| Location | Edinburgh and Glasgow |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2010 |
| Founded by | Andrew Partridge |
| Festival date | 3-5 November (Glasgow), 6-12 November (Edinburgh) |
| Language | International |
| Website | http://www.lovesanimation.com |
Scotland Loves Animation is a charity that promotes anime in Scotland. They hold an annual film festival called "Scotland Loves Anime" (often abbreviated to SLA) in October and work with other festivals to programme anime content into their schedules.[1] It will celebrate its 13th festival in 2023, which is currently scheduled to take place between 3 and 5 November in Glasgow and 6 and 12 November in Edinburgh.[2]
In May 2020, Anime Limited launched a new online festival in partnership with Scotland Loves Animation, called Screen Anime. This service hosted 4 films and one TV series monthly. It was available in the UK and Ireland only.[3] The service ended on 25 May 2021, as cinemas reopened in the UK.[4]
Scotland Loves Animation is a charity that promotes anime in Scotland, through hosting an annual film festival October and partnering with film festivals and other independent cinemas to screen anime-related content during the rest of the year. The festival was established in 2010 by Andrew Partridge, who later went on to start the Glasgow-based anime distributor Anime Limited. The main festival is based across of Scotland's two biggest cities: Glasgow and Edinburgh.
They host Education Days that run as part of the festival where the public can meet industry professionals in a full day of talks, panel discussions, and workshops. Previous guests have included The Garden of Words director Makoto Shinkai and Promare director Hiroyuki Imaishi. The festival also regularly invites directors to host Q&A sessions after their films have been screened. Previous Q&A sessions have included Naoko Yamada after the European Premiere of K-On! the Movie and Tomoki Kyoda after the European Premiere of Eureka Seven: Hi-Evolution Movie 1.[5][6] In addition to this, Jonathan Clements usually speaks before each film screening to share his insight about the director and films being shown.[7]
They have also screened films in partnership with other festivals such as the Glasgow Film Festival at the Glasgow Film Theatre and the Discovery Film Festival at the DCA.[8][9]
The festival has two awards, the jury award and the audience award, awarded to one of a selection of the festival's films that year. The jury award, often referred to as the Golden Partridge after festival director Andrew Partridge, involves a panel of judges who tend to see the films for the first time alongside the audience and, after seeing all the films in competition, debate privately and vote on which film to give the award to. The audience award as the name suggests involves audiences rating films after seeing them using an online form (earlier festivals utilised lollipop (popsicle) sticks being deposited in containers marked with the ratings on. These ratings are counted and averaged to identify the winner.[citation needed]
The "Scotland Loves Anime" film festival takes place every October in Glasgow and Edinburgh. The festival typically runs over a weekend in Glasgow, and over a week in Edinburgh. In Edinburgh they will show more films due to the greater number of film slots available. Because of the limited runs of anime films in cinemas outside of Japan, this is often the only chance to see many of these films at the cinema. Screenings for popular films are often sold-out long before the date of showing.
The festival is held in the Glasgow Film Theatre in Glasgow and the in The Cameo in Edinburgh.[10] The Edinburgh Filmhouse hosted the Edinburgh festival from 2010 to 2021 and the Belmont Filmhouse hosted the Aberdeen festival from 2015 to 2020, but in October 2022 the Centre for the Moving Image went into administration, closing these cinemas.[11]
Other events have included a festival in Aberdeen and a touring festival across the country.[12] The latter was brought back in 2021 and saw various Picturehouse locations around the country screen the most popular films of the 2021 festival.[13]
The 2023 festival will be held in November for the first time.
| Year | Dates | Films | Other information |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | Glasgow: 8–10 October
Edinburgh : 15–17 October[14] |
|
A special screening of Summer Wars was held at the DCA in Dundee, Scotland.[15] |
| 2011 | Glasgow: 7–9 October
Edinburgh: 14–16 October[16] |
|
Into the Forest of the Fireflies' Light won the first ever Golden Partridge award, even though it was a short film.[17] |
| 2012 | Glasgow: 12–14 October
Edinburgh: 19–21 October[18] |
|
Berserk – The Battle for Doldrey won the Golden Partridge, but only because Wolf Children wasn't in competition due to it not being a UK premiere. This rule was relaxed the next year.[17] |
| 2013 | Glasgow: 11–13 October
Edinburgh: 14–20 October[19] |
|
This year focused on the works of Makoto Shinkai. He was present for a Q&A after the EU Premiere of The Garden of Words. Patema Inverted won both the Golden Partridge and the new Audience Award.[20] This year was also the first year the festival ran for more than a weekend at Edinburgh. |
| 2014 | Glasgow: 10–12 October[21]
Edinburgh: 13–19 October[22] |
|
The staff from Studio Bones were present for a special screening of a few episodes of Space Dandy and a Q&A. Giovanni's Island won the Golden Partridge and the Audience Award.[17] |
| 2015 | Glasgow: 9–11 October[23]
Edinburgh: 12–18 October Aberdeen: 24–25 October[24] |
|
The festival expanded into Aberdeen for the first time. Miss Hokusai won the Golden Partridge and The Murder Case of Hana & Alice won the Audience Award.[25] This was also the year that Anime Limited started a discussion podcast about the films that are shown in competition at the festival. This podcast is hosted by the jury of the festival.[26] |
| 2016 | Glasgow: 14–16 October
Edinburgh: 17–23 October[27] Aberdeen: 9–11 December[28] |
|
Makoto Shinkai was once again the focus of this festival, as his new film Your Name. had its Scottish premiere at the festival. A Silent Voice also had its first screening outside of Japan at the festival. Both of these films sold out, and would go on to require additional screenings. Both the Golden Partridge and Audience award went to Your Name. this year.[29] |
| 2017 | Glasgow: 13–15 October[30]
Edinburgh: 16–22 October[31] Aberdeen: 2–3 December |
|
Lu over the Wall won both the Golden Partridge and Audience Award.[32][33] Due to the overwhelmingly negative reception of Eureka Seven: Hi-Evolution Movie 1 at the festival, Anime Limited canceled their plans to run a wider theatrical release of all three the Eureka Seven: Hi-Evolution Movies.[34][35] |
| 2018 | Glasgow: 12–14 October[36]
Edinburgh: 15–21 October[37] Aberdeen: 7–8 December[38] |
|
This year focused on the works of Mamoru Hosoda. His latest film, Mirai, had its Scottish premiere at the festival. Penguin Highway won the Golden Partridge and I Want to Eat Your Pancreas won the Audience Award.[39][40][41] |
| 2019 | Glasgow: 11–13 October
Edinburgh: 14–20 October Aberdeen: 24–30 January (2020) |
|
It was Scotland Loves Anime's biggest year yet, with over 3000 tickets sold. Weathering with You and Promare were the two biggest films this year, with over 1000 and 700 tickets sold for each respectively. The weekend of 19–20 October 2019 was the Edinburgh Filmhouse's 4th busiest weekend of all time, with the Saturday (19 October) having the most ticket sales in a single day in the history of the Filmhouse.[42] Weathering with You was also Glasgow Film Theatre's second biggest film of the month of October.[43] To celebrate the release of Promare, in 2019 Scotland Loves Animation held a special screening of the film at The Biscuit Factory in Edinburgh. It featured themed food and a Q&A with staff from TRIGGER, who were there to greet the audience.[44] The Golden Partridge went to Ride Your Wave, however the Audience Award went to Weathering with You.[45][46] |
| 2021 | Glasgow: 1–3 October[47]
Edinburgh: 11–17 October[48] Sheffield: 19-21 November Nationwide (Picturehouse): 4-5 November |
|
Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Q&As were pre-recorded and audience numbers significantly lower due to social distancing measures taking place. Fortune Favours Lady Nikuko won the Golden Partridge and Sing a Bit of Harmony won the Audience Award.[49] Another event called "Sheffield Loves Anime" took place in Sheffield between 19-21 November.[50] Furthermore, an event called "We Love Anime" took place nationwide on 4-5 December at Picturehouse[13] cinemas. The event was scheduled to be held in Showcase cinemas as well, but this never happened. |
| 2022 | Glasgow: 21-23 October[51]
Edinburgh: 24-30 October[52] Sheffield: 18-20 November[53] |
|
The line-up was announced on 16 September 2022. The festival had its first ever external curator this year, as Kambole Campbell programmed the Monday-Thursday films at the Edinburgh Filmhouse.[54] In Glasgow, Inu-Oh was followed by a Q&A with Masaaki Yuasa,[55] and in Edinburgh, Garden of Remembrance was followed by a Q&A with director Naoko Yamada and producer Eunyoung Choi.[56] Following the collapse of the Centre for the Moving Image on 6 October 2022, all screenings at the Edinburgh Filmhouse were cancelled.[11] The festival was moved to The Cameo, Edinburgh.[10] Goodbye, Don Glees! won both the Golden Partridge and Audience Award. "Sheffield Loves Anime" took place between 18-20 November. |
| 2023 | Glasgow: 3-5 November[57]
Edinburgh: 6-12 November |
|
The line-up was announced on the 22 September 2023.[58][59] |
Due to the 2020 Coronavirus Pandemic, the 2020 Scotland Loves Anime festival was held online. A small number of physical screenings were scheduled to be held, but they were all ultimately cancelled. The online part of the film festival was held in partnership with Screen Anime, a streaming service set up by Anime Limited earlier in the year. The online portion of the festival was held between 25 October 2020 and 25 November 2020. Two-thirds of the funds raised from the online festival was donated to the Glasgow Film Theatre and the Edinburgh Filmhouse.
The films that screened as part of Scotland Loves Anime on Screen Anime were:
The digital festival also featured two in progress films, Inu-Oh (Science SARU) and Josee, the Tiger and the Fish (Bones).
The physical festival was scheduled to be run on 7–8 November in Edinburgh and Aberdeen and 14–15 November in Glasgow, but these screenings were cancelled due to the tightening of Coronavirus restrictions throughout the UK. Lupin III: The First and On-Gaku: Our Sound were scheduled to be screened at these cinemas[60][61][62]