STUDENT FILM DAUGHTER TO COMPETE FOR THE PRESTIGIOUS ACADEMY AWARD – THE OSCAR
On 13th January 2020, the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced the nominations in all 24 competition categories, from which the winners will be announced on 9th February at the awards ceremony in the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. The animated puppet drama Daughter by Daria Kashcheeva, student of the Department of Animated Film at FAMU, which was co-produced with MAUR film, was selected as one of the last five finalists in the Best Animated Short Film category! Daughter is thus the only Czech animated film that has in recent decades managed to compete for an Oscar. The director has already won many awards, the most prestigious being the Student Oscar for the best foreign animated film, which was awarded to her last September by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Her film also won in the world-wide competition of 1615 best film-school movies. Its world premiere took place in the biggest festival of animated film in the world, in French Annecy, where it was awarded the highest award, Le Cristal d’Annecy, for best student film. Since its premiere Daughter has entered more than 80 festivals all over the world, including major festivals […] ...
Two Czech Animated Shorts Made Their Way to the Sundance Film Festival
Two animated short films supported by the Czech Film Fund will compete at Sundance — the most prestigious independent film festival. It is another accolade in the collection of major achievements for Daughter and SH_T HAPPENS. Both films were included in the Short Film Competition. The festival will take place on 23 January to 2 February 2020 in Utah, USA. “I was delighted to learn that our school and Czech animation is represented by two films at Sundance. I am very happy that Czech animated film is riding on such a good wave now and I can be a part of it. It gives me a feeling of encouragement,” said Daughter director Daria Kashcheeva. This animated puppet drama comes from the university FAMU (Department of Animated Film), co-produced with MAUR film company. “Sundance is great news for us that came in the middle of a working night and boosted our morale by at least 300 percent. We are very excited to have an American premiere at their biggest and one of the most popular festivals in the world. Every year we follow the selection at the festival and we are pleased that Sundance has been dedicating a lot of space to […] ...
Grown-up Czech animation for grown-up audiences
Acclaimed director Michaela Pavlátová is currently working on a feature-length animated film for adults, My Sunny Maad, produced by Petr Oukropec and Kateřina Černá, of the production company Negativ. Article by Eliška Děcká for Czech Film Magazine / Fall 2019 The story of My Sunny Maad is based on the critically well-received and popular book Freshta (2012, Stork Press, UK) by Petra Procházková, a Czech investigative and war reporter with a wealth of personal experience of the realities of Afghanistan and everyday family life there. At the center of her novel Procházková set the partly autobiographical character of Herra, a foreigner who comes to Afghanistan to live with her beloved husband and his family. The original screenplay was adapted from Procházková’s book by Ivan Arsenjev. However, a variety of production problems, not least among them the impossibility of shooting in contemporary Afghanistan, meant that the production company, which has enjoyed a long and fruitful partnership with Pavlátová, from the feature films Faithless Games (2003) and Night Owls (2008) to animated short Tramvaj (2012, winner of the Annecy festival the same year) began to think in terms of a feature-length animated production. At the time, Negativ had only one feature […] ...
