The Best International Short Animation award of the 20th Lebu International Film Festival went to ‘Song Sparrow’, directed and produced by Farzaneh Omidvarnia from Iran.

After winning in the Chile Short Film Festival, the Iran/Denmark production is now qualified for Oscar 2021 after winning the award in the Oscar-qualifying festival.

The animation depicts a group of refugees who, in search of a better life, pay a smuggler to take them across the border in the back of a refrigerated meat truck to a safe country.

‘Song Sparrow’ uses puppet animation to tell this tense tale based on an actual event that happened in Austria in 2015.

The people in the animation represent different ages, races, colors, and cultural backgrounds, all of them willing to put their lives on the line in search of a dream, while in reality having little choice.

Cinelebu is the only film festival in Chile qualifier of short films for the Oscar Awards in the categories of International Animation, Regional and International Fiction.