Vidhu Vinod Chopra sends old prints of seven films to be restored for better visual quality and digital sound

Considering that the quality of the older prints degenerate after a period of a time, Vinod Chopra is getting all his earlier films restored. So come next week and the producer-director will get new digital prints of seven of his movies.

It is learnt that in the first half of last year, Chopra decided to restore his films like Sazaye Maut, Khamosh, Parinda, 1942: A Love Story, Kareeb, Mission Kashmir and Parineeta. "Because Vinod felt that the films were looking visually old and the audio too didn't sound half as great as his recent movies.

The restoration would enhance the longevity of the films, " says a source associated with the filmmaker. Adding that all of Chopra's earlier films had only monolith (one-track) sound, our source explains, "Previously, sound used to be only in a single track. It's only after Dolby that we have multiple tracks for sound."

It is learnt that it cost Chopra about R 25-30 lakh to get each film restored. "We had started the restoration process some time in the middle of last year, " said our informer, adding that of late the producer-director is keen to ensure that the new restored prints are delivered to him latest by March 27.

"Reason being that a multiplex chain wants to host a retrospective of 11 of Vinod's films, including the Munnabhai series and 3 Idiots, " said our source. When contacted, Chopra said, "One of the really bad things about India is preservation. Our heritage, our movies, nothing is preserved.

So we're making the effort now and are spending a few crore to restore our films like Khamosh, Parinda to name some." Recalling the instance when he saw the restored version of Parinda, the filmmaker stated that for someone who wrote and directed it, it seemed as if he was viewing a new film.

"The new 5.1 sound takes the film to a completely different level, " he enthused, eager to share his experience with the restored version. "Take the scene where Jackie Shroff shoots at a chain. Previously everything was in the mono track. But now when the chain moves towards left and right, the sounds from the speakers is something else altogether, " he summed up.