Annecy 2025: Andy Serkis animal farm, ninja turtles against AI and goats cannot jump

Small summary of the latest events of the Annecy International Animation Film Festival

Goat, basketball in the skin

Eight long months before its release (in the animation industry, it is an eternity), Sony Pictures Animation presented to Annecy the first images of Goat. A blockbuster on which the studio is visibly large, and which could be roughly summarized as a mixture between Zootopia,, Space Jam And Whites cannot jump. The story of a young crazy but too small goat, who will still try to make a place for himself at the level. In this universe only populated by animals, the most popular league is La Roar, a very, very muscular version of the NBA, where only the best physically cut players can hope for.

Really uninteresting project, produced by basketball player Stephen Curry and signed Tyree Dillihay, who previously got hold of 32 episodes in the series Bob’s Burgers. The young man took place a slightly mechanical speech on the stage of the Bonlieu space where the presentation took place, and unfortunately had no stage ended to offer to the public. Under these conditions (most of the extracts were still only in very preliminary animation phases), difficult to make an opinion on this film that Dillihay presents as a tribute to sport but also (especially?) To the culture of basketball, which extends far beyond the land. Exit scheduled in France on February 18.

Andy Serkis on the farm

Starting from the constant that The animal farm De George Orwell had not been entitled to an adaptation for ages, Andy Serkis embarked on the adventure. A way of the cross, dixit the interested party, since the project started… 14 years ago. The film carries the stigma of this complicated gestation, made of infinite rewritings and research of funding. In fact, The animal farm Seems to have been made with a very modest budget: if the design of animals, very simple but not unpleasant, rather holds the road, the sets and the overall aesthetics of the project bring us back in 2010.

Serkis and his teams have also sought to reinvent the tale at all costs, even if it means making shortcuts that are not possible and to increase the subject on modern capitalism. A little endless, the feature film still has for him to show his nose at the time when the authoritarian diets of all hairs take power all over the planet. Even in a slightly failed version, The animal farm never completely loses its warning function.

Everyone is looking for their Smurf

In the small room in Bonlieu (strangely because we were used to the big one), Paramount came with loaded arms. The studio had in its 20-minute suitcases of the feature film Smurfs of Chris Miller (the other, the director of Shrek 3 and Potted cat) and the first act of Bob the sponge – The film: looking for the lost sponge Derek Drymon. The first is a rereading of the work of Peyo (amazing cosmic opening), where we will discover why the village of Smurfs exists and why each inhabitant has a precise function. If the design straddling the comic strip (the faces as hand -drawn) and 3D is rather refreshing, we did not expect the film to indulge in the mixture with the live action (at the end of what was shown in Annecy, the characters tumble in Paris!). Hopefully the following has a little more under the hood …

Much more delusional, the new Bob the sponge seems to be a little treasure of humor slapstickwhere the said Bob will have to prove his value by facing the flying Dutchman, a pirate ghost who wants to use his naivety to reincarnate in a physical body. Really funny and full of visual ideas. Cinema release on December 24.

And the presentation ended with two large songs: an hilarious short film almost silent from Bob the sponge, Obviously stayed in the boxes for ten years (!) Where Carlo tentacle farts a lead when Bob continues to use the restaurant of the restaurant; as well as a short Ninja turtles Unpublished with heroes at war against artificial intelligence. A film with a very high fun content, where the four teenagers stuff an AI/robot which very clumsily copies their image to make them horrible figurines. These two shorts will be visible before Smurfs And Bob the sponge – The film: In search of the lost sponge.