Rolling off Cannes Directors’ Fortnight hit “I Lost My Body,” Charades has boarded another artful animated film, “Unicorn Wars,” Alberto Vázquez’s solo follow-up to “Birdboy: the Forgotten Children.”
“Unicorn Wars” tracks two brother teddy bear soldiers, Azulín, who yearn for unicorn blood to be beautiful for ever; and Gordi, who just wants to be accepted and liked. Their mission sparks total war, leading to the arrival of the most terrible of demons: Man.
Drawn in expressive and increasingly dark charcoal strokes, “Unicorn Wars” chronicles a brutal and resonant ancestral struggle between teddy bears and unicorns in a magical forest.
Mixing humor, drama and myth, the war fantasy is produced by France’s Autour de Minuit, Borderline Films, Autour de Minuit’s new Angoulême studios, Spain’s Abano Producións, and Uniko, Belgium’s Panique run by Vincent Tavier, whose co-production credits include “A Town Called Panic,” and “Ernest & Celestine.”
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“Unicorn Wars” was presented by Vázquez at last year’s Cartoon Movie forum where it drew large applause.
“Despite being quite a new company, Charades is managed by partners with large and complementary professional experience. In just two years, it has built up an incredible reputation, with a hugely impressive lineup, seen above all this year at Berlin and Cannes,” said Autour de Minuit’s Nicolas Schmerkin.
“The fact that Charades is positioning itself as a specialist seller of adult animation projects makes it as ideal partner, and will help us complete financing more easily,” added Schmerkin.
Charades’s co-founder Yohann Comte said “‘Unicorn Wars’ was “highly cinematic, multi-layered and quite crazy in a way that can appeal to adult audiences as does ‘I Lost My Body.” The executive, whose company is also behind the Oscar-nominated film “Mirai,” added that “I Lost My Body” is one of the fist non-political animated films aimed at adult audiences.
Vázquez’s previous animated film “Birdboy: the Forgotten Children” was picked up by Gkids for the U.S.