It was the last moment arrival international artists. For a lot of us who still recognized each other after 10 or 15 years, it was kissy/huggie time. And how great to see dear friends again. Clare Kitson, Richard Williams, Jimmy Mirakami, Yoji Kuri, Kihachiro Kayamoto, Nicole Solamon and Maureen Jankovich. And, I met for the first time, Vivian Halas, the daughter of John and Joy Batchelor.

Attendees lined up for the competition screenings. Films were shown in three theatres every day throughout the festival.

But let’s get down to business. It was almost incomprehensible to imagine that there were 1,539 films submitted by 59 countries for consideration, out of which only 69 were to be chosen for competition. The selection committee met through the 24^th of May. Clare Kitson from England was the chairman of the other three, being IGor Volger from Belarus, Solweig von Kleist from France, Yuichi Ito from Japan. It was an exciting but exhilarating task according to Kitson who said, “Although perhaps with slightly different priorities, we agreed on the criteria. A strong idea, skill in communicating this idea and clearly, the pacing to carry an audience along, design talent, technical virtuosity and the desire to innovate.

The international jury consisted of Monique Renault from France; Marcell Jankovics, Hungary, Michael Dudak de Wit, The Netherlands and Paul Bush from the U.K. and, of course, Jimmy Murakami U.S./Ireland with Richard Williams as the honorary president. These members had to evaluate, grade and discuss the 69 works entered into the competition to determine the Grand Prix. I really can’t equate the buck vs. the yen, but the Grand Prix award was one million yen, the same for the Hiroshima prize one million yen, the Debut prize, 500,000 yen, Ranko Hiroshima prize, 250,000 yen, the audience prize, 100,000 yen. You figure out how many dollars in the yen were awarded. I couldn’t.

The festival building, the Ester Plaza, was seven floors high, the second being the major one with three theaters, the Grand, the Medium and the Small, where films in competition, major seminars and retrospectives were exhibited. At 9:15, as was every day, all three theaters started with retrospectives. The Grand Hall with Fantasia, Winter Days and Michael Dudok de Wit’s films. The Small Hall, at the same time, shown Hiroshima awarded films. It was a joy seeing Borge Ring’s Anna & Bella again, as well as Sylvan Chomet’s the Lady and the Pigeon and Frederic Back’s superb, The Man Who Planted Trees.

I must admit from the 19^th of August to the 23^rd it was impossible to see all the films, those in competition, Hiroshima awards, best of the world, children’s Japanese, today animation for peace and of course those in competition, which were shown over a four-day period. I found myself running back and forth across the hall all day and evening attempting to see what I could of different categories that were screened. At the same time in different theaters.

Richard Williams signs his book The Animator’s Survival Kit, which was recently published in Japanese.

Leaving the Hiroshima special awards in the Small Hall, I bounded over to the Grand Hall to catch producer Kihachiro Kawamoto’s feature, Winter Days. His astonishing puppet films have garnered awards all over the world. He had brought me to NHK in Tokyo many years ago when he was filming a puppet show about China. Winter Days is an anthology of short animated films based upon the style of poetry unique to Japan called renku, which consists of a series of linked haiku poems, In this style, a poet must use the last sentence of the previous poem composed by its previous poet. Thirty-five animators gathered to make this film, including Kawamoto, genius Yuri Noortstein from Russia, Bretislav Pojor, Czech animator and Koji Yamaura, an Annecy festival winner of the Grand Prize. Each artist portrays one of the haiku poems from the Basho Shichi Busho collection, composed by Basho Natsuo, a historic Japanese poet.

When Chiro joined me for breakfast the next day, he promised to send me the English language version of Winter Days. As we chatted over coffee, I asked, “Chiro, are you married?’ “No, I’m divorced,” he replied. “Let’s get married,” I suggested. We both had a good laugh, but now that I think back on it, it’s not such a bad idea. It was an amazing coincidence when I went to breakfast one morning, I found it difficult to understand and be understood by the local Japanese.

Thus, when I went to the restaurant I saw a young man at another table. My frustration gave me the fortitude to ask if he spoke English. “Of course,” he replied. He was Disney’s Baker Bloodworth. He was here to show his wonderful short, Destino. He was joined a few minutes later but Mike Gabriel, who was to participate in the same discussion and show his new film, Lorenzo. Of course I attended the seminar in the small hall later that morning. World animation and Hiroshima awards were screened all day. Rooms on floor one, four, five and seven showed the art of Solweig Von Kleist, commemorative exhibitions of festivals, Macintosh Animation Making World, Kids’ Clips, Paul Bush’s Haunted House installation and Frame In.