Looking Forward to the Future Vision Festival
Tokyo, Amsterdam and Online
18-29 December 2021
Animation fans, be sure to tune in for a guaranteed good time at Future Vision Festival this month with programmes online, airing on SALTO 1 TV Amsterdam, and in an exhibition and screening opening in downtown Tokyo on December 18th. Meanwhile, in Amsterdam, the plague has scuppered plans for a sister screening op de Dam at Vrij Paleis on December 18. Luckily though, everybody around the world will now get the opportunity to see these strange and wonderful films online.
‘Huge thanks to the thousands of makers who made this festival possible by sending us their work,’ says Fay Heady-Carroll, Tokyo based animator and artistic director of the festival. ‘Future Vision Festival is a celebration of unusual animation. The team selected films which broke the mould in terms of technique and subject matter and by manipulating images and interfaces in unusual ways. The main focus of the festival is animated shorts but some of the live action films we received were so outstanding that we felt we also had to include them in the programme.’
The Future Vision Festival Programme
Opening Exhibition & Live Screening at SUB Store Tokyo, December 18 2021.
The screening consists of three 30-minute programmes of animated shorts: 'Future Visionaries' new films by student of Utrecht University of Arts (NL), 'Human Programme' exploring the human condition and what it means to be human. Last but not least, 'The Bodily Fluids Programme' presents films overflowing with shit, piss, cum and blood (not forgetting the buckets of sweat produced by the animators). An exhibition will run at SUB Store, Tokyo 18-29 December 2021. This includes 'Moving Paintings' films which do away with conventional narratives and delight the eye, festival collectables, artwork and 360VR Works which will also be made available on the festival site during the festival period.
Future Vision Festival on SALTO 1 TV
Exclusive interviews, features, behind the scenes, Future Vision Amsterdam special editions and lots and lots of films throughout the festival period 18-29 December 2021.
Future Vision Online
The online programmes will be available to view free on the festival website. Animation fans can dive into the stream exclusively on 27/28/29 December. Over these three days, films grouped by theme and genre, will be streamed along with interviews and features. Each programme run between half an hour to about two hours. For a full listing of the films, see the festival site, but here’s a taste of what to expect.
Animated Documentaries: A theme of prisoner emerged in this category with USA well represented. This programme includes 'What Really Happened During the Salem Witch Trials', 'Grandma’s Closet' about the first black child in a white school and 'Freedom Swimmers' swimming from China to Hong Kong. Animation is the ideal medium for representing biographical information, historical figures and events where footage doesn’t exist, or for illustrating concepts as in 'Roshemon Effect' (USA), a technically tight animation showing how we can be prisoners of our own perceptions.
Superheroes and Kaiju: Superhero tropes are a mainstay of comics and animation but are often subverted here by films such as 'Fuck the Superheroes' and 'Portal Thing' made by children for children. Proving that superheroes are not just for kids, here comes 'Thunder Woman' an Italian film in which a sexy superhero girl battles a kind of kaiju. Kaiju feature both as heroes and villains in 'Godwin' (Japan), 'Beware of Femi-Nazis' (UK), 'Summer Nights' (Argentina) and 'Siamé - Mr Fear' (Argentina).
Robots: Lots and lots of robots all over the shop! They’re taking over your screen.
Smoking: Light up with 'The Judge' (Iran), 'Selfie' (India), 'Runner' (Japan), 'Matchbox Stories' (India) and 'Raucher' (Germany) about a guy giving up smoking.
'Tortoise and Hare' (rabbit actually) features ‘Home’ (Iran), ‘Boom’ (Argentina), ‘Carrot Feeder’ (China), Taka Kum Omega’ (Japan) in which a man and his rabbit battle evil forces.
Freaks: 'We accept you one of us!' Are they even animation? Films include text based 'Where the Fuck’s The Mute?' (UK), 'Travelling Past to Save the World by Killing Corona Virus' (India) a whimsical live action made on a phone, two forms of the same film 'Martian 3D' and 'Martian 2D' (USA), and JFK conspiracy theory related films 'JFX' (USA), and 'Eureka!' (Canada) which is the shortest film in the festival at 15 seconds long.
‘We received exquisite, animated treasures from every corner of the world,' says Fay. 'These voices are unusual to hear and impossible to ignore. The films are a mix of every imaginable animation style, bending and blending techniques and transmitting a gamut of themes direct from the zeitgeist of today's animation makers worldwide.’
Check the full Future Vision Festival programme on the website.