Pakistan’s first hand-drawn animated feature film, ‘The Glassworker’ will be screened at the 2024 Annecy International Animation Film Festival in June. Previously, a showreel of the film was shown at the same festival in 2022.
The film will be screened alongside films from huge animation studios like “Moana 2” from Disney, “Inside Out 2” from Pixar, and “Despicable Me 4” from Illumination. Other big unveils at the festival will be a preview of “The Wild Robot” from DreamWorks and a sneak peek at Zack Snyder’s “Twilight of the Gods” from Netflix.
The Glassworker Will Screen in the Contrechamp Competition
The Contrechamp Competition at Annecy was introduced in 2018. Contrechamp is a cinematic term meaning “reverse shot”. It features a more specific selection of independent films in competition at the festival.
The Glassworker will be screened along with 10 other animated features. There are films competing from countries all over the world including South Korea, the Philippines, Spain, Hungary, and Japan, among others.
Huge News for Pakistan’s Animation Industry
Annecy is the largest and oldest animation film festival in the world, named for the French town it’s held in. First held in 1960, the festival has promoted animated features, shorts, student films, and films made for television for decades. Since 2002, it has also included films made for the internet.
The inclusion of a Pakistani film, in competition at the festival is a huge honour. Hopefully, this will open more doors for animation in general in the country. At the very least, it will make a name for Usman Riaz’s Mano Animation Studios.
The Annecy Film Festival will be held from 9-15 June, 2024. The Glassworker will be screened in full at a yet undisclosed date
