Day by day, the Animafest weekend is almost here, but ahead of the inevitable ‘see you next year’, this festival edition also puts on its best suit for the last dance. And we start again with children and youth. Business as usual – Kinoteka at 9:30 am, ages 7-10 and guest Fiona Rolland (Bobel’s Kitchen). At 2 pm, however, we are already ‘coming of age’ (15+) with Julie Černa (Stone of Destiny) and Charlotte Annereau (Pebble to Pebble), as well as a number of other outstanding films for youth. At 4 pm, the key question ‘Who Am I’ arrives from the southern part of the Korean peninsula, that is, the third segment of this year’s focus-on programme with works that raise questions about identity in the context of urban life. Dahee Jeong (Man on the Chair), Leeha Kim (Mascot), Junka Kim (The Posthuman Hospital) and Sujin Moon (Persona) are just some of the filmmakers gathered here, represented in flesh and blood by Kyoung-bae Kim (Seoulsori) and Erick Oh (Origin) who will talk to the audience. This is followed by the Grand Competition Short Film 2 (6 pm), and then a connoisseurs’ treat – the new film by the legendary Quay brothers Sanatorium under the Sign of the Hourglass (8 pm). The third feature-length work by the masters of puppet-films of dark atmosphere is again an adaptation of their favourite writer Bruno Schulz, which takes place in an institution where time and space, and therefore life and death, do not exist according to known conventions. With a strong gothic atmosphere, but deeply rooted in the tradition of Central European art, this psychophysical cyclical labyrinth of memories, nightmares and visions of an elusive kaleidoscope of characters and a prevailing melancholic-macabre, dreamlike atmosphere is certainly a very demanding, but also deeply fulfilling piece. After the premiere at the Venice festival, the Zagreb audience can now immerse themselves in the unique world of the duo who found an original ‘excuse’ for their absence from Animafest, stating that a lot has certainly changed here since they last visited Zagreb in the late 1980s. At least when it comes to the central festival location, they don’t even know how wrong they are.

Today, in the evening slot (7 pm), the MSU will also show a top title from the Grand Competition Feature Film – Memoir of a Snail by Oscar winner Adam Elliot. But before that, at 6:30 pm, a sweet treat is intended for ages 6+ and anyone who feels that way. Tales from the Magic Garden is a family-friendly stop-motion animated adventure about the importance of storytelling as a source of comfort.

The professional programme on Friday is teeming with insightful lectures, talks, presentations and workshops. At 10 am, the MM Centre will present the projects in development: Immortal, a feature film by Renato Grgić and Kristijan Petrović (producer: Vanja Vascarac) and Meta, short film by the Popović brothers and Božo Balov. At 11 am, a masterclass on the topic of ‘Narrative Puzzles’ will be held by Grand Competition Short Film Jury member Osman Cerfon, who will talk about absurdity and surrealism, genre hybridisation and open structures as keys to reality. At noon, a screening and discussion on the new wave of Japanese animation, more accurately the presentation of the NeW NeW event, will be held by Sarina Nihei, also a member of the Grand Competition Short Film Jury, Ryo Orikasa, Kazuki Sekiguchi and Isaku Kaneko. At KIC, on the other hand, the workshop ‘Film for Everyone Everywhere – Inclusive Potentials of Cinema’ of the Filmaktiv Association (‘Film for Everyone’ initiative), led by Maja Ogrizović, is scheduled for 4 pm. It consists of a screening of an inclusive film accessible to the deaf and hard of hearing as well as the blind and visually impaired, a discussion about the film and inclusion, and learning the basics of Croatian sign language. The iconic Rise & Shine continues in the Studio-gallery Klet.

And the afternoon at the MM Centre is quite unique. At 4 pm, a member of the jury of the Student and Croatian Film Competition, co-founder of the Vienna festival Tricky Women/Tricky Realities Waltraud Grausgruber prepared a special film programme under the title ‘Moms on Fire and Other Acts of Liberation’ that opens up space for female and gender non-conforming perspectives – images that irritate, challenge and transform, question social conventions and explore alternative ways of seeing, and whose focus is bodies, relationships and biographies in flux. The programme is named after the film by Joanne Rytel, but also includes works by other women masters of classical and contemporary animation such as Marta Pajek, Noémie Marsily and Carla Melo Gampert. Special mention should be made of Madame Potatoe by Emma Calder, who unfortunately left us forever last year. Personal, political and feminist, the film caused a sensation in 1983 with its uncompromising portrayal of women’s liberation and creativity in the context of questioning the media spectacle and representation of success. Grausgruber will personally present her programme and the festival. At 6 pm, the MM Centre will host a retrospective of Veljko Popović (and the author himself) with nine works from the period 2008-2024. Popović’s work is the point at which Croatian computer 2D and 3D animation definitely and steadily steps into one full of artistic creativity and affirmation, which is why She Who Measures and Cyclists are rightly considered modern classics. The rich day ends at 8 pm with ‘The World Is on the Edge’ 2 with films dedicated to war. The works of Joško Marušić (I Love You Too), Paul Wenninger (Eerie Valley) and Anja Kofmel (Chrigi) can be highlighted, but all nine are worthy of the attention of the film-loving audience.

SC Cinema opens at 1 pm with World Panorama 2. This is followed by Student Film Competitions 2 and 4 (3:30 pm and 5:30 pm), with the number four being followed by guests HongYu Yue (Urban Duo), Martin Bonnin (Between the Gaps), Lea Favre (Hunting), Petra Pavetić Kranjčec (From Peter to Aida), Gregory Bouzid and Maxime Crançon (Trash) and Thanys Martin (Jeanne & Jean Jean). As befits, the prime-time slot will feature Grand Competition Short Film, this time number five, and Rui Ting Ji (Still Moving), Tobias Rud (Fish-Thinking), Marko Meštrović (How), Marcelo Iglesias (Don’t Look at Me), Suresh Eriyat (Croak Show) and Jan Saska (Hurikán). The same will happen after Grand Competition Short Film 6 at 10 pm, when Sarah Beeby (Gardening), Raphaël Jouzeau (Scars We Love), Edmunds Jansons (Freeride in C), Marten Visser (Skroll), Rafael Ruiz Espejo, producer of Cecilia Andalón Delgadillo’s film Dolores, and Thomas Meyer-Hermann, producer of Elena Walf’s film A Pain in the Butt, will make a stop at the SC.