A big surprise was seeing material made for German television that would surely be banned by American television stations. The programming was made by Studio Film Bilder in Stuttgart. When 10 Kleine Jagermeister, a rock video with music by Die Totem Hosenm, was shown on MTV they censored the showing of female breasts, a joint and a pistol. Several of the other Studio Film Bilder's music videos were so full of bare nippled breasts and other sexual images that it was obvious these works could never be cut enough to please American censors. It is a shame as there would be an audience for Help Me Mr. Dick and Fritz Loves My Tits, by E-rotic, Devil's Child by Karl Anton and Innocent Again by Sex Angels. These well made videos are shown regularly on Germany's music television network.

Studio Film Bilder also made a series of sex education shorts for children that would shock American television censors. The studio was commissioned to do sixteen shorts that deal with topics such as the problems of growing up, first love, sexual harassment and menstruation, for the show Dr. Mag Love. Dr. Mag Love airs on Saturday mornings and they show these intelligent, humorous shorts to balance the serious discussions presented during the show. The animated shorts are highly creative using a variety of animation techniques. One used a small Swiss army knife as the body of person. Others used collage, plasticine, and drawn and painted images. The series would get into trouble in America as it shows bare breasts with nipples, pubic hair on females, male genitalia, condoms, breasts being fondled and a lot of other images that are forbidden on television in the land of free speech...

The German company is 8 years old and has a staff of six directors, one producer and an administrative person. They have up to thirty people working there however when they are busy. A show of personal films by the company's directors included the premiere of Gil Alkabetz's film Rubicon.

Clare Kitson from Channel 4 in London is the commissioning editor who has funded some of the most outstanding animation by Brothers Quay, Jan Svankmajer, Nick Park, Barry Purves and other world famous animators. She presented a program of recently commissioned works that included Stressed by Karen Kelly, Bob's Birthday by David Fine and Alison Snowden, Pond Life by Candy Guard, The Village by Mark Baker, Abductees by Paul Vester and Britannia by Joanna Quin.

Animator Jonathan Amitay giving a masterclass presentation.

Other Programs
A program of recent animation from around the world featured several works from Israel's leading animators: Noam Meshulam, Alexander Geifman, Barak Shakin, Ayelet Sharon, and plasticine animator Roni Oren. Other works were by Paul Driessen from Holland, Stig Bergquist, Lars Ohlsen and Jonas Odell from Stockholm and Marv Newland from Vancouver. Newland sent a retrospective of work he has produced that included Pink Komkommer, Anijam, Lupo the Butcher and Bambi Meets Godzilla.

The United States was well represented in the festival with a program of work from New York honoring John Dilworth's Stretch Films, J.J. Sedelmaier's studio, Ink Tank and Buzzco. I also presented a masters class on recent animation productions in the San Francisco Bay Area. The program featured independent shorts by Tim Hittle (his Oscar nominated Canhead), Richard C. Zimmerman, Tod Kurtzman and Tennessee Reed Norton, plus commercial work by Pixar, PDI, ILM, Danger Team, Midland, Xaos, Protozoa, Bio Vision, Colossal Pictures, Curious Pictures, Wild Brain and Kevin Coffey's Cartoonland.

I also presented three historical shows. My show on censorship included several pre-code cartoons, an uncensored Private Snafu and a selection of shorts too risqué to be shown on TV or in most theaters in the USA. I also exhibited WWII propaganda films that featured animated and live action shorts and my screening of film pioneers included works by Winsor McCay, Otto Messmer, Willis O'Brien, Charles Bowers, Robert Cannon, Jan Lenica and other directors.