Animation Is Film has announced the 2023 winners of its annual film festival, with “Chicken for Linda!,” directed by Chiara Malta and Sébastien Laudenbach, winning the grand prize. The film also took home the audience award.
The special jury prize went to Pablo Berger’s “Robot Dreams.” In the short categories, “Letter to a Pig,” directed by Tal Kantor, won the grand prize. “Wild Summon,” directed by Karni Arieli and Saul Freed, won the special jury prize.
The in-competition feature films included “Art College 1994,” “Chicken for Linda!,” “The Concierge,” “Mars Express,” “Phoenix: Reminiscence of Flower,” “Robot Dreams” and “Sirocco and the Kingdom of the Winds and the Summer.”
Opening night film “The Boy and the Heron” and closing night film “Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget” screened out of competition and were not eligible for prizes.
“Chicken for Linda!” follows a mother, Paulette, who goes to extreme lengths to make a meal of chicken and peppers for her daughter, Linda, who requested the meal after Paulette unjustly punished her. The dish reminds her of her father; feeling guilty and dealing with a general strike that shut down stores, Paulette will do anything to get a chicken for Linda. The film comes from the U.S. distributor GKIDS.
“With ‘Chicken for Linda,’ Sébastien Laudenbach and Chiara Malta honor the challenges and rewards of being a single parent in a hectic world, employing a visually original artistic style through which lively brush strokes and daubs of color bring relatable human characters (and one very flustered chicken) to vibrant life,” the jury said in a statement.
“Robot Dreams,” which will be released by Neon, is based on Sara Varon’s graphic novel. The film tracks “the adventures and misfortunes of Dog and Robot in NYC during the ’80s.”
“In a poignant mix of humor and pathos, director Pablo Berger adapts Sara Varon’s graphic novel, showing how people and places shape our lives, while paying homage to New York City in the 1980s,” the jury said of “Robot Dreams.” “That he conveys this through pantomime and animation, without using dialogue, is all the more remarkable.”
For more information on the festival, which ran from Oct. 18-22 at the TCL Chinese 6 Theatres in Hollywood, visit animationisfilm.
