Mouse for Sale

Wouter Bongaerts’ Mouse for Sale has been selected for the Toronto International Film Festival Kids (TIFF Kids, 10-22 April). The screening is part of the festival’s Loot Bag programme featuring ‘international animated adventures’. The public section offers a collection of imaginative stories showcasing a diverse range of animation styles.

In Mouse For Sale, directed and produced by Wouter Bongaerts, Snickers, a lonely mouse in a petshop, desperately wants someone to buy him. But he’s got one big problem: his huge ears. The kids entering the store keep laughing at him. Bongaerts graduated cum laude with Mouse For Sale at the Media, Arts & Design Academy in Genk, Belgium.

Four Flemish shorts have been selected for competition at the Lille European Film Festival. Nicolas Daenens’ 27, Rosto’s The Monster of Nix, Kevin Meul’s The Extraordinary Life of Rocky and Wouter Bongaert’s Mouse For Sale will screen in the French-Flemish “métropole” from 30 March-6 April.

The Lille European Film Festival is organised annually with the purpose of revealing short film talents, facilitating meetings with potential partners or buyers, and increasing the general public’s awareness of short films. The European Film Festival was founded as a festival exclusively dedicated to shorts, but now shows feature films as well. Participation in the fest’s competition, however, is reserved for short films only.

Anima, the Brussels International Animated Film Festival, which runs from 4-13 March, is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year. The festival offers a wide variety of animation fare: 118 shorts and 12 features from all over the world will be shown at the festival. Anima 2011 will also welcome key players such as Michel Ocelot, Bill Plympton and Peter Lord.

Most of the animation selected from Flanders comes from recently graduated animators. Among them is Mouse For Sale, the winner of the first VAF Wildcard for Animation. Director Wouter Bongaerts studied at the Media & Design Academy of Genk. His internships during his last year offered him new insights into 3D animation, leading to the heart-warming short of a mouse in a pet shop, and a potential buyer. dANCE, an animated short by Wouter Sel, will premiere at Anima 2011. It portrays a graphic choreography which evokes the rise and fall of two different clans. This production is supported by the Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF), among others.