Preservation

The collections are accommodated on several sites. The J Paul Getty Jnr Conservation Centre in Hertfordshire, named after its generous benefactor, is the base for much of the work on bfi Collections' national collection while approximately 140 million feet of flammable nitrate film is kept separately at a bfi storage site at Gaydon in Warwickshire.

In recent years the Conservation Centre has successfully completed a number of much anticipated restorations of a diverse range of film titles. In 2001 we were able to exhibit a new print of the previously neglected 1937 version of As You Like It (1937), and other recently restored titles include Abel Gance's masterly Napoleon (1927) and Violettes Imperiales (1923), Odd Man Out (1947), and The Magic Box (1951).

The Conservation Centre has recently worked on the Mitchell & Kenyon Collection, one of the most exciting film discoveries of recent times, some of which have been released on DVD.