Since its founding, San Francisco Silent Film Festival has been proud to have had a role in the preservation of cinematic heritage through presentation—festivals like ours participate in the preservation cycle by bringing appreciative audiences to bear witness to the extraordinary breadth and depth of silent-era filmmaking. But since 2013, SFSFF has had a direct hand in the restoration and preservation of silent-era titles. In partnership with organizations such as BFI, MoMA, Cinémathèque Française, EYE Filmmuseum, Library of Congress, the Film Preservation Society, Gosfilmofond, and the Polish National Film Archive, SFSFF has restored and preserved many titles including Behind the Door, Les Deux Timides, Fragment of an Empire, The Good Bad Man, The Italian Straw Hat, The Last Edition, Mothers of Men, Sherlock Holmes, Silence, Soft Shoes, The Three Musketeers, aa well as fragments like Now We’re in the Air that preserves Louise Brooks’s film debut, and the San Francisco, 1906 footage shot days after the Great Earthquake! The pSFSFF Collection titles are stored in 35mm prints at the Library of Congress and available for booking (in 35mm and DCP) through San Francisco Film Preserve.
In 2025 we commenced a partnership with Robert Harris of the Film Preserve and James Mockoski of Maltese Film Works (working together as Artcraft Pictures) to restore films from the voluminous Paramount library. To date we’ve preserved The Affairs of Anatol, Beau Geste, The Caveman, It, Miss Lulu Bett, and The New Klonkike, with several more in the works.
We are gratified to have brought these titles back to life and are committed to showcasing important restorations and preservations for years to come.
