Translated material
Let's go!
Two of the world's largest animation festivals celebrate their anniversaries
The two oldest and most prestigious European animation festivals - Zagreb and Annecy - traditionally start as a doublet in early June. This year, something extraordinary awaits specialists and lovers of this art: Animafest in Croatia, which will take place from June 1 to June 6, is already the 20th (this show was founded in 1972, but for many years it worked as a biennale). And from June 7 to June 12, a gigantic French festival will be bustling with anniversary celebrations; it celebrates its 50th anniversary. Both shows are aimed at auteur films, so there are overlaps in their competition program, but there are also so many differences that animation professionals are happy when they manage to get into both.The Croatian Animafest, whose reputation in the 70s was formed thanks to the legendary “Zagreb animation school”, whose films are included in all textbooks, has been taking place annually for the last few years. But every odd-numbered year is dedicated to feature-length animation, and every even-numbered year to short films. This year, the festival will show 450 short films from 40 countries, and there are only 138 in the competition (in addition to the main competition, there is a student and children's competition, as well as an advertising competition). Everything else is special screenings, in particular dedicated to the anniversary. The prize for the best animation school this time will go to the Tokyo University of the Arts, where the most famous director of modern Japanese arthouse, Koji Yamamura, teaches. In addition, they will present the “Oriental Cartoons” project, which is very important for supporting non-profit short animation. It brings together six regional festivals from Eastern Europe: in addition to Croatia, there are also Slovenia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. In a crisis situation, this desire of animators to lend each other a shoulder looks very encouraging.
The main country of the current Animafest is Switzerland, several programs and a separate retrospective of films by Georges Schwitzgebel, who has many prizes for his moving impressionist painting, will be dedicated to it. Other famous masters who will present their retrospectives include the elderly Canadian Oscar-winner Frederic Buck - he is well known in Russia, another Canadian - Jacques Drouin, who works in the rare technique of “needle animation”, and Czech puppeteer Karel Zeman. And Briton Louis Cook, who recently became famous for the film “The Pierce Sisters,” will show his favorite cartoons. Large retrospectives of famous studios are also dedicated to the anniversary: the British “Aardman” (Wallis and Gromit is adored here too), the French “Folimage” (they are also known, but rather by film buffs) and “Acme” - a unique combination of almost all the best non-profit animators around the world to create exclusive advertising.
There are only two Russian films in the program of the anniversary Animafest: in the main competition - experimental computer graphics Abstract? Andrei Dmitriev (in our country this director is more likely to be considered a video artist), and in the competition of student works - the very stylish “Ballad of the Barber” by Beardsley, VGIK graduate student Ekaterina Kolosovskaya.
But this year there are more Russian participants than ever before in the Annecy 2010 program - ten. This looks especially impressive now, when studios are closing, and domestic animation has already been buried and laid to rest. Moreover, our films are included in literally all competition sections, except feature films. The main short film competition for Annecy is the touching Moscow fairy tale “About St. Basil’s” from the pilot series “Mountain of Gems” (directed by Natalya Berezovaya). Another film from the same cycle was included in the TV Specials program - “Nikita Kozhemyaka” directed by Yuri Cherenkov, who lives in France . Among the short films there is “Once upon a time there was a fly” by Alena Oyateva based on Mamin-Sibiryak and “About a Bird” by Olga Kudryavtseva. The series competition includes one of the parts of everyone’s favorite three-dimensional “Masha and the Bear” - “Traces of Unseen Animals” by Oleg Uzhinov. In the competition of student and debut works - two from VGIK (“Another” by Anna Shepilova, “Look Up” by Svetlana Podyacheva), one from the SHAR school studio (“Dog Playground” by Leonid Shmelkov) and the debut of Maria Stepanova “Two Princesses”. Well, in the clip competition - Annecy regular Alexey Alekseev, who now with his favorite characters from the series about a forest jam session (Log Jam) made a video clip for the Krok festival. It must be said that this year Alekseev involuntarily became one of the main heroes of the show - the festival is organizing an exhibition of his works as an artist. And the first film in the Log Jam series, wildly titled KJFG #5, was included in many special anniversary retrospectives, including “The History of Animation in 50 Super Short Films.”
The program of the current Annecy really turned out to be impressive. The festival will open with the long-awaited “The Illusionist” - a new film by Sylvain Chomet, director of “Trio from Belleville”. The competition, as always, is full of celebrities, including the irrepressible provocateur Bill Plimpton (“The Cow Who Wanted to Be a Hamburger”) and the aesthetic Michel Ocelo with his new series “Dragons and Princesses.” Past Annecy winners were collected into five anniversary programs by decade (in the 2000s, Alekseev’s “punk” film again).
The main country of the 2010 festival is Argentina, where, as it became obvious from the selection, there is great animation. In addition to the retrospective, mainly dedicated to cartoons of the 2000s, and the conceptual collection “The Revival of Animation in Advertising,” two hilarious parody full-length films will be shown - “Mercano the Martian” and “Fat Boogie.” And also a retrospective of Juan Pablo Zaramella, whose absurdist and very funny Lapsus played tricks with the transformation of black and white figures. Of course, you can’t list all the programs, exhibitions, lectures, master classes at Annecy - the festival is gigantic, it is called the animated Cannes, and it works in conjunction with the main cartoon film market, which takes place at the same time. If Animafest is especially loved for its warm and friendly atmosphere, then Annecy is primarily a working festival, although crowds of cheerful young people flying airplanes at competitive shows, of course, create a holiday spirit here too. However, I can’t help but mention one more detail about this year’s “Annecy” program: our participant has finally appeared in the traditional “Politically Incorrect” selection here - a parody video about Putin “Vova Rules,” which was for the “Dress Code” group directed by Ukrainian director Adrian Sakhaltuev.