The National Film Board of Canada announced it is adding even more compelling, award-winning animated shorts to its free streaming film collection on nfb.ca this month, kicking off with the launch of Bad Seeds in honor of International Animation Day (October 28). These latest additions join the more than 5,500 titles already available on on the site, along with NFB’s collection of about 100 interactive works, almost all of which are available for free online viewing.
Friday, October 28
Bad Seeds by Claude Cloutier
(2020, Unité centrale / NFB French Program Animation Studio | 6’22”)
Growth goes hand-in-hand with rivalry, and evolution with competition, in this shocking animated duel that’s peppered with allusions to the western film, the Cold War, board games and much more. An official selection at over 25 festivals around the world, this film has already won six awards, including Best Animation Short at the 2021 New York City Short Film Festival.
A Claude Cloutier retrospective will also be available on nfb.ca. Collection curator Marc St-Pierre has written a blog post about the filmmaker’s body of work. Since the 1980s, this seasoned animator has made 13 films produced or co-produced by the NFB, including the award-winning shorts The Persistent Peddler (1988), Sleeping Betty (2007), The Trenches (2010) and Carface (2015).
Tuesday, November 8
Impossible Figures and Other Stories I by Marta Pajek
(2021, Animoon / NFB English Program Animation and Interactive Studio | 16 min.)
Following an explosion, a mysterious and elegant elderly woman wanders deserted city streets, recalling what was and what could have been. The final film (and first part) of Marta Pajek’s acclaimed trilogy, Impossible Figures and Other Stories I is a mysterious and haunting portrait of personal and societal self-destruction. Selected by more than 50 festivals around the world, this short has won seven awards to date, including the Golden Dove for Best Animated Short Film at the DOK Leipzig Festival.
Monday, November 21
Meneath: The Hidden Island of Ethics by Terril Calder
(2021, NFB English Program Animation and Interactive Studio | 19’22”)
In this stop-motion film, Orkney Cree Métis creator Terril Calder charts a challenging journey for a precocious Métis baby girl as she contemplates her path to Hell. The short film was selected to screen at the 2022 Annecy and Berlin festivals after its world premiere at the 2021 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), and has garnered many awards, including a Special Mention – Canadian Film Institute Award for Best Canadian Animation at the 2021 Ottawa International Animation Festival.
Read more about Meneath in Animation Magazine‘s interview with Calder here.
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