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Where Old Docs Go (To Live)

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by Patrick Russell
Still from Spare Time by Humphrey Jennings Still from Spare Time by Humphrey Jennings As a filmmaker you probably spend most of your time busily researching, shooting or editing your films – or seeking the funding that will enable you to do so in the first place. How often do you consider the question of what happens to documentaries – physically – after they have received their final broadcast, or after their initial distribution is completed?

There are three important questions that should prompt today’s documentary makers to take a keen interest in moving image archiving:
  • Where, and in what form, is the documentary heritage (the factual films made by previous generations) held?
  • What can today’s documentary filmmakers do to ensure the long-term preservation of their own work?
  • How do today’s filmmakers go about accessing archives in order to reuse their content in their own productions?
Let’s look at each of these in turn.
Still from Good Housewife in her Kitchen, part of the BFI National Archive Still from Good Housewife in her Kitchen, part of the BFI National Archive Archiving a century of documentaries
In the UK, projected film has a history stretching back to 1896. It would take some thirty years for the term ‘documentary’ to come into common usage, distinguishing the more creative non-fiction works from others that might be described simply as records. Nonetheless, the roots of documentary were laid during these decades by the many hundreds of factual films turned out by the pioneers of film as a medium and an industry.

It seems obvious, now, that such films should be considered important historical documents, both as records of the evolving output of Britain’s earlier filmmakers, and as uniquely evocative artefacts of their times. This point is best made by the extraordinary impact of some of the rediscoveries that are made in our own era: for instance, the recent rescue and restoration of the Peter Worden Collection of Mitchell and Kenyon films. Yet it took decades before any systematic attempts were made to preserve such material, by when most of it had already been lost: it is estimated that some 80% of all silent films no longer exist. Much of what remained was deteriorating beyond the means of archives to prevent further loss (it is well known that cellulose nitrate film stock is both inflammable and unstable), though much important material was indeed ‘saved’ at this point.  

It is generally agreed that the first institutionally established film archive was that of the Imperial War Museum, which began collecting films in 1918 - shortly after World War One, the first major conflict to have been extensively documented on celluloid. The Imperial War Museum Film and Video Archive continues to preserve the national collection of moving image productions related to Britain’s military and conflict history: a history that has had great influence on the development of Britain’s documentary tradition. World War One saw the release of the seminal feature length documentary The Battle of the Somme (1916) alongside numerous shorter newsreel and record films. World War Two yielded hundreds of propaganda documentaries, the best known of them the classic poetic films of Humphrey Jennings.

Only in the 1930s did a more general movement towards the preservation of cinema’s past output establish itself, with the setting up of national film collections in several European and North American countries. These included the National Film Library, established as a department of the British Film Institute in 1935. Now the BFI National Archive, it has gone on to build up one of the most extensive collections anywhere in the world. Interestingly, among all of the pioneer archives of the 1930s, it was arguably the one that took the greatest interest in documentary and other factual film, believing that ‘The Film of Record’ was as important as ‘The Art of Cinema’. Possibly this reflected the influence, in the intellectual film culture of the time, of Britain’s documentary movement associated with filmmakers like John Grierson and Paul Rotha. In any case, the BFI today holds some 100,000 non-broadcast factual films. The National Film Archive, as it was then known, was also prescient in foreseeing a need for the archiving of television, a need it began addressing on a limited basis as early as the 1950s. As is well known, it was a common practice for many years for television companies to destroy copies of their programmes after transmission. Today, however, the BBC is responsible for an extremely well maintained archive of all its productions. Granada Media and ITN also maintain libraries of past material produced in the independent sector and make them available for commercial reuse, while under legal arrangements the independent terrestrial broadcasters provide financial support for the BFI to record transmitted material for long-term preservation. The BFI now holds some 300,000 television programmes, many of them documentaries reflecting Britain’s great strength as a home for documentary television. In general, it can be said that the commercial film and television industries are now much more seriously concerned with the archiving of their own back catalogues than they were in the 1930s. In the public sector, meanwhile, moving image archives have since the late 1970s been established in Scotland, Wales and all the English regions, collecting material originating from and relevant to their areas. There are also numerous private collections, and stock footage libraries.

So where are we today? Many institutions, in several different sectors, hold thousands of documentary films between them. There are some overlaps between their collections, as well as many films uniquely held by a single body. But there are also many documentaries going ‘un-archived’. The law requires that a copy of every book published in the UK be offered to the British Library, but there is no equivalent ‘statutory deposit’ legislation for films. Moreover, moving images are virtually the most expensive type of cultural artefact to preserve, but moving image archives tend to be the least well funded bodies in the cultural heritage sector. Much material remains difficult to access and deterioration continues to be an issue. There is still much to be done before Britain’s documentary heritage can be considered fully secure. Nonetheless that heritage is gradually becoming more accessible than ever before.
Building tomorrow’s archives
British documentary is enjoying a fascinating resurgence taking the form of (among other things) a growing ‘non-broadcast’ documentary culture. Independent filmmakers are no longer making films principally intended for a single television screening. New cinema, festival, non-theatrical and web spaces are emerging to provide outlets for documentaries, often produced entirely digitally. Interestingly, today’s efforts to create new means of production and distribution directly echo those of earlier generations of documentary filmmakers – for instance, the documentary movement mentioned above, or the more radical political film collectives and workshops of the 1970s and ‘80s.

Ironically, however, there is a real risk that today’s documentary renaissance could become tomorrow’s documentary dark ages. Why?

Over the recent decades in which most significant documentary production was for television, its archival preservation was relatively secure. The films were likely to be held both in the broadcasting company’s archives and, in an off-air recorded form, in the national collection. But if films are produced entirely independently they are likely to be disconnected from any established systems of archiving. After their initial distribution run is ended they are unlikely to enter into any established archives and they may be at risk of physical deterioration, or even of simply getting lost. The examples of previous generations are again relevant here. The output of the 1970s collectives, for instance, often survives in the form of a very small number of prints.

What, as a filmmaker, can you do? The simplest thing is to offer copies of your finished productions to the relevant public archive: those at the BFI, the Imperial War Museum or in the regions. They are listed at the website for the Film Archive Forum.

Material is usually sought on a format as close as possible to the original edited version of the production. Where this was mastered on film, these would be (in order of preference) original negatives, intermediate material or prints. Where material originates on video, these would be the Master Edited Tape, or a clone or copy of it on a format of identical or greater quality. Lesser material can be used for viewing copies.

Filmmakers are also advised to look after their own material, by keeping them in cool, non-humid and stable conditions, and by maintaining clear, consistent records of where their masters are held.
Still from Tea Making Tips, held in the BFI National Archive Still from Tea Making Tips, held in the BFI National Archive Accessing Archives
Archive material has many uses for documentary makers: it can be used to illustrate themes straightforwardly, to provide ironic counterpoint, to give period texture and in a myriad of other ways. However, given what has already been said, it will come as no surprise that accessing such material is not always a straightforward or easily affordable process. In addition to the technical costs involved, there is the huge issue of copyright to be considered. Even if an archive physically holds a film it may not hold the copyright, and even if it holds the main copyright there may be many third party rights to consider as well.  

However, this should not deter you from making use of archive. You are, however, advised to budget for use of such material at the earliest stages, if necessary by consulting the relevant archives for estimated costings, or if possible by employing a professional film researcher. The film research organisation Focal can help.

A comprehensive database of all UK moving image archives can be found at Researchers Guide Online.

The BBC and ITN are the principal sources for material in which they hold copyright. The BBC has recently announced its intentions to make much more of its archive accessible online: plans which could transform access to audio-visual heritage.

Public sector film archives are also increasingly concerned with making their holdings as accessible as possible within the constraints of copyright (this often means that rights still need to be cleared before reuse of any material). An outline of their collections can be found at Moving History.

The BFI’s screenonline and Mediatheque initiatives are significantly widening access to its collections; it also operates a download shop. An example of an online access project based around regional archives is Films From the Home Front.  

A valuable new, and growing, resource is the Creative Archive. Several bodies have come together to supply online films which can be repurposed for non-commercial creative use, without copyright restrictions.

For the foreseeable future, these and other welcome digital initiatives can only make available a proportion of the total material cared for by our film and television archives: the determined filmmaker will continue to make other exciting finds by dealing direct with archivists or archive sales teams. Our moving image heritage is huge, complex, fascinating and growing every day. It deserves to be studied, enjoyed, used – and added to - by the filmmakers who are creating tomorrow’s heritage.

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