A total of 176 programs from 24 countries have been chosen to participate in this year’s Cartoons on the Bay, a showcase of TV animation taking place April 10-13 in Salerno, Italy. Of the official selections, 40 works have been nominated to compete for the 2008 Pulcinella Awards.
Promoted by Rai and organized by Rai Trade and Rai Fiction, the 12th annual edition of the festival will offer a full program of events, including press conferences and networking opportunities. As usual, the screening schedule will be largely dominated by European and American productions, though China, Japan and South Korea will all have a stronger presence, as will Latvia, Malaysia, India, Slovenia and Colombia.
Among the projects representing U.S. TV animation this year are Walt Disney Television Animation’s My Friends Tigger and Pooh, Nickelodeon’s Avatar: The Last Airbender and Back at the Barnyard, Cartoon Network’s Ben 10 and Camp Lazlo, Taffy Ent’s Cosmic Quantum Ray, Soup2Nuts’ Wordgirl, and the Bill Plympton short Shut Eye Hotel. Nickelodeon will have the strongest presence among the U.S. networks with 10 projects in competition. Among them are the new series The Mighty B! and a short titled Samsquatch.
Canada is also well represented with a number of programs, including the award-winning National Film Board of Canada short Sleeping Betty from director Claude Cloutier and the Oscar-nominated Madame Tutli-Putli from Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski. Other Canadian participants include Studio B. Prods.’ Ricky Sprocket: Showbiz Boy, Nelvana Ltd.’s The Backyardigans, 9 Story Ent.’s Futz!, Decode’s Franny’s Feet and Cuppa Coffee Studios’ sixth season of Celebrity Deathmatch.
Home-grown Italian programs to be showcased include the Rai Fiction co-produced Everybody Loves a Moose (Trion Picture and Cosgrove Hall), Amita of the Jungle (Lastrego and Testa Multimedia), Gladiators (MondoTv), Uffa che pazienza (Enanimation Motus Motionworks), Stefi’s World (The Animation Band), A Bicicle Trip (Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia) and Acqua in bocca (Maga Animation Studio).
Throughout the duration of the exhibition, all programs will be available to producers, buyers, distributors, multimedia publishers, journalists and all other attending professionals at the Digital Library. For a complete list of nominees and addition information on Cartoons on the Bay, go to www.cartoonsbay.com.
