The Encounters Short Film Festival has announced the winners of its 13th annual international competition to find the best new animated and live action films of under 30 minutes length.
The festival’s 10 principal prizes went to the following entries (including what the festival said about them):
Animate Artist Award: Nijumam No Berei (200,000 Phantoms)
(France, 10 mins)
French video artist Jean-Gabriel Periot received the £2,000 Animate cash prize for
the best single-screen, innovative work, experimenting with form, technique and
content, for Nijuman No Borei (200,000 Phantoms) which uses intricate montages
and overlays of stills imagery to reveal the changes experienced by Hiroshima from
1914 to 2006.
BBC Three New Filmmakers Award: Bigboy-74
(UK, 10 mins)
Thomas Marshall won £5,000 and a prime-time slot on BBC3 for his comedy short,
BIGBOY-74 about a suicidal guy named Henry and his crash course in ‘dogging’.
Thomas’s film and the other nine finalists future also win a BBC Online showcase.
To view them, visit: www.bbc.co.uk/newtalent/film/newfilmmakers/
Best Of British Award: Soft
(UK, 14 mins)
Nottingham-based film-maker Simon Ellis added yet another award to his fastgrowing
collection by winning the festival’s £1,000 prize for the best UK entry with
Soft, his 16th short, in which a father re-discovers his fear of confrontation at the
worst possible moment. Simon’s win at Encounters comes just as he is about to
start work on his first full-length feature: Dogging: A Love Story.
Cartoon D'Or Nomination
Pushkin
(UK, 5 mins)
Bristol-trained stop-frame animator Trevor Hardy, who now lives in West Sussex,
earned the honour of representing Britain in the prestigious pan-European Cartoon d’Or
competition with Pushkin, about a missing cat and a worried owner.
Cosgrove Hall Films Children's Jury Award:
A Gentleman's Duel
(USA, 7 mins 45 secs)
Comic book artist Francisco Ruiz and his Blur Studios colleague, character animator Sean McNally won over the Encounters festival’s specially convened jury of 12-18-years-old
cinephiles with their finely designed story about an elegant tea party being
upturned when two aristocrats find they are rivals in love.
International Jury Award: Lampa Cu Caciula (The Tube With A Hat)
(Romania, 23 mins)
Romania’s growing reputation as a centre of fresh film talent is confirmed with the
jury’s decision to give 2007’s £3,000 best in festival award to Radu Jude’s film
about the seven-year-old boy who wakes up early in a remote village and decides it
is time for he and his father to take their TV set to the city to be mended.
Depict Award: Operator
(UK, 90 seconds)
Bristol-based writer, director and animator Matthew Walker wins the £2,000 first
prize in the latest Depict! challenge to find the best 90 seconds micro-film
with his animation Operator which begins with a man calling telephone enquiries
to ask: "Do you have a number for God?". To view Matthew Walker’s film and
profile, see: www.depict.org/news/45
Best International Newcomer In Animation Award: The Itch
(Romania, 23 mins)
Young British animator, Joel Green, from the National Centre for Computer
Animation, Bournemouth, wins £2,500 and the title of best animation newcomer
against opposition from Australasia, Asia, Europe, and North America with The Itch, about a man being trailed by an unwelcome companion he can’t shake off.
ITV West Award
Young Offender
(UK, 11 mins)
Isabel Anderton, Bristol wins with her short about a young white inmate who becomes increasingly disturbed as he serves out his time in a multi-racial institution for young offenders. She receives £1,000 as the maker of the best entry this year to be made in the South West.
Nahemi/Kodakk Prize For Creative Filmmaking and Nahemi/Kodak Cinematography Award
Isabella
(UK, 11mins 26 secs)
Higher Education and the Moving Image (NAHEMI) for the best film by a student at
a film school in the UK or Ireland: ISABELLA, by University of the West of England
graduate (and regular Encounters volunteer), Geoffrey Taylor, on a budget of £900.
The Encounters 2007 ceremony also included the presentation of three further awards – each chosen by festival and/or online audiences. Here, the winners were:
DepicT! Audience Award: The Picnic, by Bristol-born, University of the West of England graduate David Gilbert. David Gilbert receives a bundle of benefits from Shooting People, the online news service and resource bank for film-makers.
South West Screen Audience Award: A Short Collection Of Hilary Flamingo's Dream Vocations by Harriet Fleuriot, a graduate from The Arts Institute, Bournemouth, now based in Bristol. She receives a cash prize of £1,000 from and mentoring by an industry professional.
UK Film Council Audience Award: Les Couillus (Home Team) by French film-maker Mirabelle Kirkland, who receives £500 after her entry, about a bunch of guys attending a seminar on resolving domestic strife, was voted the favourite of festival delegates.
Read about last year's festival
