Digital Struggles for Film Restoration: La battaglia dall’Astico al Piave

Our contribution is focused on the ongoing reconstruction and restoration of La battaglia dall'Astico al Piave (1918, 35mm, tinted and toned, mt 1255), by the University of Udine in collaboration with La Cineteca del Friuli, Istituto LUCE and Cineteca Italiana, and supported by MiC. To date, three versions are documented: the 1918 Italian and French versions, both realized by the Italian Royal Army Film Department, and a further version released in 1927 which was probably re-edited by Istituto LUCE. Archival prints collected after a first survey of the film archives have been used to reconstruct the text on proxies, with the help of edge-to-edge and “repro-set” documentation and the other non-film materials. The restoration is being carried out through the digital intermediate route, using witness from Kinoatelje (“K”) as the main reference to reconstruct the order of the scenes and the colour palette for the digital Desmet procedure. The aim of our contribution is twofold: on one hand, we highlight specific restoration and reconstruction issues; on the other hand, we focus on the reloading and reframing of the long-standing and sensitive field of digital research and the educational-oriented critical edition of films, in order to document the restoration and reconstruction process and give a wider account of the material, visual and cultural history of film as a set of apparatus, discourses and practices, proposed here through an innovative digital design and environment and following new interdisciplinary approaches