Animation Now

‘Animation Now’ celebrates a new generation of queer animators. The programme includes both 2D and 3D animation in the form of narrative shorts, experimental art film and an immersive game walkthrough. 

The screening starts with the heartfelt 3D animation Dear Nana telling the story of the narrator’s late grandmother who was a supportive figure throughout their life. Clotilde follows in a stop-motion animated medium and provides a playful light-hearted moment in the programme.

The screening ends with a panel featuring some of the filmmakers in the programme on the newest wave of digital animation. Expect talk of gaming-inspired filmmaking.

Curated by Nat Lall.

Tickets are on a pay what you can sliding scale of FREE, £2, £4, £6, £8, or £10. To book, click here or call the CCA Box Office on 0141 352 4900.

Dear Nana (2023, Dir. Han Nguyen): Dear Nana is a deeply personal work that reflects my own childhood memory of living as a queer kid in a small, conservative town in North Central Coast, Vietnam. It is made in memory of my maternal grandmother who passed away in 2011. She was the first person to teach me that there is no shame in being myself and doing whatever makes me happy instead of trying to conform to the norm and doing what is expected of me. This work is both about remembering her and reassuring myself that she would still be supportive of me now that I have come so far in my journey of self-expression. The film also features aspects of Vietnamese culture, such as the tradition to venerate our ancestors and pray for their blessings.

Clotilde (2023, Dir. Maria João Lourenço): In a planet where reproduction is mandatory in the daily life of its inhabitants, there is an alien who just wishes to pleasure herself.

White-Haired Witch and Black-Haired Witch (2023, Dir. Yini Yang): In a distant corner of the universe, amidst flowers, vines, and an endless expanse of crimson water, numerous placentas float. One of the placentas connects two fetuses, and in a flash of lightning, the placenta is divided into two halves. From one of the halves, a white-haired witch grows gradually, longing to find the other half of the fetus but unable to locate it. Consequently, it gives birth to a black-haired witch from its own body to coexist. One day, the black-haired witch embarks on a journey, leaving behind a letter documenting its travels for the white-haired witch. While waiting, the white-haired witch finds answers and returns to the primordial dream.

Living with It (2023, Dir. Holly Summerson): Perfectionist Lee (Annabelle Davis) must adapt to the imperfect reality of living with an illness – brought to life as a chaotic supernatural flatmate – Bug (Lawrence Chaney). Accepting the long-term effects of illness – and making the best of an imperfect situation – are explored through the relationship between two dysfunctional flatmates in this dark comedy animated short.

Coming Out Autistic (2023, Dir. Steven Fraser): Coming out Autistic is a short animated documentary that explores the experience of telling the world that you are autistic when you also identify as LGBTQ+. Queer coming out stories are well documented, but the occurrence of telling friends, family, co-workers and strangers that you are autistic is less explored. Parallels with queer experiences are investigated and a wide range of individuals are interviewed to express the array of feelings and reactions that are encountered.

Desire’s Exhibition (2023, Dir. Salmo Pagão): With the aim of finding Desire, so-and-so performs a ritual to go down in the depths of himself. There he came across an exhibition of Desire’s works which had until then haunted his dreams and non-dreams in land. It is important to him confront the works, recognize them, and rise with crucial answers.

A mother’s love for her baby (2022, Dirs. Éiméar McClay & Cat McClay): Using a combination of 3D animation and experimental prose, A mother’s love for her baby explores the corruption and conditions endemic in the Magdalene Laundries and mother and baby homes run by the Catholic church in Ireland throughout the 20th century. Influenced by Saidiya Hartman’s concept of “critical fabulation” – the use of storytelling to fill the gaps left in historical records – the film advocates for a bottom-up form of historiography: centring historically marginalised voices of Irish women and critiquing the structures of power that (re)produce their dispossession.

Junior & The Kid (2023, Dir. Dani Wasserman): Junior & The Kid is a sparse retelling of a fictional love affair between an unnamed western cowboy and 90s baseball superstar and heartthrob Ken Griffey Jr.

Where the Mouth is (Machinima Version) (2022, Dir. Benjamiin Hall): Set in the Saxon-era archipelago once where Oxford now stands, “Where the Mouth” is (re)builds Oxfordshire as an interactive world outside of time, leaping off from the collections of the public Museum of Oxford. You are let loose in the swampy terrain to observe the local tradition of ‘beating the bounds’ – marking parish boundary stones with a stick in order to embed them in the memory of the town’s residents. The mouth of that collective memory has issued many truths, half-truths, desires, cries, anecdotes, apocryphal stories, and tiny reminders of a future from the past. 

Originally commissioned by the Museum of Oxford and Digital Artist Residency, with later support from Bloomberg New Contemporaries Digital Fellowships; Soundtrack by Peter Talisman (Slugabed and Samuel Organ) as mixed from their 2021 album ‘Lord of the Harvest’; Movement/ motion capture performance by Anya Sirina; Special thanks to Tom Milnes.

Patches (2021, Dir. Georgie Athanasopoulos): Outcast due to physical differences, a lonely little boy in the 1920’s makes an unlikely friend and finds belonging through sacrifice.

The Prince’s Dilemma (2023, Dir. Devin Rowe): The film follows Prince Philip, who longing to be with a prince of his own, must decide to follow the traditional tale expected of him or forge his own happily ever after.

ACCESSIBLITY 

Content Warnings:

• Discussion of living with a chronic illness;
• Depictions of animated genitalia, animated masturbation.

This screening has an age recommendation of N/C 16+.

74 minutes long with a Q&A after the screening.

English, Latin, Portuguese, and Vietnamese audio and screens with English language captions. BSL-English interpretation and live captioning provided for the intro and panel discussion.

We have an Audience Access Fund for travel. If you would like to take this up, please visit the access desk at the entrance of the CCA, or contact by emailing [email protected].

You can find out more information about accessibility at SQIFF 2023 here. If you have any questions about accessibility at SQIFF 2023, please get in touch with us at [email protected] or by phone on 07873 331 036.

We ask that you wear a mask if possible and please don’t attend the screening if you have any symptoms of Covid-19 or have been in recent contact with a confirmed case. FFP2 masks will be available for free around the building.

Image: from Coming Out Autistic (2023, Dir. Steven Fraser)