The Secret

The restoration of the film was made in 2015 from the internegative donated by Hong Kong Film Services to the Hong Kong Film Archive. After 2K film screening, digital restoration was undertaken by Magyar Nemzeti, the Hungarian film laboratory commissioned by the Archive. As the internegative's soundtrack negative, opening and end credits were missing, respective elements had to be retrieved from VHS and Betacam SP tapes and put back to the film after frame rate adjustment. Digital restorations were then conducted with the aim of restoring the film back to its original quality at the time of its initial release by rectifying problems arising from film deterioration, including stabilisation of jittering images, deflickering, spots and fine scratches removal, colour grading, audio noise removal and synchronization of image and sound, while any inherited defects of the film are kept untouched. The restored version is about 5 minutes longer than the 85-minute edition that has been circulating for years, bringing back to audience not just missing footage but more importantly a more original taste of the film. NOTE: As with Hong Kong film productions at the time, audio synchronization can often appear loose against the picture, due to the audio being recorded in post-production (the Cantonese and Mandarin soundtracks were recorded separately from shooting).