Last Sunday the first to win was Artur Kordas, whose animation “Rondo” premiered at the Cinefiesta. In addition to “Rondo”, two other Polish films were selected to the competition of the 11th edition of the festival, starting on July 21st. These two were the animated “Danse macabre” by Małgorzata Rżanek and “All Souls’ Day” directed by Aleksandra Terpińska. The jury, consisting of Frances Lausell (producer), Txema Muñoz (sales agent) and Jorge Molina Enriquez (director) announced “Rondo” the Best Animation of the international section, ex aequo with the Norwegian “Washed Ashore” directed by Jonas Ott. Produced last year, ‘Rondo’ is a philosophical story about a journey made in a 3D computer animation technique. The film was created as a part of the “Young Animation” programme of the Munk Studio, working under the patronage of the Polish Filmmakers Association. The executive producer of Kordas’s animation is Serafiński Studio.
On 28th July, the 19-minute film by Tomek Popakul “Ziegenort” won the Jury’s Special Prize at the 17th edition of the Korean SICAF festival. The festival, which also hosts the annual Seoul Promotion Plan film market, is one of the top events dedicated to the animated films across Asia and the whole world. At the end of July every year Seoul becomes a meeting point for creators, professionals and the audience. 34 films, including two Polish ones – the awarded “Ziegenort” and “Lumberjack” by Paweł Dębski were presented in the international short film section. The jury of the festival has stated many times, that the decision was incredibly hard to make as the quality of the competing films was very high. In the end, the jury has awarded three films, among them the Special Prize has been given to Tomek Popakul and his “Ziegenort”. The Grand Prix of the shorts section went to Hisko Hulsing for his film "Junkyard". Popakul’s graduation film “Ziegenort” has been produced by NoLabel studio.
The additional Polish feature was the Special Mention for Anca Damian’s film “Crulic – The Path to Beyond”. On giving the verdict , one of the jury members, a Canadian animator Sheldon Cohen noted the following: “As imaginary personal narrative film beyond the grave, it allows us to experience a man’s life and his injustice in a way that was not possible for him when he was alive. We see here the power of filmmaking, and in particular a magnificence of animation that achieves this goa”. The film is a Polish-Romanian initiative produced by Aparte Film and coproduced by Magellan’s Foundation, Polish Film Institute and Krakow Film Commission.
To read more, visit the official websites of the Cinefiesta and the SICAF festival.