9 min. / no dialog / dir. Karlis Vitols / Latvia
Are you a fan of the baby Minotaur? Then this film is for you. Vitols uses stop motion and oil paint on glass to tell the tale of a little Minotaur who is looking for a playmate in the Labyrinth while his father is at work. The lyrical, vivid film mashes up the world of Cretan myth with a few other familiar figures: the Minotaur appears much like Charon as he rows a boat through a gloomy landscape, the baby Minotaur observes and befriends a Sisyphus-like figure that turns out to be Daedalus or Icarus, attempting to fly with manufactured wings, and Theseus and Ariadne also make a brief appearance, though the baby Minotaur humorously thwarts the hero’s efforts in the Labyrinth. The film concludes with father and son playing together and the baby being comforted when he cries.
“My film, Minotaur, is about worthlessness of adult ambition as opposed to simple childhood happiness,” says Vitols. “Since the film is about flow of time it was important to realize it with oil paints on glass – thanks to animation the flow of time can also be seen literally.”
The film received the Latvian National Film Award “Lielais Kristaps” in 2017 for best animation film and the best animation artist.
More: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7604720/
Animated Antiquity 
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