Adieu, 35mm Film

I follow Roger Ebert (the film critic from the Chicago Sun Times -- you may know him as the Ebert of Ebert and Roeper) on Facebook, and he shared this article today.

With 35mm Film Dead, Will Classic Movies Ever Look the Same Again?

Since I'm a huge film nerd (and because I'm doing my archives project on film preservation) I found the article to be interesting, but also depressing.

35mm film is going by the wayside. Converting films to digital is the way to do it now -- it's cheaper, it's easier, and the technology is widely available. However, this means that movies made 20, 30, or even 40 years ago will never be printed, unless you can find a lab that still prints on actual film.

There's a Catch-22 here. Although the article doesn't specifically mention this, it takes staff to convert 35mm to digital. Even though digital is cheaper maintain in the long run (if you keep your hard drive backed up and have good security measures, etc.), you still need butts in the seats to get it converted -- more money to pay the staff. Soooo... only the big name movies like Singin' in the Rain and Lawrence of Arabia are converted. The "B-movies" are left by the wayside -- which leaves film nerds like me out of luck.

Another issue is the 35mm film kept by archivists. They are reluctant to play the film because with each thread through the machine, the film deteriorates more and more. So these movies will most likely never been seen again, so they will be preserved. But why even preserve them if they'll never be seen again? Again, a Catch-22.

Unfortunately, people of our generation will most likely never see a 35mm film in a movie house. It's an amazing experience, one that I think every person needs to have to understand how pervasive movies really are in our psyche -- we respond to the sound of a film reel like we respond to our favorite song, or our mother's voice. It's almost innate within us; but alas, 35mm film is going the way of the dodo.

Sad day for film nerds.