Cartoon Forum celebrated its 22nd edition in northern Poland, where the next batch of European animated series pleased broadcasters and investors from across the continent once again. The quality and creative projects pitched at Sopot showed an outstanding capacity to conquer new spaces and captivate a wide range of audiences, offering encouraging signs for a fast-growing sector as it gains prominence in the European audiovisual scene.
Cartoon Forum celebrated its 22nd edition in northern Poland, where the next batch of European animated series pleased broadcasters and investors from across the continent once again. The quality and creative projects pitched at Sopot showed an outstanding capacity to conquer new spaces and captivate a wide range of audiences, offering encouraging signs for a fast-growing sector as it gains prominence in the European audiovisual scene.
This new edition of Cartoon Forum was particularly interesting thanks to a spectacular rise in the global budget for projects. The selected series totalled a global investment of 215 million euro, up 30% from a year earlier. Meanwhile, the volume of productions rose 25% to reach 468 hours of animation. The figures reflect the positive outlook for the sector, as well as the consolidation of European animated series on broadcasters' programming schedules, both on the continent and abroad.
The first working day launched on 14th September with the traditional Croissant Show set up under a large tent right on the Sopot beach, after which participants had three days to discover future European animation hits at pitching sessions held at the Sheraton Hotel's modern Conference Centre.
Since its creation, Cartoon Forum has become known as a place where animation projects come to life, and this edition was no exception. In general terms, projects targeted to children aged 6-9 and preschooler stood out in the event’s line-up, along with short format series with episodes under 11 minutes long. The event also detected a growing interest in projects for young adults, a trend which could eventually lead to new slots for animation in channel programming.
The Forum’s screening rooms bore witness to a wide range of characters - from animals and dragons to aliens and everyday objects that come to life – with adventures everywhere from the Earth, outer space, under the ocean and faraway imaginary lands. The genres included mysteries and comedies and touched on educational topics from friendship to historical legends, to name a few. With a third of the projects selected, France was the main protagonist of the event with eight of the 10 most-attended projects. Meanwhile, Britain and Spain doubled their participation from last year with 14 and 11 projects respectively.
The ten most-attended projects included “Oscar and Hoo” – Frog Box (FR) – eOne (UK); “Burny the Little Dragon – LuxAnimation (LUX) – Gaumont – Alphanim (FR) – Cromosoma (ESP); “Dimitri” – Vivement Lundi! (FR) – Beast Animation (BE) – Nadasdy Film (SUI); “Roger” – Je Suis Bien Content (FR); “Hubert & Takako” – Xilam Animation (FR); “The Crumpets” – 4.21 Productions (FR) – Redcastle Mediaconsulting (FR); “Secret Ranch” – Tele Images Productions (FR); “Crazy Cavemen!” – Silver Fox Animation (UK) – Evergreen Entertainment (UK) – Cine Cartoon (AUT); “The Cookie and Crime Club” – Neomis Animation (FR); and “Ori & Gami” – Jus de Prod (FR) – 2 Minutes (FR).
Poland held a special place at the event with five projects that combined the country’s long tradition of animation with the search for new languages and technologies. Cartoon Forum also hosted a crowded round table for an in-depth analysis of Poland’s current animation scene, with producers from Studio Miniatur Filmowych, Human Ark and Platige Image - some of the country’s most dynamic studios-joining Mrs. Agnieszka Odorowicz, director of the Polish Film Institute (PISF), to discuss the challenges facing the sector and the advantages of co-producing animation with Poland.
Polish culture also played a key role over the three-day event with activities such as a sightseeing tour of Hanseatic City of Gdansk, a Four Colours String Quartet mini concert and various food tastings contributing to its success.
Irish animation took the Cartoon Tributes 2011 – the annual awards to outstanding companies that have had a dynamic influence on the European animation industry over the last year– winning Broadcaster and Producer of the Year: RTÉ and Monster Animation, respectively.
Ireland’s Public Service Broadcaster RTÉ was recognized as Broadcaster of the Year thanks to the special place animation has in its channels RTÉ Two and RTÉjr and its firm support to animation production.
Meanwhile, Dublin-based studio Monster Animation took the Producer of the Year award for integrating a new generation of companies that have generated international recognition for Irish animation thanks to series such as “Fluffy Garden” and “Ballybraddan”. At the Forum, the company presented its latest project: “Cosmo”
As for Investor/Distributor of the Year, the award went to awol animation, a Paris-based company headed by Irish Julie Fox that represents shows from many European independent companies.
The future promise of animation also had a place at Cartoon Forum Polska with the Cartoon d’Or award for the best European animated short film of the year, which this year went to “The Little Boy and the Beast” by Johannes Weiland and Uwe Heidschötter (Germany) and produced by Studio Soi with the support of ZDF. This touchy story of a boy whose mother turns into a monster after her divorce received a trophy together with financial aid of 10,000 euro, thanks to the support of the MEDIA Programme of the European Union.
The rest of the nominees were "Mobile" by Verena Fels (Germany), "Paths of Hate" by Damian Nenow (Poland),"Pivot" by André Bergs (The Netherlands),"The External World" by David O'Reilly (Ireland / Germany), and "The Gruffalo" by Jakob Schuh & Max Lang (UK).
Finalists were selected among a shortlist of 29 award-winning films at major European animation festivals and this year's jury was composed by Stéphane Bernasconi (France), Tony Loeser (Germany) and Victor Maldonado (Spain).
Cartoon Forum Polska came to a gallant end with a farewell dinner at the historical Gdansk shipyards, home to the Solidarnosc movement and the first uprisings against the Communist government of Poland and leading to Europe reunification.
This new edition of Cartoon Forum was organised by CARTOON – the European Association of Animation Film with the support of MEDIA - a Programme of the European Union, the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage of Poland, the Polish Film Institute (PISF) and the City of Sopot, in collaboration with Studio Miniatur Filmowych (SMF). Cartoon Forum Polska was one of the events under the patronage of the Polish Presidency of the EU Council.
The next edition of Cartoon Forum will take place from 11 – 14 September 2012 in Toulouse, one of France’s most dynamic cities and home to talented studios.
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