ASIFA-San Francisco April 1998

April 1998

CALLS & LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

ART VS COMMERCE AT THE WORLD ANIMATION CELEBRATION by Karl Cohen
Recently, interest in animation at festivals has been divided between people whose main concern is enjoying animation as entertainment and as a fine art, and those who focus on animation as an exciting form of commerce. The difference became so great that at Annecy '95 the judges ended up awarding two grand prizes with one going to a work of art and the other to a commercial TV special. ASIFA withdrew its support of Annecy '98 when the festival decided to become an annual event (instead of being held once every two years) in order to better promote its commercial marketplace for TV programs. ASIFA felt Annecy becoming an annual event could hurt attendance and the number of entries at the ASIFA supported Zagreb Festival. It will be held this year within a few days of Annecy. The Zagreb event is much smaller and less commercial than Annecy so ASIFA's support may help it survive.
The division between people interested in animation as commerce and those who enjoy it as an art was quite evident at the 1998 World Animation Celebration (WAC) in Pasadena. Promotional flyers made it quite clear that the main focus of that event was their trade show and not the films. The first flyers said almost nothing about the programs. Hiroshima, Ottawa, and other great festivals announce their tributes, retrospectives and other special programs months in advance to help promote attendance at their events. WAC waited till the last minute to announce their plans and much of the schedule was listed as "to be announced."
I did not attend WAC, but I've talked with over 20 people who attended and have read reviews published on the Internet by Animation World Magazine. The reactions are quite divided. People who went primarily to take part in the trade show and/or promote their company or independent work had a good or great time. For example, people at Wild Brain were quite pleased at Phil Robinson's presentation on his innovative use of computer images in the making of FernGully 2. Several local companies, Protozoa, Wild Brain, Colossal and Pixar, were pleased to win awards at the closing ceremony.
Bill Plympton was delight with WAC as I Married A Strange Person won the award for "Best Theatrical Feature Film." He loved the audiences' response to his feature and he told me he sold a lot of his own merchandise (books, drawings, T shirts, tapes, etc.). He enjoyed meeting people and said the parties were great. Plympton was interviewed for two hours at CAL Arts for an oral history project and he presented a workshop at USC. His only complaint was the weather (El Nino).
Several people said programs honoring Ray Harryhausen, John Coates, Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera were well attended and entertaining. ASIFA-Hollywood's job fair was reported to be a big success and it was "a mob scene" according to one person. At least one Bay Area animator who went came back with news that he had been hired to teach drawing to animation students at Cogswell College.
On the other hand some people who went mainly to see old friends and the film programs were disappointed. A lot of people who normally go to major animation festivals didn't bother to attend or submit films. One industry executive summed up the advance promotion as, "too much b.s. Nobody was excited about it ahead of time." He said, "a lot of people never felt there was a reason to attend."
A producer who has attended dozens of major animation festivals as a judge or guest of honor, told me WAC was, "just ok. The least interesting festival I've ever attended. There was nothing really bad about it. It simply lacked something and was depressing at times." He went on to say, "the screenings were badly organized and the programs were not inspiring."
A local animator called to say he was upset about having spent the time and money to go. He attend two events that didn't include all the films listed in the schedule. "The World's Funniest Cartoons" turned out to be "a lot of garbage made for Mad TV." He felt duped by the show's title. He hated what was shown. After the break the program ended abruptly after they finally showed one real classic, The Big Snit. Somebody announced WAC had to end each night at 11 or 11:30 and they had run out of time.
Other people complained about the quality of some of the programs and about shows that were cancelled. Apparently several major companies were upset at some behind-the-scenes problems and pulled out at the last moment. Dreamworks, Disney and Fox didn't present their scheduled presentations. Disney (Miramax) cancelled the American premiere of a new Hayao Miyazaki feature that they will distribute.
The festival did what they could to correct some of the problems. PDI, originally part of the Dreamworks show, did a long presentation that included a commercial reel and a trailer for Antz. In place of a sneak preview of next season's Fox shows, Matt Groenig did an unannounced two hour presentation on The Simpsons that was a highlight of WAC. His incredible program wasn't promoted properly. It was presented to a small audience.
As for the competition screenings, some great films were shown at the awards program, but people complained that the daily competition screenings were not very good. Some were nothing but episodes of TV series. Some were described as being really bad shows. People said there were large periods of time when nothing was being shown in any of the theatres that they wanted to see.
There were lots of other problems described to me including there not being a central place for people to meet and the festival didn't introduce filmmakers in attendance when their works were shown in the competitions. One person said some animators who showed their work "came with high expectations and left outraged." Another said, "they spent too much time honoring the work of their sponsors."
WAC showed far too many entries. Of course everybody who enters is thrilled that their work is being shown, so a lot of the animators and producers attend to see their work on the big screen. Does this practice sell enough tickets to pay for the costs of the extra screenings? It certainly makes for some really dull competition programs.
People who love animation don't seem to understand WAC's values. An animator said, "they have no respect for animated film. The event was so commercial that they lost the spirit of animation. Everybody was there to make money." Another said, "It really doesn't take a hell of a lot to run a good festival, but WAC organizers just don't get it."
Despite one festival worker claiming "WAC is the biggest and greatest animation festival in the world," it is far from that. The person who told me this story said, "Of course, the schmuck had never even been to any other animation festival."
What happens in the future is up to the producers of WAC. The obvious solution to keeping everybody happy is for them to hire a professional animation festival director from the U.S.A., Canada, Europe or Asia to reorganize the competition and screening and to give the industry notice that WAC is now run by an executive who does not wish to repeat the problems of the past. He or she could do what most festivals do - have a jury screen the works in advance and select only the best for the competition screenings.
WAC's main income comes from the trade show and seminars and not from ticket sales. The executive producer has said several times that ticket sales to screenings can not support the event. WAC is run as a business without the help of grants. They have an enormous overhead that has to be paid. I want them to succeed and I'm sorry to hear about their problems. I wish them well with their future events.

ANNECY VS ZAGREB by David Ehrlich (from the March, ASIFA-East ANYMATOR) "The Annecy deadline for selection was January 15. As of January 27th, they had only 450 films registered. Zagreb has reported a number for their selection that is quite a bit higher, with over 200 coming from the U.S. alone! All of you American members who supported Zagreb should feel proud that you have done the right thing and in so doing, have helped that fine festival to survive and flourish. The Zagreb selection process begins next week, and ASIFA-East's own John Dilworth is on their Selection Committee. Best of luck to all of you who submitted your films."

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