Scientific activity
A film archive is a place whose purpose can be put in two words: for eternity… In 1936, when the country recognised the need to collect and preserve film records, construction of the All-Union Film Depository began. At first it was simply a matter of gathering film copies scattered across studios, distribution offices and elsewhere. At the same time every film released in the country began to be deposited here. After the Second World War a considerable collection of captured film material was brought here as well. To make sense of these materials, specialists with a knowledge of languages and of film history were needed; the first generation of research staff was formed from them.
The archive was created for extensive cultural, educational, research and teaching work, in particular for the comprehensive study of the art of cinema, its history and theory.
Carrying out this work was inconceivable without a dedicated research institution established on the basis of the All-Union Film Depository. The structure of the State Film Fund was then set out:
- Department of scientific processing of the domestic film collection;
- Department of scientific processing of the foreign film collection;
- Research and technical department with an experimental laboratory and a restoration workshop;
- Film depository.
It was a strategic programme for a film archive of a new type. Since 4 October 1948 Gosfilmofond of the USSR has been carrying out this programme, whose essence is fixed in the organisation's charter: to collect, preserve and process film materials and make them available to historians, specialists and film lovers. The bio-filmographic catalogues published by Gosfilmofond have become the most accurate sources of information on Russian cinema. Many of them are unique and are bibliographic rarities.
The events Gosfilmofond holds in Russia and abroad support the country's standing, connect the present with the past and help the future.
The main venue for popularising the treasures of Gosfilmofond is Russia's only Moscow International Archive Film Festival.