‘The sun thief’ is the 2022 final project carried out by the 4th year Animation students of L’Idem Barcelona. A 2D Animation short film that tells the story of Uma, a brave girl who defies the gods to save her village: a small town affected by water shortage, drought and high temperatures.
For 9 months and under the supervision of the school’s teaching team, 2D Animation and Art specializations students have worked on this audiovisual production, reproducing the workflow of an Animation studio. ‘The sun thief’ features original music created by ESMUC Master’s Degree in Soundtrack and Music Composition for Audiovisual Media students.
Length: 5’35”
Technique: 2D Animation
Production: L’Idem Creative Arts School in collaboration, Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya (ESMUC) and the Réseau des Écoles Françaises de Cinéma d’Animation (RECA).
Synopsis
In the distant past, before the existence of night, young Una lives in a village ravaged by the intense and constant presence of the sun. Witnessing the suffering of her villagers under such conditions, Una plucks up her courage and travels to the temple of Ramesh, the sun god, to plead with him for a solution. She convinces him to extinguish the sun using his magic brazier.
Upon returning to her village and finding that an eternal, cold night is not much better than the previous situation, Una decides to steal the brazier from the God to take control of the sun. However, her theft is discovered and stopped by a crazed Ramesh. Blinded by anger and seeking retribution, the god kills Una in front of his entire village. And, seeing the villagers’ reaction, he senses human suffering for the first time.
He then realizes that Una’s intentions were noble and, repentant, Ramesh decides to immortalize her as a light in the night sky. And in this way, he allows her to watch over the welfare of his people during the second half of each day. And so the god creates the moon and the cycle of day and night.