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‛What does it mean to be a boy? And what does it mean to be a girl?’ asked the director of the popular film Long Way North (2015) after seeing a documentary about a famous woman from US history named Martha Jane Cannary, who was better known as Calamity Jane. It is the childhood of this unique personality and the events that shaped her (back then) considerably nonconformist personality, which director Rémi Chayé portrays in this artistically captivating film. Along with her father and siblings, little Martha travels to Oregon, their dream land, where there is work and a good life for their entire wagon train. But their journey gets complicated when her father is injured in an accident. Martha sees a logical solution – she takes over the reins of the family wagon. However, such a thing is inconceivable for the wagon master, so Martha learns lassoing and riding skills in secret so she can trump the wagon master’s son, who was put in charge of the wagon instead of her. But she’s accused of stealing precious items and loses the support of the wagon train and her family. Martha isn’t one to stand such injustice; she sets out to clear her name and earn the respect she deserves. The film won the Annecy Cristal for Best Feature Film.

After losing the people closest to him, the film’s hero – the director’s alter ego – shuts himself away in a safe world of memories. In this world, time has stopped and everyone he has lost is still alive. As years go by, the world in his mind keeps on growing and is being populated by uninvited literary characters and heroes of animated films from his childhood. But the characters, who are the same age in all of their stories, suddenly start ageing. When the protagonist realises that there is no such thing as eternal youth, he decides to return to reality. Luckily, he has all these amazing characters accompanying him on his complicated journey.

This magical and imaginative journey through the subconscious mind of Mariusz Wilczyński is characterised by mesmerising images and music by Tadeusz Nalepa which are irreplaceable and complement the film’s melancholy atmosphere. In his feature debut, this self-taught director of many acclaimed short films imprinted not only his memories, but also allusions to contemporary Poland. After eleven years of work, he created an artistic opus which gives the viewers no time to breathe but in return offers a unique and unrepeatable personal experience. The film premiered at the Berlin IFF.

In a time of superstition and magic, a young apprentice hunter, Robyn Goodfellowe, journeys to Ireland with her father to wipe out the last wolf pack. While exploring the forbidden lands outside the city walls, Robyn befriends a free-spirited girl, Mebh, a member of a mysterious tribe rumoured to have the ability to transform into wolves by night. As they search for Mebh’s missing mother, Robyn uncovers a secret that draws her further into the enchanted world of the Wolfwalkers and risks turning into the very thing her father is tasked to destroy.

Wolfwalkers is the highly anticipated new feature film from the renowned Irish studio Cartoon Saloon and its similarly renowned filmmakers. Director Tomm Moore’s filmography already includes two unforgettable feature films (The Secret of Kells and Song of the Sea) and many awards and Academy Award nominations. Ross Stewart, the co-director of Wolfwalkers, worked with Moore on his first film.

Renowned French comics artist and writer Joann Sfar has successfully adapted his comic book series The Rabbi’s Cat (2011). After almost ten years, he returns with another adaptation of his own iconic work. Little Vampire is loosely based on his comic book series of the same name, known also in the Czech Republic.

The universe of Little Vampire is characterised by the way it plays with horror stereotypes. Not everything turns out the way the readers or viewers would expect. But the film doesn’t lack suspense or a sometimes more, sometimes less scary atmosphere. The titular protagonist isn’t thirsty for human blood and definitely doesn’t want to hurt anyone. He’s a kind-hearted boy who has been living for centuries in a seaside villa with other kind-hearted monsters. The problem is that Little Vampire is bored, he would like to go to school like other kids and he wants some friends his own age. He finds one in a lonely boy named Michel who lives with his grandparents. But what children of this age truly want is a real adventure. And our two heroes embark on an adventure – and a pirate one at that! Just like Sfar’s previous work, this film honours the artistic style of the comic book (although the shaky strokes of the original are bit more stable in the film), the characters’ playful design and the diversity of the settings. The film was nominated for the César Award and competed in the 2020 Annecy Festival.

The film is based on the two greatest works of Russian genius: A short story titled ‛The Nose’ by Nikolai Gogol, and composer Dmitri Shostakovich’s 1930 eponymous opera based on Gogol’s story. The film is dedicated to pioneers, innovators in art. People who are ahead of their time. And, most importantly, people who do not fear going against the tide even at the cost of personal well-being, and often life.

Director Andrey Khrzhanovskiy, a legend in Russian animation, takes viewers on a daring post-modern adventure lined with constant narrative digressions, allusions and anecdotes. Apart from the digressions and motifs, this requiem for Russian avant-garde is also rich in various filmmaking techniques. Cut-out animation and drawing are complemented by live action and documentary footage from archives and from the present day. The main characters of the film are writers Nikolai Gogol and Mikhail Bulgakov, director Vsevolod Meyerhold and composer Dmitri Shostakovich, who gave the film’s director his personal permission to use his opera, thus the music plays a substantial part in it.

In French internment camps, Spanish fighters against the Franco government were often treated as criminals rather than people fleeing a cruel system. For some time, one of the camps, a place with poor hygienic conditions and limited access to food and water, was home to illustrator Josep Bartolí. One could say that – unlike others – he was lucky because he befriended one of the guards. But their friendship irritated other guards, who in turn put Bartolí and their compassionate colleague through the mill. The only way for Bartolí to cope with the hardships and separation from his love was to draw.

The time of Bartolí’s suffering and constant moral dilemmas inspired a French comic artist and cartoonist of the Le Monde daily, known as Aurel. Josep is his debut film, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. The film uses captivating and bleak images from the internment camp and elsewhere to create static portrayals of certain moments as well as references to Bartolí’s work. Scenes from happier periods of Bartolí’s life, when he went to Mexico, where he became the lover of Frida Kahlo, then create an even sharper contrast.

The story behind the film Even Mice Belong in Heaven began in 2010 when director and graphic artist Denisa Grimmová came up with the idea to adapt Iva Procházková’s successful book into a puppet film. Its originality lies, among other things, in its approach to death, which the author can present to children with ease and playfulness.

The creative team approached the book with great ambitions, screenwriters added plotlines and characters and this Czech production became a co-production between four countries. After almost ten years of preparation, development, filming and post-production, viewers can look forward to a thrilling adventure set predominantly in the afterlife. Two animals, considered by their close friends to be weirdoes and outsiders, Quickfeet the mouse and Whitebelly the fox, have an accident and run into each other in animal heaven. Despite being arch-enemies in life, together they set out on a journey to overcome old sorrows, find a new beginning and develop an eternal friendship. The film offers not only an original story full of intense emotions but also an unforgettable spectacle enhanced by the puppet design, decorations, setting and meticulous animation.

For little Ilze Burkovska-Jacobsen, director of this captivating ani-doc,      World War II was her favourite war. It was in this Great Patriotic War where the Nazis were finally put in      their place by the great and glorious Soviet Union, whose heroes little Ilze watched      on television programmes filled with Soviet propaganda. She liked to pretend to be fallen soldiers and made every effort not to tarnish their memory. As a ‘proper patriot’ she defended the ‘prosperity’ brought to Latvia by the Soviet Union… As she would learn later in      life, the reality was far from what it seemed to be and from what Ilze saw on TV, at school and from her father. It’s this first-hand experience with living in Soviet-controlled Latvia that enhances the truthfulness of My Favorite War. The director puts animated visions from her childhood in contrast with photorealistic      archival footage, people spreading the truth (her grandfather, declared an ‘enemy of the people’) and real events from the places where she grew up. Cut-out animation and an artistic style characterised by, among other things, the obsidian black eyes of all the characters emphasises the oppressiveness experienced in the described period between the 1970s and the 1990s by      the people of Latvia and many other countries.

When she was just a little girl, Lauren had a strange encounter on the Japanese island of Okinawa. A mythical demon called a baku crept into her sleep and consumed all her nightmares. Since then, Lauren has wanted to meet the baku again. And what’s more – she’s convinced such magical creatures need our protection. In an alternative reality version of the 1960s ‛hippie era’ in the US, Lauren uses the help of her friend Joan, a seer, and together they establish a special zoo for cryptids – mythical animals and other (often dangerous) creatures. Here people can admire them and neither they nor the animals are exposed to danger. But Lauren and Joan are not the only ones who search the world for the last surviving legends. Their peacenik culture is opposed by the militant Nick, who sees these magical creatures as a means of gaining power and is set on hunting the baku. With her help, he wants to destroy the dreams and plans of ‛all hippies and other scum’ and establish an authoritarian regime. So Lauren has her hands full with saving all the endangered creatures. But is the cryptid zoo the right solution? And what does her sidekick Phoebe, who belongs among the endangered creatures, think? The road to achieving Lauren’s ideals leads them through America, where they encounter a clairvoyant and a treacherous faun and get involved in bloody conflicts. Everything is in psychedelically colourful settings created by graphic artist and director Dash Shaw, whose film My Entire High School Sinking into the Sea (2016) was awarded a Special Mention of the Jury at Anifilm 2017.

An adventurous story about how easy it is to lose freedom and how hard it is to get it back. A group of street artists arrives on an island lost in the ocean which is ruled by the all-powerful Commander. A botched cannon shot during their performance at a fair triggers a series of dramatic events. Young man Drin, girl Tuvi and seagull Natan are suddenly outnumbered by the Police.

Even though the film, with a slightly nostalgic undertone was made by a small independent team on a very limited budget, it boasts superb puppet animation and unusual stylisation and voice casting. This puppet film by renowned Czech director and graphic artist Jan Balej, whose trademark style has played a significant role in Czech animation after the Velvet Revolution, won this year’s Czech Lion Award.