Cartoons on the Bay festival director Alfio Bastiancich has announced the 40 titles short listed to compete for the fest’s annual Pulcinella Awards. Taking place In Positano (Italy) April 27-May 1, the event will host buyers, television heads, producers, distributors and creative directors from all over Europe, and taking home one of the prestigious awards will greatly increase a project’s chances of being picked up.
The 40 nominated works will compete in the categories Preschool Series, Children’s Series, Action and Adventure Series, All Audiences’ Series, TV Series Pilots, Short Films, TV Specials and Social and Educational Programs. The international jury will also select Grand Prize winners for Best Animated Character of the Year, Best Series of the Year and Best European Program of the Year.
Among the pre-school nominees are Neptuno Films’ (Spain) Dougie in Disguise, Astley Baker Davies’ (U.K.) Peppa Pig and Ocon Inc.’s (Korea) Dibo the Gift Dinosaur.
In the Children’s category, Nickelodeon’s (U.S.) My Life as a Teenage Robot will be competing with Walt Disney Television Animation’s (U.S.) Brandy& Mr Whiskers and Millimages’ (France) Pitt & Kantrop.
Cartoon Network Studios (U.S.) has two entries short listed for the All Audiences section–The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy and Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends.
Among the competitors in the Action & Adventure category is Disney Channel (U.S.), which puts its American Dragon:Jake Long up against Nickelodeon’s Avatar: The Last Airbender, Warner Bros Animation’s Xiaolin Showdown, Rai Fiction’s (Italy) The last of the Mohicans and Sip Animation’s (France) W.I.T.C.H.
The TV Pilots category includes entries from BBC Worldwide (U.K.) with The Secret Show; De Mas & Partners (Italy) with The Bee-Bees, Ellipsanine (France) with The Farm, Je Suis Bien Content (France) with Lili’s Island and Icon Animation (Spain) with Sandra, The Fairy-Tale Detective.
Competing for the title of Best TV Special are BBC Worldwide’s The Tale of Jack Frost, La Fabrique’s (France) The Dream Bird, Millimages’ The Little Raindeer and The Televisio de Catalunya’s (Spain) The Manairons.
Pixar Animation Studios’ Boundin’ from director Bud Luckey will screen in the Short Films competition, taking on Cartoon Saloon’s (Ireland) Culin Dualach, among others.
The full list of nominees can be found on the web at www.cartoonsbay.com.
British studio Aardman Animation, home to the clay-animated Wallace and Gromit property, and Italy’s own Rainbow, producer of the TV series Winx Club, will both be named Studio of the Year at the 2005 event. In addition, Oscar-winning maverick American cartoonist/animation director Gene Deitch and Italian brothers Roberto and Gino Gavioli will receive this year’s Career Award.
Leave a Reply