acmi gets an oscar in time for 4th melbourne international animation festival opening night!
Coinciding with the opening night of the 4th Melbourne International Animation Festival (22-27 June), the Acting Premier, the Hon John Thwaites, joined Australia's two winners of Academy Awards for animation, Adam Elliot and Bruce Petty (Oscar winner 1977), to unveil a new public display at ACMI of Adam's Oscar and the 'plasticine star' of his film Harvie Krumpet.
When Harvie Krumpet won the Academy Award for animation a wave of euphoria swept across the country. This small budget film made in suburban Melbourne and its charming and unassuming team of makers had triumphed over the massive resources and clout of the international studio empires.
Almost immediately Adam Elliot's Oscar became a symbol of the best, most ingenious and inspired aspects of Australian culture and the local film industry.
A number of Adam's earlier films have screened at previous Melbourne International Animation Festivals; Harvie Krumpet will screen at this year's festival, and ACMI is currently screening some of the films he made as a student at the VCA in its Memory Grid.
Bruce Petty and Adam Elliot are the judges of the Australian animation category for the 4th Melbourne International Animation Festival.
'Adam's decision to lend his Oscar and Harvie for permanent display and the enjoyment of visitors to the Australian Centre for the Moving Image is remarkably public spirited,' says Terry Cutler ACMI board President.
'This loan is a tribute to Adam's enormous generosity and to his close relationship with ACMI, which is responsible for nurturing new and emerging talent and for celebrating the best Australian and international moving image arts, including animation through its support for Melbourne's annual International Animation Festival.'
The sheer diversity of the 200 films from more than 20 countries set to screen in the 4th Melbourne International Animation Festival includes programs showcasing the little known utterly unique (and some might say truly bizarre) films from Estonia and a program of work by John Kricfalusi (of Ren and Stimpy fame) which reveals one of the strangest imaginations around. Add to this an eclectic collection of Animated Documentaries, great low-cost programs of kids animations, and the ever-popular Best of the Festival, and you have what has truly become one of Australia's great film festivals.
Both Bruce and Adam also have films screening in this year's event - Harvie Krumpet will screen as part of MIAF's Australian Panorama (Saturday 26 June, 6.30pm), and while Bruce's latest film Human Contraptions (which is distributed through Film Australia) will screen in the International Panorama Program 3 (Thursday 24 June, 7pm & Friday 25 June, 7.15pm).
Published Tuesday, 22 June 2004
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