A three-day international Conference "National Cinemas - A Universal Heritage Issues of Reappraisal, Preservation and Popularization"

Speakers from Armenia, the USA, France, Austria, Great Britain, Poland, Bulgaria, Russia and Ukraine participated the Conference. Henri Verneuil's son Patrick Malakian, the honored and distinguished guest of the Conference, shared with the public vivid memories of his father's life and activities.

The three-day Conference covered topics of cinema of the Armenian Diaspora and history of the socialist film legacy. Among the significant achievements of the Conference were the discovery of the previously unknown data on the cinema of the Armenian diaspora from the early 1920s to the present day and a new research on Hamo Beknazaryan's uncompleted film "The Second Caravan". Also, the Conference helped bring into light the neglected multicultural aspects of the Soviet Armenian cinema and acknowledge the exceptional value of such phenomena like "a red thread of Armenianness" running through the films by an Italian film director Ervand Janikyan, the outtakes from "The Color of Pomegranate" by S. Parajanov and theoretical approaches to the history of Armenian cinema.

Henri Verneuil's films posters' exhibition kicked off on the first day of the Conference (29 October). The exhibition was followed by the screening of Verneuil's "Weekend at Dunkirk" (1964) at the Moscow Cinema.

On the last day of the Conference the guests visited the "Armenia Wine" Company, where the closing ceremony took place. Thanks to the joint efforts of the National Cinema Center of Armenia and Hamo Baknazarov Project curated by producer Daniel Bird, S. Parajanov's three short films Hakob Hovnatanyan (1967), Kyiv Frescoes (1966) and Arabesques on the Theme of Pirosmani (1986), restored from the original camera negatives in 4K, were handed over to the National Cinema Center of Armenia to be included in the permanent archive collection. At the same time, a memorandum was signed between Patrick Malakyan and the "Armenia Wine" Company, which granted the Company an authorization to produce wine and brandy under the name of Henri Verneuil.

The reports of the Conference speakers will be compiled in a scientific collection, further to be published by the National Cinema Center of Armenia. This publication is certain to help promote the research on the Armenian-Soviet cinema among wider international scientific circles. This unprecedented Conference has become an important platform for exchanging experience and establishing new contacts between Armenian and foreign participants. The National Cinema Center of Armenia strives to make it an annual international event to promote the development of film studies in Armenia.