JM Barrie silent film lost for decades to be shown.

The very first film adaptation of Peter Pan will be screened at the Caird Hall in Dundee

It was the first film adaptation of Kirriemuir playwright JM Barrie’s tale of the boy who never grew up.

The silent adventure was eventually released in 1924 after Hollywood studios chased Barrie for nearly two decades to sign over the film rights.

But just five years after its release the movie vanished from the public eye at a time when studios were destroying silent films by the thousands to make way for sound.

The classic black and white silent film, which has since been fully restored, will now be shown at a special screening in Tayside, with one of Europe’s finest organists providing the improvised accompaniment.

Donald Mackenzie, who has presided at the Odeon Leicester Square organ for almost 25 years, said he was delighted to be performing on the Harrison and Harrison organ in Dundee’s Caird Hall at the event on November 24.

Barrie wrote numerous books and plays but is best remembered for Peter Pan, which premiered on the London stage in 1904 and was an instant success.

Movie studios in Hollywood recognised the potential of Peter Pan and pursued Barrie for almost 20 years before he finally sold the film rights to Jesse Lasky at Paramount.

It was directed by Herbert Brenon and starred Betty Bronson as Peter Pan, Ernest Torrence as Captain Hook, Mary Brian as Wendy, and Virginia Browne Faire as Tinker Bell.

The principal character was generally a young boy played by a girl. The reason was purely practical – girls were lighter in the harnesses required to lift them into the air for flying sequences.

Barrie wrote extra scenes for the film, including a fairy wedding and treetop game of football, but Brenon stuck largely to the stageplay.

Since there was no national film archive in the US and Paramount had no interest in a long-term distribution of the film, most copies of Peter Pan were destroyed over the years.

Despite its popularity, Peter Pan vanished in 1929 and, for decades, the film was thought to be lost.

In 1971, a 35mm nitrate colour print of Peter Pan was discovered at the Eastman Theatre in New York.

Then, in 1995, a full restoration was made possible with funding from the Walt Disney Corporation. However, complicated rights issues made public screenings impossible for several years.

Now, at last, all legal problems have been resolved.