Film & Animation

In 2011, two Italian filmmakers announced 8-Bit Generation, a stunningly-shot miniseries about the history of retro computing and gaming. Over 55 interviews were shot with a who’s who of tech legends, including a very rare interview with Commodore founder Jack Tramiel, who passed away in 2012.

Preorders were taken, the soundtrack released, and then? Nothing. The project and its creators disappeared, leaving nothing but questions and a bunch of angry fans. For the first time, one of the film’s producers talks publicly about what went wrong, the future of the project, and reveals exclusive, unreleased footage from the documentary.

Filmmaker and digital archivist Jason Scott will interview producer Bruno Grampa, flown from Milan to the XOXO stage.

CLOUDS is an interactive, generative documentary on the intersection of code and culture, drawn from 40 interviews with artists, designers and hackers into an ever-shifting conversation manipulated by viewers in real-time. Funded on Kickstarter, Brooklyn-based artists James George and Jonathan Minard will give a live walkthrough and answer your questions about how it was made.

In the world of PES, grenades are ripe avocados, birthday candles are laser fire, and rubber bands are cooked spaghetti. His imaginative stop-motion films have been viewed 61 million times on YouTube, and his Fresh Guacamole is the shortest film ever nominated for an Oscar.

PES joins us from Los Angeles to screen his work and share a sneak peek at Submarine Sandwich, his upcoming short that raised nearly $49,000 on Kickstarter.

Natasha Allegri started as a storyboard artist for Adventure Time, creating the gender-swapped Fionna and Cake characters. But she’s best known as the creator of Bee and PuppyCat, the animated story of a young disenchanted woman and her mysterious, space-traveling PuppyCat. The most-funded animation project in Kickstarter history, 18,000 devoted fans pledged $872,000 to make six more episodes.

We’ll screen the original pilot, and if you’re extra nice, Natasha might share an exclusive work-in-progress look at the upcoming series.

Irish animator David OReilly is the genius behind the recently-released Mountain simulator, the hologram game sequences from Spike Jonze’s Her, and a series of surreal and disturbing short films, like the award-winning The External World.

David joins us to screen A Glitch Is A Glitch, the Adventure Time episode he wrote, directed, and produced, in which the Ice King creates a computer virus that turns the Land of Ooo into a glitched-out, datamoshed disaster.

Last year at XOXO Film, Kirby Ferguson debuted the first episode of This Is Not A Conspiracy Theory, his Kickstarter-funded followup to Everything Is A Remix. This year, he returns to premiere the second part of the series examining the complex forces that shape the American political landscape.

Take the most-loved sci-fi adventure ever, split it into 15-second clips, and ask thousands of fans to remake their favorite segment however they see fit. The result was the Emmy-winning Star Wars Uncut, arguably the most insane and impressive fan-film of all time.

Two years in the making, Empire Uncut is the epic sequel, splitting The Empire Strikes Back into 480 scenes and assembled from 1,569 fan-made submission, nearly twice what they received for Star Wars Uncut.

For the first time anywhere, creators Casey Pugh, Jamie Wilkinson, and KK Apple premiere the fan sequel at XOXO Film.