Kamal Amrohi’s 1972 cinematic masterpiece ‘Pakeezah’ , starring Meena Kumari, is set to return to the big screen in a painstaking new 4K restoration by the Film Heritage Foundation (FHF).The restored film will have its world premiere at France’s Festival Lumière in Lyon, the historic birthplace of cinema, before travelling to London for a gala screening at the BFI IMAX as part of the BFI London Film Festival. The London screening will be presented by FHF director Shivendra Singh Dungarpur alongside Kamal Amrohi’s children, Tajdar and Rukhsaar Amrohi, and grandson Bilal Amrohi.The restoration, undertaken by the not-for-profit Film Heritage Foundation in association with the Amrohi family, comes in a significant year for the foundation. Over the past 12 months, FHF has placed restored classics at major international festivals, including Berlin, Cannes and Venice.Hailed by the late film critic Derek Malcolm as one of the most extraordinary musical melodramas ever made, ‘Pakeezah’ has a production history almost as dramatic as the story on screen.“Restoring ‘Pakeezah’ has been a long-held dream,” said Dungarpur. He recalled watching the film as a child with his grandmother in a cinema in Dumraon, Bihar, and described the restoration as one of the most exciting and challenging projects he had undertaken.The restoration took two years. When FHF inspected the original camera negative at Ramnord Lab in 2024, archivists found that it had almost melted and was completely unusable. The team therefore had to work with an interpositive, a CinemaScope print and a colour reversal internegative preserved by the NFDC-National Film Archive of India.With no surviving members of the original cast and crew, restoring the film’s distinctive colours presented another major challenge. The restoration team studied original production stills and consulted Tajdar and Rukhsaar Amrohi, who had memories of the film’s production and its sets. During the restoration of the iconic song sequence “Inhi logon ne”, reference images were repeatedly reviewed to ensure that Meena Kumari’s costume retained the intended shade.The surviving film elements were in varying stages of deterioration, with scratches, mould, colour fading, haloing, emulsion damage and advanced vinegar syndrome. The two-year process involved painstakingly balancing the different sources, removing damage and colour fluctuations and establishing visual consistency throughout the film. The audio was also restored into a 5.1 surround-sound mix using the surviving sound negative and a theatrical release print.The film was 15 years in the making.‘Pakeezah’ was initially conceived in the mid-1950s as a tribute to the beauty of Amrohi’s wife and muse, Meena Kumari. The film spent nearly 15 years in production, beginning in black-and-white in 1956 before shifting to Eastmancolor in 1958, with German cinematographer Josef Wirsching behind the camera.Production was repeatedly delayed by casting changes, script revisions and Amrohi’s perfectionism. A studio fire destroyed part of the original black-and-white negatives. By 1964, production had stalled completely following the separation of Amrohi and Meena Kumari.Meena Kumari subsequently suffered severe health problems, including alcoholism and liver cirrhosis, and ‘Pakeezah’ was abandoned. The project was revived in 1969 after actors Jattvibeil Dutt and Nargis saw the existing footage and persuaded a weakened Kumari to complete what became her life’s work.The production suffered further losses. Wirsching died in 1967, after which a collective of leading Indian cinematographers took over and worked to maintain his visual aesthetic. Composer Ghulam Mohammed died in 1968 after writing the film’s iconic songs, with Naushad subsequently brought in to complete the background score.‘Pakeezah’ finally reached theatres on February 4, 1972. Meena Kumari died just weeks later, on March 31. The film went on to become a major box-office success and is today regarded as a landmark of Indian cinema.For Tajdar Amrohi, who was present at the film’s grand premiere in 1972, the restored screening in London will be an emotional return. “I never imagined that I would be presenting the restored film with my family at the gala premiere in London fifty-four years later,” he said, thanking FHF for bringing his father’s work back to life for new generations.Rukhsaar Amrohi described ‘Pakeezah’ as her father’s “obsession”, “dream” and “oxygen”. She said Amrohi had nurtured the film for more than 15 years and that she had witnessed the sacrifices and perfectionism that went into making it. “I only wish my father were alive to see his creation restored and reborn for the world to see fifty-four years after it was released,” she said.The restored version of ‘Pakeezah’ runs 153 minutes and is presented in 4K, with English subtitles, a 2.35:1 aspect ratio and 5.1 sound. The restoration was carried out by Film Heritage Foundation at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory in association with Bilal Amrohi of Lionheart Cinema.