Historical Pacific films are being archived next year at the Smithsonian Institution Washington D.C. in hope they will be digitised.
Anthropologist Joshua Bell and the global indigenous peoples group are part of an ongoing project focussing on indigenous people, called 'Recovering Voices'.
Mr Bell said he wants to make the footage accessible for Pacific communities.
He said the team will be going through the content of all the films that have been donated to them from across the region, as there is currently no background information on the footage.
"What we'd like to do is to help do research cataloguing of the film, so the ones watching the films, kind of helping update basic catalogue information about what's in the footage," he said.
"They're doing description of that, you know, where films are from? What regions and who shot them?"
Photo: Images from: Niue 1774–1974: 200 years of contact and change. Published by Otago University Press. ‘The two kings, “Dick” and Togia’ under the grand old flag. NZ Premier Richard Seddon toured the Pacific in May 1900. He's pictured with King Togia-Pule-toaki.