Film Preservation Faces Epic ‘Crisis’ : Movies: Despite modern methods, America’s film stock is reeling toward a future of deterioration.

Half of all film titles produced before 1950 have been lost forever, and archives are unable to keep up with the deterioration of even modern film stocks, according to a study by the Library of Congress.

“The battle for preservation is being lost” and federal projects, which have seen their inflation-adjusted funding fall to half of 1980 levels, can “merely chip away at the film preservation crisis,” said the study, released Friday.

Private preservation efforts have grown in recent years because cable, network and home video markets have given studios economic incentives to take better care of their film libraries, the report said. But recently discovered problems, including fading color, indicate that even modern preservation methods are inadequate.

The report, required under the National Film Preservation Act of 1992, is the first in-depth look at film preservation. It is based on information from organizations including the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Motion Picture Assn. of America, as well as public hearings in Los Angeles and Washington.

The research will serve as the basis for a national film preservation plan to be prepared by the Library of Congress in the upcoming year.

According to the report, the films most at risk are silent-era newsreels, documentaries and independent movies, films the report calls “important records of America’s social memory.” Such films are in jeopardy because they lack the commercial potential of modern feature films.

“There is no one who is really rooting for these films,” said David Francis, chief of the motion picture and broadcasting division of the Library of Congress. “But they are an important record of 20th-Century life.”

The silent films made from the turn of the century through the 1920s are also threatened because they were made using materials that deteriorate much faster than modern stocks under most conditions.

Films consist primarily of an emulsion layer, which carries the image, and a plastic base. Before 1950, the plastic base was usually cellulose nitrate, which has a tendency to shrink and emit gases that destroy the emulsion layer. It is so flammable that it sometimes ignites spontaneously.

Among the full-length features of the silent era, fewer than 20% from the 1920s survive in complete form today, the report said. The survival rate of features from the previous decade is 10%.

Since 1950, most films have been made using cellulose acetate, which is more sturdy than nitrate. Acetate was once thought to be the ideal material, but recent research indicates that it decays about as quickly as nitrate. Problems that have cropped up recently, including color fading, give preservationists new cause for concern.

The report did not offer specific solutions, but it mentioned several issues that will be addressed by the national plan. The first is the securing of a source of public funding for preserving films not protected by commercial interests, the report said. That won’t be easy.

“There probably isn’t a lot more federal funding to be had in present circumstances,” said Francis.

Since 1985, the annual federal allocation for National Endowment for the Arts film preservation program has been frozen at $500,000, according to the report. After deducting operation costs, the NEA was able to fund the preservation of just 26 films in 1992, the report said.

Additional revenue sources could include taxes on blank videocassettes and on movie tickets, Francis said. Other goals include balancing storage and access needs, coordinating preservation efforts among studios and archives, and providing greater access to publicly preserved films.

Currently, more than 80% of the total film footage in public repositories is held by the Library of Congress, the Museum of Modern Art Film Department, the George Eastman House in Rochester, N.Y., and the UCLA Film and Television Archive.

Private studios, however, will play an increasing role in film preservation because film libraries have become very profitable assets, the report said. Studios now make an average of $1 million more per release through after-market cable and videocassette outlets than through first-release runs, the report said.