The Blue Arrow by Enzo d'Aló.

However, there is the question of organizing this festival every year. This might not be the best decision considering the difficulty of getting new, good, films and getting these films in only a one year turnaround. Even after two years, you can't help but feel a sense of déjà vu, of repetition that seems to celebrate the same films forever. Not to minimize the merits of Wallace and Gromit, or to complain that some other films mentioned above, Puss in Boots by Bardine and The End of the World by Driessen, were already seen at Annecy 1995. (These two films were completed too late to be included in competition, but were projected at night on a giant screen beside the lake.) You can't blame serving them up again -- their absence would have been cruelly missed this year!

Since the appearance of MIFA in 1985, the festival has had two poles of attraction. Now, the festival and the market cannot exist without eachother. The implant of an international marketplace in the heart of the festival is supposed to preserve the creative geniuses of the "cultural ghetto" by bringing them a healthy commercial counterpoint. This tendency toward the quantitative, will it be equaled with the qualitative? Will the sheer amount of events be pared down for the best? It's important not to forget that in the long run -- and Disney is always there to remind us -- quality pays!

The awards ceremony, from left to right: John Payson (Joe's Apartment), Paul Driessen (The End of the World in Four Seasons), Nick Park (A Close Shave), Candy Guard (Pond Life), Gil Alkabetz (Rubicon), and Hans Spillaert (Under the Waxing Moon).

Michel Roudevitch is a freelance journalist who has been attending the Annecy festival since its' inception. He writes for a number of French magazines and newspapers, including Liberation, Positif, and Le Technicien du Film.