Simone Massi’s La memoria dei cani (The Memories of Dogs) was awarded the State of Baden-Wuerttemberg and City of Stuttgart Grand Prix award at the 14th Annual Stuttgart Int’l Festival of Animated Film (April 26-May1). Other big winners include Michel Ocelot’s feature Azur et Asmar and the series Little Princess from producer The Illuminated Film Co. and distributor TV-Loonland.
Massi received a 15,000 Euro cash prize for The Memories of Dogs, an 8-minute film that employs a minimalistic style to deal with themes of human suffering and dignity. Meanwhile, Ocelot’s Azur et Asmar was named best animated feature film and collected a cash prize of 2,500 Euro, donated by Leonhardt & Kern Werbung GmbH. The 93-minute French fairy tale will be in competition at this year’s Annecy International Animated Film Festival, which kicks off on June 11.
The British kids’ show Little Princess took the award for Best Animated TV Series Little Princess for the episode ‘I Want My Snail,’ directed by Edward Foster. Based on the international best-selling children’s picture books by author/illustrator Tony Ross, the 65×11 series for kids 2-6 currently airs on Milkshake!, FIVE and FIVE Life in the U.K. A special mention went to Nickelodeon’s Spongebob Squarepants for the episode ‘Dunces and Dragons,’ directed by Vincent Waller.
The 10,000 Euro Award for Best Graduation Film went to Filmakademie Baden-W’rttemberg grads Tim Weimann and Tom Bracht for their 14-minute short My Date From Hell, which judges felt was ‘a perfect example of mainstream animation.’ Another 2,500 Euros went to Best Student Film winner Beton from Ariel Belinco and Michael Faust of the Bezalel Academy auf Arts and Design in Jerusalem.
The four-minute short film Migration assist’e (Aided Migration) from French filmmaker Pauline Pinson took the The Audience Award and a 6,000 Euro cash prize, while Russian filmmaker Oleg Uzhinov won the 4,000 Euro prize for Best Children’s Animated Film for the 13-minute short Zhiharka.
The first ever German Animation Screenplay Award (5,000 Euro) was presented to writer Heike Sperling and producer/writer Oliver Huzly from Berlin for their project Sing, Jase, Sing! Based on a nursery rhyme written by James Kr’ss in 1958, the script tells the story of Henry, a rabbit raised by hedgehogs. The feature-length screenplay won out of a field of 33 submissions.
For a complete list of 2007 Stuttgart winners and more information on the festival, go to http://www.itfs.de.
