The first public screening of the newly restored 1921 film Scenes of Māori Life on the Whanganui River is on Tuesday at the Whanganui Regional Museum.
The film has been restored and scanned by conservators at Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision - the national audiovisual archive.
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision kaiwhakataki/programme coordinator Lawrence Wharerau said it was improtant that "we first return this film to the iwi of Whanganui, whose ancestors' lives and images are recorded".
He said the images had regained clarity and freshness with the restoration work.
"It's a spectacular piece of footage that brings the past to life."
The original film was shot in 1921, when Elsdon Best, Johannes Anderson and James McDonald of the Dominion Museum spent several weeks at Koriniti, Hiruharama and Pipiriki in the Whanganui River valley.