Abreu was on hand to receive his award for his richly textured tale about a boy who sets off to look for his father, The Boy and the World. Bill Plympton, who won for Cheatin’, sent a message to the festival promising to return next year.
“Next year” is finally a certainty in what has been a winding journey for this now-flourishing festival. Originally founded as Anifest in 2002, former organizers moved the festival from the South Bohemian spa town of Trebon to another larger spa town in the north of the Czech Republic, where it sputtered and finally folded in 2013. Trebon’s devoted fan base kept their festival alive as the newly anointed Anifilm, and, much in the way the short lived Prague Film Festival breathed new life into the Karlovy Vary IFF 20 years earlier, the rivalry strengthened loyalties to the benefit of the Trebon festival.
Festival director Tomas Rychecky found favour in the highest levels of government, with the Ministry of Finance guaranteeing festival funding last year, and the new Minister of Culture Daniel Herman on hand for the 2014 closing ceremony professing his affection for the festival (and, not coincidentally, his family’s hometown). The entire week of the festival, which ran from 6-11 May, was an example of a perfect melding of event and location, with children, film students, families, and animation industry professionals filling the main square, castle parks, and wandering side streets of this fairy-tale charming small castle town. Halls were regularly packed to S.R.O. capacity, with programme quality deserving of the enthusiastic audiences.
With Anifilm, the Czech Republic stands poised to claim a fourth pillar for its family of leading CEE international film festivals, along with Karlovy Vary, the Jihlava documentary festival, and the oldest children’s film festival in Zlin.
Equally deserving of mention was the festival’s closing ceremony itself, nimbly guided by a pair of cheeky hosts and liberally peppered with acts from the dazzling theatre-circus group, La Putyka. The message was vibrant and clear: Anifilm has secured its spot on the international scene.
There were also award winners. Estonian director Krystjan Holm was happily stunned to win the Best Short Film award for his absurdist comedy Worst Case Scenario. And in a nod to the expanding world of animation, two awards were given out to Czech video games. Arma 3 won the award for technical contribution of the year, and Hyperbolic Magnetism won Czech video game of the year for 2013.
The remainder of the awards follows:
Best Student Film: Plug and Play (Switzerland), dir. Michael Frei
Student Film Special Mention: Symphony no. 42 (Hungary), dir. Reka Bucsi
Kreus Young Talent Award: Olivie Dolanska
