This year Animateka was held for the 12th time. During seven days of the festival the audience and invited guests had a chance of watching more than 190 films. The jury that comprised of five members watched and judged all the films selected to competition. They've made the decision to present the Grand Prix to Wojciech Sobczyk's "Summer 2014". The jury gave the following explanation: We discussed why this film should win the Grand Prix. There were many things that were noticed. The technical mastery, the hypnotic soundtrack pulling the viewer through a dramatic journey. We agreed upon the inventive editing through framing, the apocalyptic yet beautiful panoramas, the sense of depth, and the uncompromising violent spectacle, like a cinematic fresco. But ultimately, it’s simply a BOLD film that hit us hard. Fucking hard.
"Summer 2014" was produced by the Association of Animation, Experimental and Video film "Studio A" based in Krakow. Harsh but poetic, the film is a treaty about the desire of domination and violence as the driving force of history, shown in the spectrum of grey. After a great battle, the surrounding landscape, devoured by great fire, looks apocalyptic. Meaningless flags flutter in a dead field. Sobczyk’s film presents history as a sequence of recurring plagues and misfortunes where man, trying to find his own place, gets lost even more and falls even lower.
Grand Prix of Animateka is the fourth prestigious award for Sobczyk's film, that in 2014 was nominated to the European Film Awards in the short film category.
This year seven Polish films were presented in the competitive sections of Animateka festival – among others "Domestication" by Sylwia Gaweł or "Don't loose your head" by Karolina Specht. Another four films were selected to screen as a part of the non-competitive sections. It is worth adding that Poles are guests at Animateka every year. Last year the Grand Prix of the festival went to "To Thy Heart" by Ewa Borysewicz.
You can read an interview with Wojciech Sobczyk here.
More information about this year's edition on Animateka can be found at the festivals website.