Don Hertzfeldt’s ‘World of Tomorrow’ Selected Best Animated Short of 2015

A survey of 20 international animation experts from twelve countries has selected Don Hertzfeldt’s World of Tomorrow as the best animated film of 2015. The results were published by the Montreal-based film publication 24 Images.

What I appreciate in particular about this recognition is that it’s not yet another award or contest. The survey participants, comprised of festival programmers and critics, simply listed their top 10 picks of the year, and their lists were tallied together to see which films received the most votes. Even better, every participant’s top 10 choices are made public, which serves as a superb short film guide for adventurous animation viewers.

Hertzfeldt’s World of Tomorrow premiered last January at Sundance, where it won the grand jury prize, and has since gone on to win prizes at top film and animation festivals including AFI Fest, Annecy, Fantoche, Ottawa, SWSW, and Zagreb.

It should be noted that just three films from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science’s 10-film Oscar shortlist also made the animation experts’ top choices: Don Hertzfeldt’s World of Tomorrow, Claude Cloutier’s Carface, and Konstantin Bronzit’s We Can’t Live without Cosmos.

Here’s the tally of films that received three or more mentions in the survey:

13 MENTIONS

World of Tomorrow, Don Hertzfeldt (USA)

9 MENTIONS

Rhizome, Boris Labbé (France)

8 MENTIONS

The Master (Isand), Riho Unt (Estonia)
Teeth, Tom Brown, Daniel Gray, Hungary (Hungary-USA-England)

7 MENTIONS

Le Roi des aulnes (Erlking / Erlkönig), Georges Schwizgebel (Switzerland)
Uncanny Valley, Paul Wenninger (Austria-France)

6 MENTIONS

Sonámbulo, Theodore Ushev (Canada)

5 MENTIONS

Le Repas dominical / Sunday Lunch, Céline Devaux (France)
Peripheria, David Coquard-Dassault (France)

4 MENTIONS

Autos Portraits / Carface, Claude Cloutier (Canada)
Mynarski chute mortelle / Mynarski Death Plummet, Matthew Rankin (Canada)
The Pride of Strathmoor, Einar Baldvin (USA)
Small People with Hats, Sarina Nihei (UK)
Splintertime, Rosto (France-Netherlands-Belgium)
We Can’t Live Without Cosmos, Konstantin Bronzit (Russia)
Yùl et le Serpent, Gabriel Harel (France)

3 MENTIONS

Edmond, Nina Gantz (UK)
Ernie Biscuit, Adam Elliot (Australia)
Guida, Rosana Urbes (Brazil)
House of Unconsciousness (Alateadvuse maja), Pritt Tender (Estonia)
My Dad, Marcus Armitage (UK)