Animated Dreams, one of the most important animation festivals in the Baltic and Nordic regions which runs between 19th and 23rd November, will open on 19th November with the World Premiere of Mati Kütt's beautiful and stunning 45- minute puppet film Sky Song.
Kütt, who lives and works in Tallinn, is one of the most respected animators in Estonia receiving numerous awards for his inventive and breathtaking stop motion films that have captured the imaginations of cinema audiences from across the world. His latest film, made at the prestigious Estonian animation studio Nukufilm that has existed for more than 50 years, follows the journey of a postman who has to deliver a package to the moon. Full of beautiful imagery and wild innovation the film will provide Animated Dreams with the perfect way to begin 5 days of screenings, lectures and special events.
As always the Animated Dreams international competition will showcase some of the finest global animated shorts selected from more than 400 entries whilst features such as Sylvain Chomet's hugely popular The Illusionist and Los extraños presagios de León Prozak (The Mysterious Presages of León Prozak) a wonderfully accomplished work from Carlos Eduardo Santa, considered one of the pioneers of Colombian Experimental Animation, will also be screened. There'll be an opportunity to experience 25 Years of the Royal College of Art animation, a retrospective of UK's leading animation school that has nurtured numerous successful animators over its storied history. The country focus is on Finland including the best of recent years‘ Finnish indie animations as well as the Estonian-Finnish joint comics exhibition and Comics Battle. Late night programmes on Desire and Sexuality will keep broad-minded audiences warm during the cold November nights.
For the third time a lecture programme Keyframes will be held in parallel with the Animated Dreams film screenings. This year's focus will be on Animated Documentaries with lectures by luminaries such as Andy Glynne, the director of Animated Minds, a series of films dealing with mental illness, and Theodore Ushev, the director of The Lipsett Diaries, an award-winning short about the famed Canadian experimental filmmaker Arthur Lipsett.
The programme director of Animated Dreams Heilika Pikkov said:
"As one of the most important animation events in Northern Europe, we're proud that we're presenting a varied international programme whilst - in the case of our opening film - celebrating the very best films from the region. Animation fans and professionals are warmly invited to come and visit our festival as well as the Estonian animation studios."
This year Animated Dreams will offer festival accreditation in conjunction with Sleepwalkers, the student and short film festival, which will allow accredited guests to experience the delights of both. For more information go to the Animated Dreams website at anima.poff.ee or visit their Facebook page.
Full information about the Animated Dreams programme will be released over the coming days
Animated Dreams is a sub-festival of the Black Nights Film Festival which also encompasses a main programme of feature premieres and retrospectives, the Nokia Mobile Film Festival (MOFF) which invites filmmakers from around the planet to make a short film on their mobiles and upload it to the MOFF website, the Just Film Children and Youth Festival and Sleepwalkers, the Student and Short Film Festival. The Black Market Industry is a regional film market which introduces film industry professionals to the latest works from North-Eastern Europe and its neighbouring regions whilst in the Baltic Event Co-production market deals projects from the Baltic countries, Scandinavia, Central - Eastern Europe and Russia. On the night of December 4, the European Film Academy will be presenting the 23rd European Film Awards in Tallinn an event that will kick off Tallinn's hosting of the European Capital of Culture.