Canadian animator Cordell Barker, creator of the Oscar-nominated short films, “The Cat Came Back” and “Strange Invaders,” is now in production on “The Anta Claus of the South Pole.” Release is scheduled for 2026.
The Tonic DNA/National Film Board of Canada co-production is produced in association with Crave, a division of Bell Media Inc., with the participation of the Canada Media Fund.
Described as an alternative Christmas Special, the family-friendly adventure comedy returns Cordell Barker to his signature style – hour and music-sluiced unpretentious 2D block-colored line animation and a subversive take on an institution held dear, after his anarchic visions of respectively pet care and parenting in “The Cat Came Back” and “Strange Invaders.”
Here, seething with envy at his counterpart in the North, Anta Claus sets out on a penguin-power journey to discover the secrets of a perfect Christmas. “Along the way, however, he learns that the true spirit of the holiday lies not in perfection but in the lovable community of oddballs he left behind,” said a synopsis unveiled by the National Film Board of Canada on Tuesday.
The lead character is voiced in English by acclaimed actor Tyrone Benskin (“Debris,” “Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol”), an institution on Canada’s theater, film and TV scene, and in French by comedian-actor Anthony Kavanagh (“Les bogues de la vie”). The score is composed by celebrated Montreal musician Martin Léon, known for his work on the Oscar-nominated “Monsieur Lazhar.”
