MUMBAI: The White Shadow, an Alfred Hitchcock film, that was found in a garden shed in New Zealand was has been released after nearly 80 years of its making. The film was being shown at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences‘ Samuel Goldwyn Theatre.

David Sterritt, chairman of the National Society of Film Critics, described the discovery as "one of the most significant developments in memory".

"These first three reels offer a priceless opportunity to study his visual and narrative ideas when they were first taking shape," he was quoted as saying.

The director was just 24 when he wrote, edited, designed and assistant-directed the silent film, it is understood.

The only known print of Hitchcock‘s silent film lay in a garden shed in the North Island town of Hastings for decades. The film was part of a collection by Jack Murtagh, a cinema projectionist.