10-12-2008

Restored Hyppolit, the Butler

By Gyorgy Karpati

    The 1931 film Hyppolit the Butler, the first Hungarian "talkie," has been digitally restored.

    The restoration of the movie cost 58,000 euros, the Hungarian National Film Archive announced on December 8.

    Only the 1949 Goose Boy the first Hungarian color movie, had been previously restored Vera Gyurei director of the National Film Archive told FNE.

    The negative of Hyppolit was such a bad condition that it could have been saved only by digital restoration. Most of the missing frames were replaced by digital technology.

    Hyppolit, the Butler was the first Hungarian film hit of the thirties and was voted as one of the 12 Best Hungarian Films ("New Budapest 12") by Hungarian filmmakers and critics in 2000.

    Restoration of Hungarian born Academy Award winner Michael Curtiz's The Exile (1914) is being prepared along with Meseauto, a comedy hit of the thirties which was re-made in the UK as The Car of Dreams.