Restoration of "Vertigo", 1996

"We were faced with the simple question of do we let this great film go forever or do we bring it back? And we felt that it made both emotional and economic sense to give a new generation a chance to see something truly beautiful."

"We're in the business of snatching great films back from the brink of extinction. The negative had gotten to the point where if we didn't restore "Vertigo" now, it would have been too late," says Robert Harris. "Without this effort, no one would ever again experience "Vertigo", for the glorious first time or a still-awed tenth, as it was intended to be seen."

Casey Silver, Chairman of Universal Pictures, comments:

"Alfred Hitchcock's legacy is a great source of pride to the studio. He is a master filmmaker and "Vertigo" is a good example of a master at the top of his game. Now, a whole new generation of moviegoers will have the opportunity to be swept away by "Vertigo" on the big screen in 70mm."
 

"People who have seen "Vertigo" before have never seen it like this. Those who are lucky enough to be experiencing this film for the very first time will see it as Hitchcock would have wanted it to be seen today, with all the sound, visual effects and other elements of excitement at their absolute best and in sync with `90s technology. For decades, this has been a motion picture that people can't get out of their heads; and we want that legacy to continue."

So it was with great sadness that film restorers James C. Katz and Robert Harris discovered that the perfection Hitchcock demanded had deteriorated into shrunken and vinegared sound elements and faded negatives that could not possibly do his dark romantic fable justice. For Harris and Katz the loss was unthinkable.

"Vertigo" is truly one of the most important movies ever made," says Harris. "It's on the Library of Congress list of most important films; and on many critics' Top 20. It's unacceptable to think that such an incredible and enduring work of both art and entertainment might be lost forever to generations of movie-goers." Yet that is exactly what almost happened.

Although there is a feeling that once something is filmed it remains forever, it is sadly not the case. Images are fragile, their colors and tones easily fade away, and acetate safety film grows brittle and old. In fact almost 50% of all films ever made have been lost to the ravages of time.

"It is an outrageous thing that an industry that is only 100 years old should have already lost so much," says Jim Katz. "Fortunately, things are better today. But the condition of film elements just 20 years old can be abysmal."

For decades, Hitchcock's work was privately stored outside of the studios. Unfortunately, hundreds upon hundreds of boxes filled with original Hitchcock film material were junked just to save storage expenses. Even worse, the material was stored in a vault that was not state-of -the-art and unable to protect the negatives and black and white separations from the ravages of climate and time. The loss was imminent.

To recover lost film, it takes individuals akin to both archaeologists and detectives, film preservation and restoration experts such as Harris and Katz, two producers who have taken special interest in preserving state-of-the-art films from Hollywood's lavish era of large-format features. "It's a lot harder to fix a film than it is to make one," admits Katz, who has produced such contemporary features as the 1989 satire "Scenes From the Class Struggle in Beverly Hills" and the 1986 comedy "Nobody's Fool". "You have to go into it not believing anything, because whatever you find is going to just be the beginning of your problems." "What we do is part digging through history, part film production and part science mixed in with a whole lot of bulldoggedness," adds Bob Harris, who is one of a handful of people in the world with the skills to extract the buried treasure that can lie beneath decades of dirt smudges, tears and neglect. Together, the pair are the world's foremost experts on fully restoring large format films.
 

"What Bob and Jim are doing isn't a normal restoration, which these days amounts to just cleaning up the negative. They actually enhance the picture further. They don't try to make what Hitchcock did better, but they try to give the audience today a sense of seeing the film for the first time the way it was originally presented. And this is really important."

When Harris and Katz cracked the remaining film cans containing "Vertigo", they had a good idea what they would find. "We knew exactly what to expect, given the way the negative was stored and the peculiarities of the 1950's film emulsions. We found fading and shrinkage, as well as torn negative replaced with dupe, basically a film that looked and sounded nothing like what Hitchcock had created," says Katz. He adds: "We're not magicians of course and we can never restore the negative to mint condition. But we can say that "Vertigo" will now be seen as Hitchcock could only have dreamed it would look and sound." To undertake this task, Harris and Katz were provided with over $1 million from Universal, Hitchcock's final studio home since the early 60's, which now owns the rights to 14 of the filmmaker's features, including "Vertigo". Although the film was originally released in 1958 by Paramount, the rights eventually reverted back to the director, moving with him to Universal, along with other Hitchcock features from the late '40's to early '60's, including "Rear Window", the 1956 remake of "The Man Who Knew Too Much" and "Psycho".

Back in the early '40's, Hitchcock had made "Shadow of A Doubt" and "Saboteur" for Universal, which released all his films from 1963's "The Birds" through 1976's "Family Plot", his final film. The studio currently has one of the largest film libraries in the world, with materials dating back to 1915, and annually spends more than two million dollars on preserving these precious films for the future. "Universal has been really great. They truly believe in the project and they trusted us to do whatever was necessary. It means a great deal that studio executives are standing behind this vital preservation of our cultural heritage," says Harris. Adds Katz: "It's imperative that we do everything to the best of current human and technical abilities -- because a film only gets restored once. The support was critical."

Dan Slusser, General Manager of Universal Studios, oversees much of the studio's restoration work. "There's a substantial commitment to preserving film here at Universal," says Slusser, who knew Hitchcock personally late in the director's life. "We've been at it a long time. In the case of "Vertigo", when Universal came into it, the negative had been sitting on a shelf in a public storage warehouse for 18 years. When you put a film in an area where it isn't properly preserved under an ideal humidity and temperature, it deteriorates very rapidly. That's exactly what happened with "Vertigo". It had to be restored frame by frame, reel by reel. It's a very laborious, expensive process, but we felt that if we did not put in the effort, it would have been lost forever. That would be an unacceptable loss not only to Universal but to the world."

Casey Silver, Chairman of Universal Pictures, concurs: "At Universal, we are steadfastly committed to restoring and preserving great films, not only for today's audiences but for the new audiences of tomorrow. With the global demand for motion picture product ever increasing, film preservation is not only a moral imperative for us but a business imperative."
 

About the Restoration Team
Robert A. Harris and James C. Katz

Filming of "Vertigo"

The Legacy of "Vertigo"