Stuttgart International Festival of Animated Film in full swing

ITFS 2021 – The Highlights on Friday, May 7

 
 
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On Friday, 7 May at 18:00 CET, the first ITFS Awards Show will take place! As part of the Trickstar Professional Awards, the German Animation Screenplay Award, the Animated Games Award Germany and the Trickstar Business Award will be presented in a joint award ceremony. Presenter Anja Lange will lead through the evening with studio guests.

From Friday, 6 May, 12:00 CET, the programme of the International Competition 3 will be available in the Media Library on OnlineFestival.ITFS.de. The programme includes "Have a Nice Dog!" (Jalal Maghout, Germany, Syria 2020) about a lonely man – trapped in Damascus, surrounded by war – who increasingly loses himself in his fantasies of fleeing and the inner dialogues with his dog. In Joanna Quinn's and Les Mills' "Affairs of the Art" (United Kingdom, Canada 2020), we reconnect with Beryl, the working-class heroine who not only reveals her own obsession with drawing but exposes the addictions of her eccentric family, which include pickling, screw threads and pet taxidermy.

Also, the Young Animation Competition 2 entries can be viewed from 12:00 CET, including „Disparus“ (Tiphaine Burguburu, Pauline Epiard, Élodie Laborde, Lisa Laîné, Clémentine Vasseur, Valentine Ventura, France 2020) about a shady reporter who takes off on a journey to document a presumed exctinct species. The second part odf the Tricks for Kids Competition is also now available online, including “Rico & Oskar: Alles Banane“ (Michael Sieber, Germany 2020).

In addition, several AniMovie Competition films are online as of 12:00 CET today. “Strike” (Trevor Hardy, UK 2019), a German premiere, tells the story about Mungo Morrison, a young mole who secretly dreams of becoming a professional footballer. In the German premiere of “You Animal! The Nimfa Dimaano Story” (Avid Liongoren, Philippines 2020), a perfume saleskitty experiences amorous-trashy adventures with two men before she emancipates herself from the male world to do her own thing. In “Calamity” (Rémy Chayé, Denmark/France 2020), 12-year-old Martha Jane on her way to the Wild West has to take charge of her siblings and, after a theft, to find proof of her innocence. Please note: this film is only available from 7 May, 0:00 CET to 8 May, 23:59 CET – as well as the ITFS 2020 AniMovie award winner 2020 “Le voyage du prince” (Jean-François Laguionie, Xavier Picard, France/Luxembourg 2019), running Out of Competition.

The Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg will present a selection of its most beautiful student projects at ITFS 2021 from May 7, 0:00 CET to May 9, 23:59 CET.
And don't forget – the following programmes have already been available since May 3:

• Pandemic Animation – For more than a year now, our daily routine has consisted of washing our hands (”WYH”), keeping our distance (“Where are you now?”), isolation (“Quarantine”), boredom (“Words of Boredom”), self-doubt (“Forever”), conspiracy-mongers everywhere (“Anatomie eines Weltverständnisses”). Humorous, thoughtful, poetic and sometimes even strangely prophetic, the works illuminate life in and after the global lockdown.
• Creating*Diversity shows how creatives from all over the world create practised diversity. Their films tell (life) stories from different countries and cultures, about people with different religions and sexual identities. “Cha” by Gagandeep Kalirai, for example, hauntingly portrays a grandmother’s memories of the massacre of Sikhs in Delhi in 1984; “All Those Sensations in My Belly” by Marko Djeska describes the journey of a trans woman to herself in a way that is both emotional and visually impressive; and “A Stone in the Shoe” by Eric Montchaud paints a shining example of integration.
• In Persona: Monique Renault – As one of the first female animators, Monique Renault has been addressing gender roles, female sexuality, anti-militarism, anti-clericalism, and prejudices in her films since the 1970s. At the same time, she thus presented to a broad audience the possibilities and seriousness that animation offers.
• Animation around Europe with O!PLA – Focus on Poland, Focus on Slovenia: From Weasel to Nighthawk and New Portuguese Animation: Professional Category
• Furthermore, the five nominees of the New World Classic Animation Award

Studio and School Presentations come from La Poudrière and Hochschule Offenburg.
At 10:00 CET begins the Screenplay Workshop “Fear of a “Black is Beltza“ Planet” about the transmedia project “Black is Beltza“ which started in 2014 with the comic book (in Basque, Spanish, Catalan, French, Japanese), exhibitions in Bilbao, Barcelona and San Sebastian, music inspired by the idea of “Black is Beltza“, multi-culturalism and anti-racism.
The Lecture “BC Minorities for Film and TV Society” at 14:00 CET presents “BC Minorities for Film and TV”, a non-profit based organization that focuses on empowering minorities, by bridging the gap through creating equal opportunities.
The Voices of French Animation panel at 15:00 CET invites its audience to talk face-to-face with some of the filmmakers of the Voices of French Animation programme. The panel, a collaboration with UniFrance, will be moderated by Bernard Payen (Editor-in-Chief Court-Circuit Arte).
The WolfWalkers Lecture at 17:00 CET will be given by one of the directors of the Oscar-nominated animated feature film, Tomm Moore, and will include a Q&A session.
At the Animation Production Days, an joint venture by ITFS and FMX – Conference on Animation, Effects, Games and Immersive Media, the second part of the Conference Part: Enable! Case Studies and Market Trends takes place on Friday, May 7, from 11:30 CET. 

GameZone
The Talk Wonderwomen – Women in Games & Animation (19:00 CET) gathers women with different perspectives on and from the field of games, who have been shaping and advancing discourses on digital games for years and/or are currently doing so at the highest professional and scientific level: Pippa Tshabalala (Gaming and Online Culture, Johannesburg), Finja Walsdorff (ForschungsKolleg, Siegen), Margarete Jahrmann (Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, Zurich), Tracy Fullerton (USC Interactive Media & Games Division of the USC School of Cinematic, Los Angeles) and Carmen Johann (Designagentur Johann, Bad Bertrich).
The Game Jam: Creating*Diversity takes place from May 7, 0:00 CET to May 9, 24:00 CET and invites both beginners and professionals to work on ideas and prototypes for games about diversity, equality, inclusion or discrimination.
Since May 3 and until May 16, the virtual video exhibition Glaube, Liebe, Hoffnung (Faith, Love, Hope) of the Staatsoper Stuttgart can be visited.
 
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At 10:00 CET, the SWR X LAB - The New Innovation Lab of SWR will introduce itself. At the ITFS, current projects such as a “Tatort” gaming app are presented at ITFS along with the digital Festival experience. The digital Festival experience in particular can be used as an example of how we approach our challenges.

ITFS Live-Stream
The ITFS Live Stream begins, like every day, at 14:00 CET, including series highlights such as Studio 100's "Alice in Wonderland" as well as Cartoon Network's "Victor and Valentino" and "Craig of the Creek".
The evening programme from 20:00 CET includes the music video mini-series "Ein Trip mit E" by EnBW and Jung von Matt NECKAR as well as a selection of psychedelic and party-inspired short films – including "Flamingo Pride" by Tomer Eshed.
The complete film programme of the ITFS Live Stream can be found here: https://onlinefestival.itfs.de/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/ITFS21_LiveStream-Freitag.pdf

ITFS VR Hub
The ITFS VR Hub will host the talk "How to Build Mozilla Hub" with the developers of the ITFS VR Hub Allison Crank and Christophe Merkle at 12:00 CET. The talk “Die Relevanz von Bewegtbild & Videos im Social Media Advertising bei Facebook, Instagram & Co.“ with Stephan Sigloch, CEO of Klickpiloten, will follow at 15:00 CET. At 22:00 CET, everyone is invited to an electronic music set by Michael Fakesch (Funkstörung, Monkeytown Records, !K7)!
For the first time, the ITFS has announced an avatar competition this year: Users of the ITFS VR Hub were able to design their own avatar - and anyone interested can still vote until 10:00 CET on May 8.