_{A selection of photoographs and materials from archive research trips.}

The project's research is being undertaken in two main centres and a range of additional public and private holdings. The first centre is the Cineteca di
Bologna, which holds archives, a library, a publishing arm and exhibition spaces, in addition to running the annual Il Cinema Ritrovato film festival. The Cineteca holds the papers of one of the most important postwar producers, Franco Cristaldi, and his Vides company, which represents a crucial hitherto untapped resource. Several hundred folders containing dossiers on films
and film projects with contracts, estimated and actual costs, business accounts, daily set reports, box office, and foreign sales are at present stored uncatalogued in a warehouse.

The second centre is the Cineteca Lucana in Basilicata. This archive possesses the complete uncatalogued papers of the producers’ association ANICA and of the government General Cinema Archive (AGC), as well as the papers of Silvio Clementelli (Clesi film). The ANICA papers consist of hundreds of dossiers covering all aspects of the activity of the association during the period, including relations with government, unions and film sector associations in addition to documentation relating to co-productions, festivals, prizes and censorship. The AGC archive, which is of similar size, is composed of government papers relating to the activities of production companies.

Additionally, the Italian National Cinema School (Centro sperimentale di cinematografia) in Rome holds important smaller collections that contain selective insights into production procedures and practices. These include the papers of the producer Alfredo Bini, Lorenzo Quaglietti (scholar of the film industry), Rizzoli film, and Vides-Cristaldi (mostly press materials). The Rome Chamber of Commerce archive holds annual accounts of film companies, details of bankruptcies and other legal acts, permitting the reconstruction of the rise and fall of many film companies. Further targeted research will be undertaken into some twenty additional Italian archives which are known to contain significant material on production practices.