Lucca Animation

Italianimation is a non-competitive programme that aims to offer to our best artists the possibility to reach a great audience. A fixed appointment in Lucca Animation to promote Italian Animation and arouse interest, both in the audience and in the professionals, for a too often overlooked sector. This decision stems from the acknowledgement of the existence of a vast animation production in our Country, yet with few possibilities to make it to a wide distribution.

After the golden age of Carosello (the Italian advertising show, with ads created also by great animators) Italian animation got no longer the attention of the audience and fell soon into oblivion. The Nineties saw a slow reemergence of the industry with the two famous feature by Enzo D'Alò (La Freccia Azzurra and La Gabbianella e il Gatto) and some studios attempting television series production. This positive climate expanded to auteur animation that started again to be seen and garnering successes at international festivals.
Simultaneously, in the latest decade, a generalised renewed attention to the animation phenomenon brought new momentum to this art and promoted the birth of new schools, courses and passion that are in these years bringing their fruit.

Obligatory mention goes, before all, to the animation department of the Scuola Nazionale di Cinema (National School of Cinema) born in 2001 in Chieri (Turin), which is backed by the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia (Experimental Film Centre) of Rome and produced in the latest years a number of graduation films awarded in festivals. Many other schools could be cited alongside this first one, from the famous ISA in Urbino to the IED in Milan, all graduating young  talents.
Another important production comes from the studios, which are mainly engaged in commercials and commission films, but whose directors and animators create also new series and short films.
Independent animators, working on their own and continuously presenting their often self-produced works in the festivals, not rarely with nicely surprising outcomes, are the real lifeblood of our animated cinema.
Italianimation selection for this year reflects this picture: films like Il mistero del pesce (The Mystery of the Fish) or Pimogenito complesso (Firstborn Complex) are realised by studios and, in this case, co-produced abroad; works from individual animators, or from artist coming from other fields, such as music (Tommaso Cerasuolo), graffiti writing (Blu), or from art in general.
What we can see is a varied scenario that is still lacking the attention it deserves and a whichever form of stability, but that is surely promising and we want to encourage in any way we could.