFF partnered with the UCLA Film & Television Archive and the Academy Film Archive. Using a newly discovered 35mm nitrate print from the British Film Institute, restorers digitally re-registered the three strips of Technicolor film, frame by frame. The result was a revelation: the 2009 restoration premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, revealing the lush, emotionally explosive reds of the ballet sequence that audiences hadn’t seen since 1948.
Once nearly impossible to watch due to a shredded soundtrack and torn frames, this landmark of African cinema was restored by TFF alongside Cineteca di Bologna. The vibrant, chaotic road movie now exists in a DCP that preserves the raw energy of post-colonial Senegal.