The Annecy International Animated Film Festival has announced the feature films that will screen in and out of competition at the 2007 event. The selection jury -- which included distributor Lucie Kalmar, producer Bruno Gaumetou and director Thierry Schiel -- choose a very international group of films for competition.
From the U.S., D. Jud Jones and Risto Topaloski's FILM NOIR will compete at Annecy. In the film, private detective Sam Ruben suffers from amnesia and doesn't know why everyone wants to kill him. The U.S. and the U.K. are represented with the selection of Aardman and DreamWorks' FLUSHED AWAY, directed by Sam Fell and David Bowers.
Japan has three selections -- Koichi Chigira's BRAVE STORY, Mamoru Hosoda's TOKI WO KAKERU SHOUJO (THE GIRL WHO LEAPT THROUGH TIME) and Satoshi Kon's PAPRIKA. BRAVE STORY follows an 11-year-old boy as he travels into another world where he must summon the bravery to battle a world of demons, his own friends and ultimately himself. The other film from Asia is the Thai production KHAN KLUAY, directed by Kompin Kemgumnird. Khan Kluay is a young elephant who leaves the jungle to discover what happened to his missing father.
Europe is represented by three films as well. France's Michel Ocelot follows up KIRIKOU AND THE WILD BEASTS with AZUR ET ASMAR, where two childhood friends, one blonde and one dark-haired, become rivals in their older age. MAX & CO. comes from Frederic and Samuel Guillaume of Switzerland and SLIPP JIMMY FRI (FREE JIMMY) is the first 3D animated feature from Norway, which was directed by Christopher Nielsen.
The out of competition features are also from all over the globe and include THE UGLY DUCKLING AND ME and GHOST IN THE SHELL: STAND ALONE COMPLEX -- SOLID STATE SOCIETY.
For a complete list of all the films and series that will be part of Annecy, visit www.annecy.org/home/index.php?Page_ID=201.
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
