Are older LGBT films endangered?

One of my favorite movies from the 80's, Parting Glances will be screened at Los Angeles film festival Outfest with a restored cut. The 1986 film starred Richard Ganoung, Steve Buscemi. John Bloger and Kathy Kinney focusing on a love triangle between Ganoung, Bolger and Buscemi's characters, with Buscemi playing a man dying from AIDS. Parting Glances has a rather tame love scene early in the film, one that's always felt much steamier than it really was because of the tenderness displayed by Bolger and Ganoung.

What stands out for me, though, is the following comment:

"The preservation of Parting Glances is an important first step in ensuring the survival of important and endangered LGBT works," said Stephen Gutwillig, Outfest Executive Director. "Unfortunately many other films are in imminent danger of fading away-their original exhibition prints in tatters, their negatives in woeful storage conditions, or even lost," he continued. "The Outfest Legacy Project is working to raise funds to rescue these films, strike new prints for widespread public exhibition, and expand access to researchers and the public.

I remember volunteering once for a small gay and lesbian film festival and we had to make last minute changes to our schedule because of issues with the prints for current films (one arrived needing repairs while another was held from us because the previous festival to show it discovered a need for repairs). Since most of these films weren't wide releases and didn't get a major release budget, the producers juggled a small number of prints. I hadn't thought about it, but the state for older films must be even more precarious, coming from a time when gay cinema was even smaller than it is today. It's a disquieting wrinkle to consider.