Animatou is a festival dedicated to bringing the best of Swiss and international animation to spectators of all agesand promoting an awareness of art films rarely screened in commercial cinemas.

The festival propose four competitive programs:
- international
- young
- swiss
- experimental

Animatou also presents a series of programs outside of competition:
- Features films
- Documentary program,
- Selection of Music Videos,
- Best of Annecy Program, and
- A selection proposed by the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts.

Animatou’s collaboration with Swiss universities includes a partnership with the Geneva University of Art and Design: putting the art of animation into practice, each year the school’s students create the festival’s trailer.

Each year, a country is selected on the basis of its high quality of production for a special program.
Thank you to ESPACIO CENTER for inviting Animatou for a carte blanche. We have selected some short animated Swiss films and we hope you’ll enjoy the programme!

Animatou, International animated film festival in Geneva, Switzerland, 4 -12 octobre 2014 is a festival dedicated to bringing the best of Swiss and international animation to spectators of all ages and promoting an awareness of art films rarely screened in commercial cinemas. Animatou tries to offer the best, the most unusual and the most imaginative animation, with an intergenerational programming for both young and old, screenings for an informed public and professional meetings. The strength and substance of the Animatou Festival is to touch all audiences, explore the narrative potential of animation through screenings of short and feature films, workshops for children and master classes.

Animatou is also the synergy of several dynamics that allow the Festival to exist and shine: film makers, producers, schools, cultural partners, institutions, and of course, the volunteers.

Animatou’s collaboration with Swiss universities includes a partnership with the Geneva University of Art and Design: putting the art of animation into practice, each year the school’s students create the festival’s trailer.

Animatou will be serving as the vector between the artist, the creation and the public, with a competition bringing together many film makers from different countries all over the world.

Each year, a country is selected on the basis of its high quality of production for special programmes including a school programme, a retrospective of work by a film director, along with a focus on some of the contemporary work from this country and its new talents.

Animatou invites you to lose yourselves in a unique world and immerse yourselves in animated creativity. Animation is an inexhaustible source of inspiration for its creators and still promises many more years of wonderful discoveries that we are looking forward to sharing with you all.

Lani Weber Schaer
Matilda Tavelli Cunado
Co-Directors

BON VOYAGE
Directors:Fabio Friedli
Producers: Hochschule Luzern - Gerd Gockell
Production company: Hochschule Luzern
Scriptwriter: Fabio Friedli
Music: Sound Design: Thomas Gassmann
Animation: Fabio Friedli, Nils Hedinger, Martin Waespe

Dozens of emigrants climb on to an overcrowded truck. Their goal: fortress Europe. When they arrive there after an exhausting journey, the confrontation with another brutal reality awaits them: the European handling of refugees.

Technique Drawn animation

ROMANCE

Director: Georges Schwizgebel
Producer: Studio GDS, National Film Board of Canada (NFB), RTS Radio Télévision Suisse
Production company: Studio GDS -  Schweizer Radio und Fernsehen , National Film Board of Canada (NFB)
Scriptwriter: Georges Schwizgebel
Music: Sergej Rachmaninov Sound Design: Olivier Calvert
Animation: Georges Schwizgebe

An airplane passenger falls asleep while watching a movie and dreams of his pretty neighbour. A pretext for a visual interpretation of a Rachmaninov scherzo where fantasy and reality are fitted together.

Technique Drawn animation

MIRAMARE
Director: Michaela Müller
Producer': Coproduction
Production company: Academy of Fine Arts University of Zagreb
Scriptwriter: Michaela Müller
Music: Sound Design: Fa Ventilato, Michaela Müller
Animation: Michaela Müller

A look at life on the mediterranean borders of Europe, where tourists try to relax while “illegal” immigrants struggle for a chance to a better life. Breaking out of a strictly confined tourist zone, two children of a Swiss family rapidly experience that reality here has very little to do with the posh life in the camping site. Then a storm hits the shore and washes away almost all distinctions between rich and poor.

Technique Paint on glass, Cameraless animation

DER KLEINERE RAUM
The Smaller Room
Directors: Nina Wehrle, Cristobal Leon Dooner
Producers: Nina Wehrle
Production company: Nina Wehrle
Scriptwriter: Nina Wehrle, Cristobal Leon Dooner
Music: Sound Editing: Nina Wehrle, Cristobal Leon Dooner
Animation: Nina Wehrle, Cristobal Leon Dooner

In a room there is a box. In the box there is a forest. In the forest there is a lost child. Living beings made of paper appear and vanish in “Der kleinere Raum”.

Technique Puppet animation