ABSTRACT
In 1995, during the Filmmuseum workshop, ‘Disorderly Order’, mentioned above, Meyer (cited in Hertogs and Klerk de, 1996: 18) asked the participating film historians the following question: ‘[S]hould we preserve these films just as we find them, or should we try to get as close to the original as possible?’ Film museums and restorers are confronted with this choice with each restoration: either to restore the imaginary ‘original version’ of the film or to make the best possible duplicate based on what the starting material looks like at the time of restoration. What is fascinating is the way these two options were approached, and how this was related to the continually shifting discourse on film as an historical object.
