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A little girl finds acceptance in embracing her own difference. This lyrical animated film has the timeless charm of an old fable – one whose subject is difference and self-affirmation. For her second film from the trilogy about childhood, the most prominent personality of Portuguese animation chose the technique of photocopies with images scratched into India ink on glossy paper.

This animated short about men and hair tells the story of little bald Léon and of his grandfather, an old man with a bushy black beard. A thing of legend, the grandfather’s beard seems endowed with magic powers. In this remarkable film for younger as well as older audiences, the authors used likeably stylised puppets.

A former pilot looks back on his life. The Earth, the sky, his wife – everything played an important role on his journey from the runway to an abandoned boat house. Apart from its artistic style, this atmospheric and characteristically nostalgic film by Vladimir Leschiov is interesting thanks to the detachment with which it tells the pilot’s story completely without words.

The Blue Marble is a fictional story based on the reality of child soldiers. A young girl and the other students of her village school are brutally kidnapped by rebels and sent to training camps where they are trained to become ruthless killing machines as child soldiers. A story of oppression and hope.

China, 746 AD, ruled by the Tang dynasty. During the period of the greatest prosperity in the history of China, the emperor keeps a considerable number of concubines. He prepares a big feast for Yang, his most beloved concubine. But the celebration doesn’t go as planned… This artistically refined tragicomic film with fluid animation tastefully uses Chinese ornamentalism.

This suggestive film filled with strong emotions and subtle toned-down colours tells the story of a young woman who decides not to answer a phone call from her grandfather, unaware that it will be his last. When he dies, she is overwhelmed with guilt and regret and can’t sleep. But then she remembers a promise made long ago: to illustrate his wartime adventures.

This animated short about social conformity tells the story of Edmond – a very "different" sort of guy. When his co-workers jokingly crown him with a pair of donkey ears, Edmond suddenly discovers his true identity. And while he enjoys his newfound self, the ears create an ever-widening gap between himself and others.

In the vestibule of a hospital room, a young boy waits to see his dying mother. The clamour and spiralling movements of bodies around him intensify, forming a grotesque circus – a cacophonous circle that pushes the child back, depriving him of one final touch of his mother’s hand. The author made this deeply personal film using an unusual combination of techniques – rotoscoping, object animation and 3D computer animation.

Can time be made to stand still? Can it be reversed? Koji Yamamura’s Muybridge’s Strings is a meditation on this theme, contrasting the worlds of the photographer Eadweard Muybridge, who in 1878 successfully photographed consecutive phases in the movement of a galloping horse. This captivating film is enriched by Koji Yamamura’s refined artistry.

This peculiarly drawn film imbued with a dose of originality tells the unusual story of a couple. He’s a magician, she’s a firefighter. Isolating themselves from the chaos of a world in turmoil, the two lovers live in a crane basket high in the sky, where they go about their daily business. But when reality calls...