13th Children Kinofest: The Largest Children’s Film Festival Announced the Program

From June 12 to 21, the 13th Children Kinofest — one of the largest Ukrainian cultural projects for children and teenagers — will take place and, as always, will be completely free of charge. This year, the event will become even more special because the Children’s Film Competition — a contest of young directors aged 7–14, held annually within the framework of the festival — will celebrate its 10th anniversary.

Cinema screenings will take place in Kyiv, Dnipro, Lviv, Odesa, Chernihiv, Poltava, Khmelnytskyi, Zhytomyr, Vinnytsia, Zaporizhzhia, Ternopil, and Lutsk. Attendance requires prior registration — this can be done from June 5 on the festival website. To register a group of more than 5 people, one should contact the local coordinator. Partners of this year’s festival became the PLUSPLUS TV channel and the Kyivstar TV film and television platform.

Films of the International Competition will be shown in cinemas, and the best of them will be determined by audience voting. These are 7 new films from various European countries for children’s audiences:

• “Arco” (France, USA, United Kingdom) — this year’s Oscar nominee and Best European Animation according to the European Film Academy. This is a fantasy story about a boy who sets off on a journey through time.
• “Olivia and the Invisible Earthquake” (Spain, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Chile) — winner of two nominations for the European Film Academy Award from the Locarno Film Festival program. An animation about a girl who turns her family’s stressful move into an exciting game for the sake of her younger brother.
• “Mary Anning and the Treasures of Ancient Times” (Switzerland, Belgium) — participant of the world’s main animation festival held in Annecy. The real story of a girl who, at the age of 12, made one of the most important paleontological discoveries in history.
• “Barry. Rescue Dog” (Germany, Switzerland) — another film based on real events. The film tells about an orphan boy from an alpine monastery who raises a puppy that will later become the most famous rescue dog in the world.
• “Forester” (Poland, Czech Republic) — participant of the Locarno Film Festival and winner of the SCHLINGEL festival award for Best Children’s Role. A fantasy about a girl who accepts the challenge of her classmates and sets off in search of mythical creatures from her mother’s fairy tales.
• “The Secret Floor” (Germany, Austria, Luxembourg) — winner of the Giffoni International Film Festival. A fantasy film about a boy for whom an old hotel elevator becomes a time machine to the year 1938.
• “Lost in the Jungle” (Latvia, Poland, Czech Republic) — an adventure animation for the youngest viewers about a girl searching for her missing younger brother in tropical wilds.

A special retrospective film screening — a tradition of Children Kinofest — will also take place in cinemas. This year, the organizers will turn to modern classics and focus on the legendary Irish studio Cartoon Saloon, which gave the world the famous animated films “The Breadwinner” and “Song of the Sea” and received 5 Oscar nominations. The festival will screen their debut film — the Irish folklore-based “The Secret of Kells” (directors Tomm Moore and Nora Twomey).

The cinema screenings will close with the winner of last year’s Children Kinofest — the Italian-French film “The Last Time We Were Children.” The film, based on the Italian novel of the same name, tells the story of four children who play war while a real one explodes around them.

In the festival online cinema, viewers will see the special program “Northern Lights. The Best Children’s Cinema of the Nordic Countries.” The selection of 12 films combines classic and modern cinema from Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark, and Iceland — a region famous for its powerful production of children’s film content, specialized programs at major film festivals, and separate film events for children. The program includes:

• “Moomins and the Comet Chase” (Finland, Poland) — a restored version of the famous animation decorated with a soundtrack by Björk, the creation of which was personally supervised by author Tove Jansson.
• “The Snow Queen” (Finland) — a surreal fairy-tale film based on Andersen’s work of the same name, submitted by Finland for the 1988 Oscar.
• “The Children of Noisy Village in Winter” (Sweden) — a screen adaptation of Astrid Lindgren’s stories about the adventures of young residents of a tiny Swedish hamlet by three-time Oscar nominee Lasse Hallström (“Chocolat”, “My Life as a Dog”).
• “The Brothers Lionheart” (Sweden, Iceland) — another adaptation of Lindgren — a fantasy filmed from her screenplay about two brothers who enter a magical world. Winner at Berlinale.
• “Doctor Proctor’s Fart Powder” (Norway, Germany) — an adaptation of the modern bestseller of Norwegian author Jo Nesbø, a comedy about friends who protect the explosive invention of their scientist neighbor from treacherous kidnappers.
• “Bamse and the Volcano” (Sweden) — a new animated adaptation of the legendary Swedish comic series on which more than one generation of children grew up. Adventures of the strongest and kindest bear in the world.
• “Valhalla” (Denmark) — participant of the Annecy Animation Festival, a fantasy about two children who meet Thor and Loki and enter the kingdom of the Scandinavian gods.
• “The Great Race” (Norway) — the most visited Norwegian film of all time, a puppet animation about a genius inventor and his crazy supercar for racing.
• “Kasper and Emma at the Theatre” (Norway) — nominee for the Amanda Norwegian Film Award, a family film about two friends who, after their first visit to the theatre, decide to stage their own play.
• “The Boy in the Golden Pants” (Sweden, Denmark) — participant of the Cinekid festival, a family fantasy about a boy with magical pants whose pockets are always full of money.
• “Siv Sleeps Astray” (Sweden, Netherlands) — participant of Berlinale, a fairy-tale film about a seven-year-old dreamer for whom a sleepover becomes a magical journey.
• “Lars. LOL” (Norway) — nominee for the European Film Academy Award and winner at the Cinekid festival. A sensitive drama about the friendship of a girl with a boy with Down syndrome.

Also online there will be a special screening of “Okaybye” (Netherlands) — participant of the Children Kinofest 2024 program and winner of the youth jury prize at the Chicago International Children’s Film Festival. The main heroines are teenagers Jamie and Iman, who run away from a school for children with hearing impairments to visit the grandmother of one of the girls.

Both in cinemas and online it will be possible to watch the works of the finalists of the 10th anniversary Children’s Film Competition. Viewers will take part in voting for the Audience Choice Award winner. Submission of works for participation continues until May 10 on the website.

Children Kinofest is the largest film festival for children and teenagers in Ukraine, created with the aim of educating a new generation of film viewers in Ukraine, developing practices of family cultural leisure, and promoting the art of cinema. Since its founding in 2014, the event has been attended by more than 300 thousand viewers.

With the support of UNICEF, the EU program “Creative Europe,” and the State Film Agency of Ukraine.

Partners: Embassy of France in Ukraine, French Institute at the Embassy of France in Ukraine, UKRSIBBANK, Embassy of Norway in Ukraine, Embassy of Belgium in Ukraine, Embassy of Finland in Ukraine, Embassy of Spain in Ukraine, Goethe-Institut in Ukraine, Embassy of Italy in Ukraine, Italian Institute of Culture in Ukraine, Polish Institute in Kyiv, Embassy of Sweden in Ukraine, Embassy of Switzerland in Ukraine, UKRSIBBANK.

General media partner: Suspilne Kultura

General television partner: PLUSPLUS