ABS-CBN Film Restoration Project ends after 14 years of service

ABS-CBN Film Restoration Project ends after 14 years of service. Image: Facebook/ABS-CBN Film Restoration

After 14 years of preserving and restoring Philippine cinema classics, the ABS-CBN Film Restoration Project is bidding farewell to its initiatives, citing the 2020 network shutdown as one of the factors.

Project head Leo Katigbak took to Facebook on Thursday, May 1 to announce the news, saying that they ended their run last March 31 with April being primarily dedicated to staff transitions and reviewing the final projects before the official end date.

“Sadly it is still a casualty of the efforts to close down the company in 2020 by a man who wrought havoc and killed dreams as well. For the last few months, we barreled through as much as we could with what meager resources were available to us and until our very last day, we gave it our all,” he wrote.

Katigbak noted that the project, also known as Sagip Pelikula, was able to restore more than 240 movies from as early as 1939 to reintroduce them to new audiences.

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The project chair also added that the advocacy will be partly sustained by other ABS-CBN departments starting May. 

Katigbak then went on to thank every single person who contributed to the benefit of the digital film restoration project.

“The team would like to thank then Chairman Gabby Lopez and President Charo Santos who had the vision to future proof the filmed assets of the company and allowed the initiative that became SAGIP PELIKULA to flourish and save many movies beyond its initial scope; Carlo Katigbak who afforded us another 5 years, delaying the department’s closure in 2020 with a scaled-down group,” he wrote as he mentioned more names.

Katigbak underscored how poetic that the initiative began with the remastered release of “Himala” and ended with the premiere of “Tatlong Ina, Isang Anak,” which both starred the late National Artist for Film and Broadcast Arts Nora Aunor.

“Preserving the past to inspire the future is a never-ending quest and we hope we were able to encourage many, including a new generation to take up the challenge. Sa mga tumangkilik, naniwala, nanaginip…maraming salamat po. Ako si Leo Katigbak… nakiki-Sagip Pelikula,” he concluded the post.