„I'm here” and „Fury” with awards at the Slamdance festival
Co-financed by the Polish Film Institute, the short film „I’m here” directed by Julia Orlik received the Grand Jury Award for the best short animation at the Slamdance Film Festival. A special distinction was awarded to Krzysztof Kasior’s documentary – „Furia”. One of the most important independent cinema festival in the world took place on January 20-30, 2022.
The image „I’m Here” – by a student of the Film School in Łódź – has already won the Best Student Short category at the Kaboom Animation Festival in the Netherlands and the Dušan Vuko Award for the best student film at the Animafest International Animated Film Festival in Zagreb. The film also received the Grand Prix at the following festivals: PÖFF Shorts in Estonia, the Polish Etiuda & Anima, and the 1st Prize in the French Nice Short Film Festival and the Golden Pigeon statuette at the German DOK Leipzig. In addition, the animation was awarded a special mention at the Krakow Film Festival and the Stuttgart festival, as well as the Audience Award at the ANIMATOR festival in Poznań. The animation was also presented in competitions of festivals, incl. in Shanghai, Nijmegen and Busan.
The film tells the story of a marriage in which an older man takes care of his paralyzed wife. Despite his old age and his own health problems, he does his best to alleviate her suffering. He is helped by his daughter, who tries to reconcile taking care of her mother with work in the hospital and her family life. Each of them has different views on what care should be like, which leads to many arguments.
„Fury”
Documentary by Krzysztof Kasior – a graduate of directing at WRiTV University of Silesia and the Dok Pro Program at the Wajda School, who is also the author of its script – has so far been shown at the Krakow Film Festival, and was also included in the Millennium Docs Against Gravity and German DOK.fest Munich competitions. Mateusz Golis was responsible for cinematography, Filip Drzewiecki for editing, Marzena Majcher for music, and Krzysztof Kasior, Mateusz Golis and Marcin Popławski for sound. The film was produced by Władysław Ślesicki Film Foundation in co-production with Wild Panda Film and Gaugan Film.
In the description of the plot of the film we read: Ola is 25 years old, works in a call center in a small town, does not get along with her parents, and there is no one really close to her. When problems worsen, she is referred to therapy. However, instead of on the couch, she starts going to MMA training, brutal cage fights. Within a year, she turns out to be the best among Polish amateurs and dreams of gold in the world championships. She returns from Las Vegas defeated and must finally face herself.