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WFAC Announces 2005 Program

WFAC Announces Programme for 2005 Animation Festival


WATERLOO, ON – The Waterloo Festival for Animated Cinema (WFAC) is pleased to announce the programme for the fifth edition of the film festival, being held November 17th-20th, 2005 at the Princess Twin Cinemas in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.

A film festival dedicated to animated feature films from around the world, WFAC showcases the power of animation in filmmaking, and celebrates the art and the artists who work in this wonderful visual narrative form. The WFAC showcase has become one of the most comprehensive public exhibitions for animated feature films in the world.

The selections to the WFAC 2005 programme are notable for highly personal and powerful work that challenge popular notions of what theatrical feature animation can be. Many of the films have received accolades and awards from other world-famous animation festivals such as Annecy, Ottawa and Tokyo.

Alosha Popovich i Tugarin Zmey (“Alosha Popovich and Tugarin the Serpent” - Konstantin Bronzit, Russia, 2005). The film follows the adventures of Alosha as he sets off on a comical epic journey to retrieve the gold stolen by the warlord Tugarin from the city of Rostov. Rated G.

Fragile Machine (Ben Steele, United States, 2005). The film explores the birth of the first conscious machine, as a scientist who was lost with grief at her daughter's death volunteers to be the subject in a series of experiments designed to meld man and machine. Rated 14A.

Frank and Wendy (Kaspar Jancis, Estonia, 2005). The film follows the mission of two top American secret agents who are sent to the world's hotbed of danger – Estonia – to save the world. Rated R.

Kumou no Mukou, Yakusoku no Bashou (“A Place Promised in Our Early Days” – Makoto Shinkai, Japan, 2005). Set in an alternate 20th-century Earth teetering on the edge of war, the film tells the story of three children who make a vow that one day threatens to tear them apart. Rated PG.

Mind Game (Yuasa Massaki, Japan, 2004). Based on the popular cult classic manga (Japanese comic) of the same name by Robin Nishi, this film describes the adventures and misadventures of a young aspiring manga artist who is given a second chance to live his life – which he does, in the oddest way. Rated R.

Nyócker! (“The District” – Aron Gauder, Hungary, 2005). This satirical retelling of Romeo and Juliet with a twist follows the machinations of Richie as he tries to help his impoverished neighbourhood – by travelling back in time and establishing an oil reserve right under his district, with unexpected consequences from a certain foreign superpower. Rated R.

Strings (Anders Rønnow-Klarlund, Denmark / U.K., 2004). A mythological film about the son of a king who was treacherously murdered, who sets out to reclaim his birthright, and discovers the truth about his people. Rated PG.

Terkel i Knibe (“Terkel in Trouble” – Stefan Fjeldmark, Torbjørn Christoffersen, Kresten Vestbjerg Andersen, Denmark, 2004). The film tells the story of a normal young boy named Terkel, who has parents who don't listen to him, a little sister who loves hanging around him too much, a best friend who swears like a sailor, and somebody who is out to kill him. Rated 14A.

WFAC 2005 will also feature a retrospective on Japan's greatest stop-motion puppet animator Kihachiro Kawamoto, including some of his most acclaimed short films and the anthology Fuyu no hi (“Winter Days”), directed by Kawamoto with contributions from thirty-five of the world's greatest animators, including Yuri Norstein, Bretislav Pojar, and Koji Yamamura, who was featured at WFAC 2003. Expressing a sense of season through their vastly differing styles, each animator portrays one of the haiku poems from “Winter Days” in the haiku collection Basho Shichi Bushu (“Seven Anthologies of the Basho School”) composed by historical poet Matsuo Basho and his students in the renku style, in which each poet uses the last sentence of the previous poem by the previous poet.

WFAC 2005 runs from November 17th-20th, 2005 at the Princess Twin Cinemas.

For more information, please contact:

Joseph C. Chen, Curator
Waterloo Festival for Animated Cinema (WFAC)
Phone: +1 (519) 721-0417
Email: [email protected]



About the Festival

The Waterloo Festival for Animated Cinema (WFAC) is a film festival for animated feature films, founded to promote appreciation for animation as a narrative medium for mature cinematic storytelling, and to review and celebrate animated feature films in the venue they were meant to be seen in: a theatre.

The 2005 Festival consists of three programmes: World Cinema, Retrospectives, and Tidbits. The World Cinema programme features contemporary feature films from around the world. The Retrospectives programme looks back at films of a certain theme or artistry, which have contributed to the films of today. Last but not least, the Tidbits programme features films from small creative teams challenging the limits of what can be accomplished, to tell the stories they want to tell.

WFAC 2005 will be running November 17th-20th at the Princess Twin Cinemas in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.

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