Usually, when people talk about animation, they either talk about American cartoons or anime. But what about Europe? Surely, Europe has put out some good cartoons as well.
What are the best European cartoons? Either shows or movies is fine.
I love Russian animation. I think it started when I saw the movie The Little Humpback Horse on television years ago.
Here it is in Russian. The one I saw was dubbed, with Jim Backus providing the voice for the king.
Then I saw Ballerina on the Boat, which is also charming, but animated in a different style. Loved this one, too.
Does claymation count? Aardman Animations and their movies are quite well-known, and not only in Europe.
I know them from the Angry Kid series. It used to be on Atomfilms.
Fantastic Planet. I think I saw it 3 times when it came out. I was 11 and I was amazed that animation was being used to tell a serious story.
Don’t forget Three from Prostokvashino !
The ***Asterix ***cartoons from France.
Russian cartoons are indeed very good. There’s a series called Prostokvashino that I used to watch with my daughter when she was little. The writing was clever and very funny, enough for both children and adults to enjoy.
There was an afternoon PBS show in the late 1970s called International Festival of Film. At least half of the content seemed to be European and its those shorts from two now extinct countries that made the greatest impact on me; Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia. The ones from Zagreb Studios were particularly memorable. If anyone can find a video of *[Homo Augens/I] online, please post a link here. I haven’t seen it in over 40 years and it still gives me nightmares.
Two great ones from France:
The Painting where the characters in an unfinished painting are alive and go seeking the artist to finish it up. Here’s the trailer. Visually beautiful.
Phantom Boy, about a boy with the ability to leave his body and who helps bring down an evil crime lord. Trailer
Elmer J. Fudd,
The cartoon short that you mention (Homo Augens) was in a TV series called International Festival of Animation, not International Festival of Film. Maybe you have been looking for the wrong title for the series. Perhaps you can find a videotape or DVD or something for the entire series somewhere rather than just that one cartoon. It looks like there are many other good cartoons in the series.
Yeah, I just had a brain fart when I typed that. Here is the closest thing to series guide I’ve been able to find:
The Triplets of Belleville is an animated French movie from 2003 that was nominated for a best animated feature Oscar (Finding Nemo won that year). It’s about a woman who raised her grandson to become a bicycle racer. When he’s kidnapped during the Tour de France, she goes on a mission to rescue him. Very funny, stands up to repeat viewings.
A Town Called Panic - Belgian stop-motion animation where all of the characters are plastic toys. The three main characters are a cowboy named “Cowboy,” an Indian named “Indian,” and a horse named “Horse,” all of whom share a house in the countryside. Of the three, Horse is the adult. This movie is full of manic, over-the-top action. The most-repeated line in the movie is, “Oh, no!” Very silly and very funny.
No love for Allegro Non Troppo?
My favorite Eastern block cartoon is Worker And Parasite :D.
I’ll just assume you mean “Nu, pogodi…” 
It always seems to me like stop-motion animation used to be a really big thing in Eastern Europe, probably because I remember stuff like for example the czech TV series The Octopuses from the Second Floor that featured life action combined with somewhat spooky stop-motion octopods.
One of the famous names of czech stop-motion was movie director and animator Hermína Týrlová.
Here is a link to one of her short movies, “Little Blue Apron”:
https://ulozto.cz/file/DSMP4TZXu/blue-apron-hermina-tyrlova-1965-shortmovie-no-language-avi
Ah, bellissimo!
“Frisney did THIS???”
I grew up watching*Il était une fois…*,
Me too! I loved it as a child and continued to watch when I was a teenager, although it was targeted at kids. Learned a lot from it.