It’s been a while since I have attended a film festival and the lovely folks at Cardiff Animation Festival let me stretch the old critic legs and enjoy a weekend full of brilliant and quirky films made by students and professionals alike.
As ever, CAF was excellent from beginning to end. I saw a lot of familiar faces and met lots of talented filmmakers. It was truly a privilege to watch the result of months of hard work and passion, so it’s only fair I celebrate the work by spreading it out across several posts rather than a single long posts.
Here is Part I of my Cardiff Animation Festival coverage:
Shorts 5: Home
There we 13 films in this category with each bringing their own visual style and perspective on the theme. Interpretations of home ranged from a personal residence to a whole community or country, exploring themes including homesickness, hoarding, and how our home shapes our identity.
We were treated to beautifully abstract works in Homesickness which boasts vivid oil pastels to full narrative stories such as the wonderful stop-motion piece, Two Black Boys in Paradise, is a visual poem exploring two young men’s journey to self-acceptance.
For me, the standouts were Sophia Uy’s PASALUBONG! and Qianhui Yu’s Statue in the Garden. PASALUBONG! explores the friendship of two Filipino children in an airport mall before one of them moves to the USA. In Statue in the Garden, a young woman finds a statue of a dog in the garden of her new home and discovers its history.
Small Pics highlights:
- PASALUBONG! directed by Sophia Uy
- Statue in the Garden directed by Qianhui Yu
Shorts 6: Shuffle
Shuffle had 10 films which were all about bringing the unexpected and experimenting with the medium. Thematically, these films are abstract.
There are films that explore the nuances of everyday life to those that deal with external crises. Ostrich and How to Build a Sand Castle are fast-paced vibrant pieces that explore identity and finding one’s voice in a very personal way, while De Imperio is an intense glimpse into imperialism and the struggles to fight against it.
My highlights in this selection were Shadab Shayegan’s Pear Garden in which a six-year-old girl visits her grandma following the latter’s mastectomy. Not fully understanding the situation, the little girl chases grandma’s shadow at night to try and get her breasts back. One of my favourite shorts of the entire festival, the animation was stunning and had a childlike quality and perspective. Shayegan’s use of mismatched colours and shapes that seem out of place convey the confusion and plight faced by the child.
Ovary-Acting is a comical stop-motion film following a young woman who is frustrated with people pressuring her to have baby. When she unexpectedly gives birth to her reproductive organs in the bathroom, the two talk through societal expectations through a brilliant musical number.
Small Pics highlights:
- Pear Garden directed by Shadab Shayegan
- Ovary-Acting directed by Ida Melum
Different Voices Short Films
Different Voices is an ongoing program developed by Biggerhouse Film that provides neurodiverse filmmakers the opportunity to create and present their work. Before the screening, we got to hear from some of these wonderful filmmakers and the selection was incredibly strong.
Fawn by Molly Mayhew follows the eponymous character returning to her childhood home and dealing with the trauma she experienced growing up at the hands of her parents. We see adult Fawn encounter her child self and come to terms with what has happened, literally and figuratively confronting the trauma and comforting her inner child.
Marco Luke Drago’s The Man, the Moth, the Legend is a mockumentary following American folklore legend, Mothman, and his life in Point Pleasant, West Virginia. In two minutes, we see watch Mothman recount his life as an outcast and the unexpected celebrity he became later.
Small Pics highlights:
- Fawn directed by Molly Mayhew
- The Man, the Moth, the Legend directed by Marco Luke Drago
The subsequent parts will follow in the coming days, so stayed tuned. I’m going to be stretching and celebrating this as long as possible because the festival is such a major platform for many of these artists and filmmakers and I had such a blast.
And remember: support independent filmmakers and artists!