Jun 4, 2024

Annecy 2024 10 Shorts You Don't Want to Miss

It is time again this year for the Annecy International Animation Film Festival to bring the world of animation down to the picturesque French Alps.

The soul or heart of the festival is a competition for short animated films. This year, 67 films are competing in various short film competition categories.

In the main short film competition, there was a record low of 31 competition films, which reflects a disturbing trend towards long short films. I resist the debate here about why this trend (probably influenced by the live-action trend) is problematic and unnecessarily eats up the screening space. In fact, most movies are fairly short and can be just as effective. The festival simply cannot add more screening spots (it will cost$ $ $), so there will be fewer opportunities to be selected.

On the good side, some of the long movies are very strong ones, and that's what created this programming log jam. It's a good issue I think, but still an issue that must be addressed by the festival if the trend continues. (Perhaps the festival should lower the maximum running time from 30 minutes to 20 minutes-)

This year's competition will feature solid works such as the Ottawa International Animation Festival Grand Prize winner, The Harrowing Miracle (Ryo Orikasa), The Return to the Hairy Hill (Daniel Guise) and Johnson's Wild Drizzle (Ivan Lee). It is filled. To make things a little easier for participants, we include 10 diverse new, if available trailers from short competition that you have to keep an eye on amid the haze and fad of the festival.

Beautiful Man, Nicolas Kepens (Belgium, France, Netherlands, 2023, 18:43)

" From the director of The Quirky Easter Egg (2021) comes a fresh new film about 3 bald brothers (Stephen, Burt and Cohen) heading to Istanbul for flocking. Each anxiety rises to the surface while they wait together in the hotel for an appointment. The touching and absurd stop-motion work sprinkled moments of expressionless humor that explored family, mortality and masculinity at stake.

Maybe an Elephant (Kanskje det var elefanter), Torill Kove (Norway, Canada)

Oscar winner Torill Kove (Danish poet, my grandmother ironed the King's short, me and my Moulton), director's quirky family Kove and her sisters are their teens. They are coming of age and need guidance. But the mother is restless and seeks change. When a father accepts a job in Nairobi, the family embarks on an experience that will change them forever. A gentle, playful, beautifully designed take on the family at the crossroads.

La Voix des Sirènes,Gianluigi Toccafondo (France/Italy)

Deep under the sea, the siren gives birth to two children. When an underwater creature attacks the family, one of the children is forced to flee to the surface, where she discovers unexpected joy. The Italian Master (La Coda, Criminal, Pinocchio) uses his distinctive paint and collage style in beautiful and fascinating stories of mermaids, sirens, seahorses, frogs that turn into crocodiles, and various creepy underwater creatures.

Highlighted by various shades of blue, green, yellow and pink, Toccafondo's familiar "stretch" paintings create an unforgettable, sensual and gorgeous atmosphere (each frame is represented by a second pin screen by Michèle Lemieux

Le Tableau, Michèle Lemieux (Canada)

). The Austrian film (formerly Here and The Great Elsewhere, 2012) uses the famous Alexeïeff-Parker pinscreen to create a fascinating study of Queen Mariana of Austria through a 1652 portrait by Velázquez.

Skillfully playing with shadow and light, Lemieux captures the deep pain and tragedy of Mariana, who at the age of 14 married her uncle, a 30-year-old senior. Then she saw 5 out of 3 children die, and later allegedly had a child with serious mental challenges. All this is happening against the backdrop of political and economic turmoil in Spain. The use of Pinscreen technology imbues the story with a unique ambience that is eerie, soft and soothing at the same time.

Papillon, Florence Miailhe (France)

Elderly people swim in the sea. With each stroke, his memory drifts to the surface, returning to his childhood swimming, swimming, first love, parent-child relationships, Olympic races, and concentration camps.

Inspired by the life of Alfred Nakasch, a North African swimmer who competed in France at the 1936 Olympics, Florence Miare (who received an Honorary Crystal at Annecy 2015 for her work) has a vivid and metamorphic style of painting under the camera (perfect for the transformative nature of water). It is a beautiful, effective, and efficient way to capture a complex life submerged in joy, fear, love, and tragedy.

Percebes, Alexandra Ramires, and Laura Gonçalves (Portugal, France)

In a year when Portugal is in the limelight for its animated achievements in Annecy, the country has become the most popular destination for acclaimed duo Alexandra Ramires (em>Elo) and Laura Gonçalves (whose last film, The Garbage Man, will be released in 2022 Animafest Zagreb). It is worthy of being well represented in the competition by a number of awards (including the Grand Prize at the Awards Ceremony).

Perceves (also known as Gooseneck barnacles) is an expensive and highly visually appetizing (some call it "Lucifer's finger") seafood delicacy popular in Galicia, Spain, and the Algarve, Portugal. Against the backdrop of the Algarve, this strange (and apparently delicious) journey from the birth of shellfish to the meal is explained through interviews with fishermen, locals and tourists, with beautiful watercolor designs and a chill soundtrack dominated by the sounds of the sea surroundings and the passing voices of locals and tourists, Perceives the ambivalent nature of local culture, tourism,

The car returned from the sea, Jadwiga Kowalska (Switzerland)

Poland. 1981. Young Leszek spends his days with his friends. The shelves in the store are empty and there is no money anyway. There is no prospect for much of anything in this life. They spend their days drinking, smoking, laughing and talking about their common passion: cars. Contrary to the odds, Leszek can buy himself a rundown car. Excited to have such an unusual "house on wheels", the group decided to go by car to the Baltic Sea.

This artfully edited piece of playful black and white minimalism is a warm appreciation of savoring those fleeting, seemingly minor moments of friendship, adventure, and joy in the face of stifling political and economic realities.

Hurikán, Jan Saska (Czech Republic, France, Bosnia and Herzegovina)

(literally) There is a problem with the hog・headed Hurikán. He loves to drink, but his favorite beer stand is running out of beer. When Hurikán offers to get a new barrel of beer for the bartender (he is also hot), he ends up in a wild odyssey through the district of Prague, beaten, robbed, chased and very thirsty, Hurikán reaches his limit.

Finally, a modest and honest comic film (Sasca's hilarious debut, a long-awaited follow-up to a happy ending) is not a deep lingering existential or political musings, a simple, personal quest to quench one's thirst.

Tennis, Oranges, Sean Pecknold (USA)

In this heartbreaking and surreal stop-motion work, a burned-out robot vacuum cleaner sweeps the floor of a hospital to find a higher purpose in life. In the meantime, the two rabbits live a solitary daily life without feces in a nearby community center until a chance encounter with a vacuum stimulates new dreams and desires.

Director: Sean Pecknold Sean Pecknold, who has previously directed numerous commercial projects and music videos such as Featherweight (2021), Tennis and Orange, tends to balance the melancholy, charm and substance based on the chaplinesque. Just fine, even the most cynical Annecy viewers are trying to bubble a little under the eyes.

Circle, Joung Yumi (Korea)

A young girl appears, draws a circle, and departs. The sequence is expanded. First, a man enters a circle and sits on a briefcase. The woman sits on the ground to eat with the next. Others will join immediately. The circle will soon become crammed with people. Finally, the girl reappears and tries to fix the predicament she has created.

The subtle and expressionless depiction of the tricky dynamics of boundaries, boundaries and habits by the director of Waves and Love Games shifts from the space of hope and possibility to just how quickly