Mamoru Oshii brings his basset hound to compete at Annecy

by Chris MaGee

Anyone out there who's a fan of Mamoru Oshii knows that the 58-year-old anime director is a fan of basset hounds. They have appeared in most of his feature films including "Ghost in the Shell: Innocence" (above). Now one of these lovable pooches is going to finally be the star of an Oshii film, albeit a short one. Oshii's 12-minute animated short film "Je t'aime" will be in competition at this year's Annecy International Animated Film Festival. The short will be set in a post-apocalyptic near future in which humans have been wiped out and feature a basset hound who wanders the blasted landscape pining for "the warmth of a human being".

Annecy is considered the Cannes of animated films, and Oshii's "Je t'aime" will be competing against 39 other short films, including four others from Japan - Kei Oyama's "Hand Soap", Shinsaku Hidaka's "Koisuru Nezumi", Mirae Mizui's "Playground" and Atsuko Nagashima's "Roku-jyo to yo-jyo-han". The 50th annual Annecy International Animated Film Festival runs from June 7th to 12th in Annecy, France. For a full listingt of this year's line-up click here. Thanks to Anime News Network for this news.