Resurrection of Lester’s almost lost treasure ‘Nidhanaya’
Saturday, 30 November 2013 00:00
-
- {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
A maestro who revolutionised the Sinhala cinema circuit through his movies, Dr. Lester James Peries is a celebrated personality not only in Sri Lanka but also in prestigious cinema circuits around the world.
In recent years Dr. Peries faced a turbulent situation when the only copy of his movie ‘Nidhanaya’ in Sri Lanka was found in a state beyond restoration. However, the movie was restored after the discovery of a dupe negative preserved at the National Film Archive of India with the support of a couple of dedicated individuals.
‘Nidhanaya’
‘Nidhanaya’ is based on a dark tale by G.B. Senanayake and is considered a milestone film that people even abroad admire deeply. It is atypical of Lester James Peries’ customary family dramas.
The story revolves around a psychotic killer yet is an underlying serious political study on the degradation of a class of society. In 1972 this film won the Silver Lion of St. Mark at the 33rd Venice International Film Festival and was selected as one of the outstanding films of the year, receiving a Diploma at the London Film Festival. It was also voted as the best film of the first 50 years of Sri Lankan cinema.
Speaking of his most controversial film, Dr. Peries had once stated: “My most controversial film is ‘Nidhanaya,’ which received a very positive reception at the Venice Film Festival. The most accurate critics highlighted that, despite its setting in 1911, this film holds a strong social and political value in denouncing the system. The character is trapped between two cultures: the Western/British one and his culture of origin — he is lost between two worlds. Unable to adapt to either one or the other, he absorbs the worse elements of the two cultures; the society changes and he goes insane.”
The restoration process
Two key elements were combined in the restoration process of ‘Nidhanaya’ with the use of a combined dupe negative preserved as the National Film Archive in India and a 35mm positive print struck form the original camera negative held by Degeto film.
The prints were scanned at 4k resolution and all wear marks were eliminated by cleaning and stabilising the image. The grading of images restored the richness of the original cinematography. The soundtrack was also digitally cleaned and background noise reduction was applied to reduce imperfections without losing the dynamic features of the original. The digital restoration produced a new 35mm inter-negative.
In 2013, Shivendra Singh Dungarpur collaborated with the World Cinema Foundation (WCF) for the restoration of the 1972 Sinhalese film ‘Nidhanaya’ directed by eminent Sri Lankan filmmaker Dr. Lester James Peries.
This restoration was a joint effort of the WCF, the Sri Lankan National Film Corporation, Padmarajah (the copyright holder), and the National Film Archive of India (NFAI) and Sameera Randeniya of Film Team, Sri Lanka. The film was restored by the L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory in Bologna.
Almost lost forever
“The film would have been lost forever to the world, but for the NFAI. There is no film element available of this title in the whole world, neither with the producer, the right holder nor with the Director in Sri Lanka. The only surviving film element was the dupe negative that had been preserved at the NFAI. The NFAI had preserved it for over three decades and provided it to the WCF for frame by frame restoration.
WCF made a digitally restored print. The National Film Corporation of Sri Lanka and the copyright holder, G.R. Padmaraj readily agreed to the restoration of this milestone of the Sri Lankan film industry, and the WCF Chairman and noted film-maker Martin Scorcese fully supported the restoration project,” the Pune-based institute’s Director Prashant Pathrabe said.
Pix by Lasantha Kumara
