The 23rd edition of South Korea’s Bucheon International Animation Festival (BIAF2021) came to a close Tuesday, announcing this year’s award winners. The Crossing by Florence Mialhe took the BIAF Grand Prize for feature film, Audience Prize and Diversity Prize. Another artful feature, My Sunny Maad by Michaela Pavlátová took both the Jury Prize and Music Prize. In the short film competition, Hugo Covarrubias’ Bestia won the Grand Prize, while Steakhouse by Špela Čadež was awarded the Jury Prize.
The Crossing is a unique film that shows refugee issues from the perspective of children. A fairytale-like painting style using mainly primary colors highlights this POV — however, the colors are not the clear and vibrant ones normally associated with children, instead being somewhat dingy. The BIAF2021 juries praised Mialhe’s amazing work for its consistency in the theme, while bringing out the maximized diversity of animative expressions in the film.
The jury said of the impactful use of music to push the story in My Sunny Maad: “It was impressive that the refreshing wind instrument of the music led the melody on the native base reminiscent of the Middle East culture, harmonized the center without erasing the color of tradition, and helped the film develop its natural scenes. It was amazing as they were all combined and sounded as if listening to a single song. In the more educational scenes where women dream of freedom, they played a pop-style music showing their unlimited musical production, which further [showed] the meaning of the film that talks about women’s freedom and growth.” (Read more about the movie in the December ’21 issue of Animation Magazine, available soon.)
BIAF2021 Award Winners:
Feature Film
- Grand Prize – The Crossing, Florence Mialhe (Germany/France/Czech Rep.)
- Jury Prize – My Sunny Maad, Michaela Pavlátová (Czech Rep./France/Slovakia)
- Special Distinction Prize – Inu-Oh, Masaaki Yuasa (Japan)
- Special Distinction Prize – Archipel, Félix Dufour-Laperrière (Canada)
- Audience Prize – The Crossing, Florence Mialhe (Germany/France/Czech Rep.)
Short Film
- Grand Prize – Bestia, Hugo Covarrubias (Chile)
- Jury Prize – Steakhouse, Špela Čadež (Slovenia/Germany/France)
- Special Distinction Prize – Love, Dad, Diana Cam Van Nguyen (Czech Rep./Slovakia)
- Special Distinction Prize – Anxious Body, Yoriko Mizushiri (Japan)
- Special Distinction Prize – Battery Daddy, Seungbae Jeon (S. Korea)
- Audience Prize – Ecorce (Peel), Samuel Patthey, Silvain Monney (Switzerland)
- AniB’s Choice – Ecorce (Peel), Samuel Patthey, Silvain Monney (Switzerland)
Graduation Film
- Jury Prize – Girl in the Water, Shirou Huang (Taiwan)
- Special Mention – Amayi, Subarna Das (India)
TV & Commissioned Film
- Jury Prize – Vanille, Guillaume Lorin (France/Switzerland)
VR
- Jury Prize – The Hangman at Home, Michelle and Uri Kranot (Denmark/France/Canada)
Korean Short Film
- Jury Prize – Namoo, Erick Oh (U.S.)
- Special Distinction Prize – Battery Daddy, Seungbae Jeon (S. Korea)
Special Prize
- EBS Prize (Short) – L’Amour en Plan (Plans for Love), Claire Sichez (France)
- KOSCAS Prize for most popular film – Fortune Favors Lady Nikuko, Ayumu Watanabe (Japan)
- COCOMICS Music Prize – My Sunny Maad, Michaela Pavlátová (Czech Rep./France/Slovakia)
- Diversity Prize – The Crossing, Florence Mialhe (Germany/France/Czech Rep.)
- KAFA (Korean Academy of Film Arts) Prize – Invisible Eyes, Seunghee Jung (S. Korea)
BIAF2021 was held October 22-26 in Bucheon, South Korea. Learn more at biaf.or.kr/en.
