The beginning of the year brings new screenings and chances of awards for Polish animated films. Though there are not many festival screenings this months, Polish animated films will be shown at prestigious film festivals, among others, at the French Clermont-Ferrand, American Slamdance and Swedish Goteborg.

January festivals started in the second half of the month. On January 16, the 26th edition of the Film Festival in Trieste started. In this year's non-competing programme of animated films, two Polish animations are included among eleven films shown there, namely, "To Thy Heart" by Ewa Borysewicz and "Hippos" by Piotr Dumała. This year's edition of the festival will last until January 22.

Also on January 16, started the 27th edition of the French festival Premiers Plans, which annually presents the most interesting debut films by directors from all over the world. This year, in the animated film competition Poland is represented by "Of A Forest" by Katarzyna Melnyk. Since the autumn premiere in the competition at the DOKLeipzig film festival, this film by the student of Lodz Film School has been shown, among others, at festivals in Slovenia (Animateka), Serbia (Balkanima) and France (Cinessone).

The film invited to the animated film screening within the frames of the 38th edition of the Film Festival in Goteborg is the latest film by Jerzy Kucia, "Fugue For Cello, Trumpet and Landscape". In the special, non-competing series Animani, the audience will watch six screenings, in which both feature-length and short films are included. The Swedish festival ends on February 2.

This month, Polish animated cinema will be also shown at the independent film festivals. This year, the organisers of the American festival Slamdance invited "Hippos" by Piotr Dumała to participate in the short film competition. It is the third festival in January for the film by Dumała, produced by the Fumi Studio from Warsaw. 21st edition of the Slamdance festival is held from 23rd to 26th January.

At the end of the month starts one of the most important festivals dedicated to short films – the festival in Clermont-Ferrand. Every year, the event attracts thousands of viewers, as well as numerous film professionals, who annually participate in film market, organised simultaneously with the festival.

Four Polish films are invited to the competition sections at this year's edition of the festival, and three out of the four are animated films. In the international short film competition, the aforementioned "Hippos" by Piotr Dumała and the student film by Karolina Specht, "An Incredibly Elastic Man", will meet. In addition, in the French film competition there will be shown the Polish-French co-production "A Blue Room" by Tomasz Siwiński. This year's edition of the festival lasts until February 7 – this is when the names of the winners will be announced.

The list of current animated film festivals, at which Polish films are shown, can be found in the "at festivals" section

JANUARY 2015