THE 9TH INTERNATIONAL ANIMATED FILM FESTIVAL ANIMATOR HAS ENDED
The 9th edition of the International Animated Film Festival Animator ended on July 14. During the festival's closing ceremony, Polish films were awarded.
The International Animated Film Festival Animator is the largest cultural event dedicated to animated film in Poland. During each edition of the festival, over 300 films from around the world are shown, including the competition, retrospectives, thematic reviews and premières. This year's edition of the Animator festival was held from 8 to 14 July in Poznan. Films selected from almost thousand animations from 58 countries competed for the Golden Pegasus. The selection panel chose 49 short films and 5 feature-length films from around the world.
During the festival's closing gala, we learned the names of this year's award-winners in the animated film competition. The films were evaluated by the jury consisting of Špela Čadež (Slovenia), Michaela Pavlátová (the Czech Republic), Mateusz Solarz (Poland) and Stanislav Sokolov (Russia), Margaret Parsons (the USA) and Paweł Sitkiewicz (Poland).
The festival's Grand Prix, the Golden Pegasus, went to Igor Kovalyov for his film "Before Love."
Marta Pajek received two awards for her latest film "Impossible Figures and Other Stories II," made in Animoon Studio. Pajek was given the special award: the Polish Filmmakers Association Award for the best student film and the award sponsored by the distribution company Spectator.
The Wojciech Juszczak special award for outstanding artistic merits and the artistic director's award went to Izumi Yoshida for her film "Kinki." "For an interesting attempt to prove that, through an abstract film, one can penetrate even the darkest recesses of human mind." - we read in the statement by the art director of IAFF Animator, Marcin Giżycki.
The audience award for the best short film was given to Izabela Plucińska for her animated erotic comedy "Sexy Laundry."
To honour the occassion, the gala included the performance of the music group Kwartludium, which played live the music composed by Aleksander Nowak for the screening of the film "The Railrodder" by Gerald Potterton. The author of the animation in the cult classic "Yellow Submarine," who was the special guest of the festival, won the Crystal Pegasus for lifetime achievement.
The full list of award-winning films can be found on the festival's website.