Hand Drawn Animated Film

Turning the darkness of reality into something full of light and wonder

Dear Readers..,

My name is Zolbayar Dorjsembee. You can call me VINCI. I’m the CEO of Flame Bros Animation Studio and the writer and director of “SNOWIE”.

“Snowie” is a song every Mongolian child has grown up with for 40 years.

In winter 2020, singing it as a lullaby to my baby, the inspiration of Snowie animation was born.

I told myself, it had to exist somehow, even as a simple comic sketch.

Five years later, I’m happy to introduce Snowie as a 90-minute feature animation film.

The film follows Ayalguu and Egshiglen through a day of trying to sell books to stranger fairytale animals at cafes and restaurants. But it does not go so easily.

It’s winter. It’s crowded. It’s cold.

And yet, inside their mind, the world remains full of wonder. Like how they see every other person as a fairytale animal.

Egshiglen, the older sister. She’s 8 years old. Clever, careful, and carries an adult-like responsibility. But she is still a child at heart.
Then there is Ayalguu. She’s 4 years old. Diligently follows Egshiglen, accompanying her and helping sell the books.

Yet she is also someone who, almost absentmindedly, gazes at a sparkling white dress through a shop window, dreaming of becoming a Snowie.

“Who do you want to be when you grow up?”

I’m sure every one of us has been asked this question at least once as child. Like many of us, Ayalguu hears it in a gentle whisper from her older sister, Egshiglen, on a bus to the city to sell books and make a living.

Ayalguu answers: a “Snowie,” which becomes the name of my film. In her world, a “Snowie” is a snow girl, the icon of winter celebration, dressed in sparkling white, always welcomed and adored.

When selling books fails, Egshiglen reinvests what little they’ve earned into small, more sellable New Year’s sparklers, just enough to believe they can go home with something in their hands.

Hope, in this film, is both cause and result.

On their way home that day, they fall asleep on the bus, only to wake and find the bag filled with their hard-earned money, gone.

When the music fades, their imagined world dissolves, shifting into the stark reality of two girls covered in snow in the corner of the yard.

The next thing Ayalguu sees is a long hospital hallway. Suddenly all those fairytale animals have turned into humans. And she waits for something she can’t quite comprehend..

Fearing their mother’s disappointment, they stop in front of their home, unable to gather the courage to go inside.

Egshiglen sat in the corner of the yard, hugging her knees and sobbing softly. Ayalguu is there gently trying to comfort her sister.

Snow falls slowly.

As they rub their frozen hands together, a single snowflake falls down above them. Drawn to its sparkle, they forget their hardships as reality melts into fantasy, and they drift into a dreamlike world, dancing together.