Although not singled out by the Annecy jury, Alexandre Petrov's My Love is generally agreed to be one of the standouts of this year's festival. © DAGO-Film Studio.

We cornered Alexandre Petrov at Annecy and for the price of a glass of wine (well, two -- the other was for Alik Shpilyuk, who interpreted for us) learned about his latest project, My Love (Moya lyubov). We discovered that the transition from a lonely artist to the head of a production team is not always easy.

Explaining What You Can't Explain to Yourself
"I was working in Canada for three years, and had felt a great longing Russian literature, Russian text. So when I read the novel I just stopped all the other desires immediately. I was preparing a Russian fairy tale and this choice was... unexpected," admits Alexandre Petrov, at a bar in Annecy. The Russian director is considered among the top world animators with his painstaking signature technique of painting on glass after winning an Oscar for best animated short in 2000 for his Old Man and the Sea.

The work he selected was a short story by Ivan Shmelev, which details the inner psychology of a 16-year-old student in a Russian village near the turn of the century, torn between a sweet chambermaid and a mysterious, glamorous neighbour. Petrov's technique seems ideal for tale of first love -- the impressionist-inspired backgrounds shimmer in a perfect approximation of a vibrant spring through the eyes of a boy whose surging hormones leave him jittering in his skin as his dilemma sharpens. The strong narrative combined with Petrov's elaborations of the boy's subconscious imagery gives the film an outstanding psychological depth and emotional impact. Though snubbed by the jury at Annecy, it was generally agreed to be one of the standouts of this year's festival.