The length of film that filmmakers would get in the Soviet Union was in direct proportion to the length of their movie. For instance, everybody making a 10 minute work would receive enough film for about 20 minutes, regardless of an idea. The limited amount of film really hindered observation and objective capturing of reality. It was especially tough on Robertas Verba, who just loved improvising. Luckily, Dreams of Centenarians was a rare exception. It was given a much greater length of film (approximately 3 hours). That allowed its director to film the Lithuanian provincial life as long as he pleased and assemble a collection of shots, only a small part of which was used for the movie. This is confirmed by the archival footage that was left out – a shot of Roma people selling goods at the Luokė market.

The existence of this archival footage had long been forgotten until it was rediscovered a few years ago. The cut-outs of the film had been saved in the Lithuanian Central State Archives as a unique, over two-hour long ethnographic audiovisual document, thanks to the Head of the Archives at the time, Algirdas Žėbas. Usually, though, the footage discarded from the final cut would’ve been destroyed in the Soviet times.