The international Animation Festival Fest Anča, the only one of its kind in Slovakia, will focus this year’s program on the theme of bodies and everything related to corporeality. During its upcoming 18th edition, taking place from June 24 to 29, the festival will present up to 25 Slovak majority and minority films across both competitive and non-competitive thematic sections.
The main International Competition of Shorts will offer a rich selection of 36 films, with the only Slovak representative being the Czech-Slovak-Ukrainian co-production I Died in Irpin (dir. Anastasiia Falileieva, 2024). The film had its world premiere last year at the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival, where it also won the Best Animation Award.
In the Slovak Competition of Shorts, most entries come from the production of the Film and Television Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts. Student works include three adventure films for children: Feast (dir. Rebeka Vakrčková), Havo (dir. Michal Dubjel), and Boiling Shapes (dir. Samuel Škrabálek). These are complemented by the sci-fi short Drowned Places (dir. Katarína Jelínková, Darya Sidorova, Viktória Zimmermannová). The section concludes with Free the Chickens by Matúš Vizár, which premiered last year at the prestigious Annecy International Animation Film Festival.
One of the thematic sections, Film Block: Dialogue Between the Body and the Environment, presents a curated selection of Slovak short films exploring the theme of the body and corporeality. The retrospective, curated by animation film theorist Eva Šošková, features eleven titles mapping the development of Slovak animation over nearly three decades. It’s a diverse collection encompassing various genres, animation techniques, and themes. The selection begins with two films from 1997: Lovers Without Clothes, the directorial debut of Katarína Kerekesová, and The Crocodile Doesn’t Give a Shit (dir. Matej Kladek), one of the shortest Slovak films at just 48 seconds. These are followed by the award-winning In a Box (dir. Michal Struss, 2001), Fat Fatal, a 2005 bachelor film by Michaela Čopíková, and The Spring (dir. Michal Meszároš, 2008), created using 3D computer animation. The first decade of the new millennium concludes with two 2010 films: the hand-drawn Blue Red (dir. Daniela Krajčová) and tWINs, a successful graduation film by Peter Budinský.
The second half of the retrospective continues chronologically with Pandas (dir. Matúš Vizár), which earned third place in the Cinéfondation section at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival, marking a major success for post-1989 Slovak animation. Two films from 2016 follow: the drawn animation Chilli (dir. Martina Mikušová) and the puppet animation Deer Brother (dir. Zuzana Žiaková). The selection closes with Poetika Anima by Kriss Sagan (2018), created using a mix of 2D CGI and hand-drawn techniques. All featured works were produced at the Film and Television Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts.
The thematic Film Block: AFN Presents: That’s What She Said, Vol. 2 will include the Slovak film Dream Rotation by the directorial quartet of Katarína Jelínková, Darya Sidorova, Viktória Zimmermannová, and Rebeka Vakrčková.
The non-competitive section Short Films from Around the World will showcase top picks from the international festival circuit. Representing Slovak production is Hurikan (dir. Jan Saska), a co-production between the Czech Republic, France, Slovakia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina, which premiered last year in Annecy.
The humorously titled Extremely Short Section of Extremely Short Films will highlight works by two promising young Slovak talents: The Grind by student Marta Müller from the Digital Arts Department at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design, and Catch the Light by Matej Adam Gemza, representing the Elementary School of Arts in Poprad.
The Anča in Wonderland program, which annually reflects audience feedback and focuses on unusual films, will feature The Master by Bogdan Perederii, a student of the Private Secondary School of Film Art in Košice.
Fest Anča also caters to younger audiences, with three Slovak films included in two family-friendly sections. The Short Films for Children program will feature the student film How the Bear Composed a Song (dir. Kristína Bajaníková) from the Academy of the Performing Arts. The Program for Children will include two feature-length films that have gained international recognition: Living Large (dir. Kristina Dufková), which premiered last year in Annecy, and Tales from the Magic Garden (dirs. David Súkup, Patrik Pašš Jr., Leon Vidmar, Jean-Claude Rozec), which had its premiere at this year’s Berlinale.
