Henri Langlois
| Henri Langlois | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born |
13 November 1914 İzmir, Ottoman Empire |
| Died | 13 January 1977 (aged 62) Paris, France |
| Occupation | Co-founder and director of the Cinémathèque Française |
| Known for | Film preservation, film archiving, film history. cinephilia |
| Partner(s) | Mary Meerson |
Henri Langlois (French: [lɑ̃glwa]; 13 November 1914 – 13 January 1977) was a French film archivist and cinephile. A pioneer of film preservation, Langlois was an influential figure in the history of cinema. His film screenings in Paris in the 1950s are often credited with providing the ideas that led to the development of the auteur theory.
Langlois was co-founder of the Cinémathèque Française with Georges Franju and Jean Mitry and also co-founder of the International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF) in 1938. Through close collaboration with the Cinémathèque's longtime Chief Archivist, Lotte Eisner, he worked to preserve films and film history in the post-war era. An eccentric who was often at the center of controversy for his methods, he also served as a key influence on the generation of young cinephiles and critics who would become the French New Wave.
In 1974, Langlois received an honorary Academy Award for "his devotion to the art of film, his massive contributions in preserving its past and his unswerving faith in its future".
In 1936 Henri Langlois, Georges Franju and Jean Mitry founded the Cinémathèque Française in Paris, their film theater and museum. It grew from ten films in 1936 to more than 60,000 films by the early 1970s. More than an archivist, Langlois saved many films which were at risk of vanishing. Besides films, Langlois also helped to preserve other items related to cinema such as cameras, projection machines, costumes, and vintage theater programmes. He eventually collected so many items that he donated them in 1972 to the Musée du Cinéma in the Palais de Chaillot, where they covered a two-mile span of film artifacts and memorabilia. The collection was relocated due to damage from a fire in 1997.
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