‘The Violinist’: Music Springs Hope In Love And War In The Singapore-set Annecy Cristal Winner

If you love traditional hand-drawn animation, stirring classical music, and/or interested in World War II history, The Violinist is a must-watch.

Set in 1930s Singapore before and during World War II, the richly illustrated film follows two childhood friends and aspiring violinists Kai (voiced by Singaporean actor Ayden Sng) and Fei (Singaporean actress Fang Rong) whose relationship is torn apart by war and the Japanese Occupation. When Kai disappears after becoming a spy with the allied forces in Malaya, Fei searches for him for decades, whilst becoming a renowned concert violinist, performing with the violin Kai left behind.

Directed by Singapore’s Ervin Han and Spanish Disney veteran Raúl García, The Violinist is a sweeping historical epic about abiding love, the devastation of war, and the profound mastery of music.

Besides majestic string-led classical pieces, the visually appealing hand-drawn film—reminiscent of the classic style of Studio Ghibli, of which Han is a fan—vividly depicts the changing faces of Singapore over a span of 80 years, from its later colonial days to the bustling ultramodern city-state it is today.

That The Violinist is Singapore’s first ever full-length animated film and historical epic is remarkable, considering that the country does not have an animated film industry.

Even more impressive is when the 114-minute film won the 2026 Annecy’s Cristal Award for a Feature Film, the biggest festival prize in animation. Its soul-stirring score—composed by Golden Horse Award-winning Singapore musician Ricky Ho and Spanish composer Isabel Latorre—also won the SACEM Award for Best Original Soundtrack for a Feature Film at Annecy.

The Singapore-Spain-Italy co-production also picked up three nominations at the 63rd Golden Horse Awards—one of the most prestigious film awards in Asia—for Best Animated Feature, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Original Score.

Currently making the festival rounds, The Violinist had its North American premiere at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival, and will hit cinemas worldwide region by region.

Meanwhile, here are but five good reasons to check out The Violinist:

Top 5 Highlights of ‘The Violinist’

1. Soul-Stirring String-Led Film Score

Music is the thread that ties together the film’s plotlines of friendship, love, war, yearning and survival. Besides classical works by the likes of Tchaikovsky and Mendelssohn, there are also stunning new string-led pieces composed by Ho and Latorre, with lead violin performances by Singaporean musician Joy Yong.

One standout original composition is the "Sunset Sonata in D Major", which Kai started composing before the war and which Fei eventually completed and performed in concert years later as the sweeping "Sunset Concerto".

As mentioned in the film, “The violin is the closest sound to the human voice.” The Violinist’s emotive score definitely plays a big part in the film’s narrative.

2. Artful Traditional 2D Animation

The Violinist has an artful old-fashioned hand-drawn animation style which is visually pleasing and easy on the eye. Whether it is an invigorating orchestral performance or an intense wartime scenario, the emotions of every scene are conveyed distinctively.

Take violin playing, for instance, which is so integral in the entire film. The directors took great care to ensure that “the fingering” was in the right place when characters are playing the violin. Truth be told, it doesn’t look quite there but it definitely looks natural enough to non-expert eyes!

3. No Sugarcoating of War Atrocities 

The protagonists’ lives being disrupted by the Japanese invasion of Singapore (1942-1945) is also one of the film’s unforgettable sequences.

From the Japanese warplanes flying over the statue of Sir Stamford Raffles (the Briton who founded Singapore in 1819), to Singapore citizens being executed by Japanese soldiers, it is heartening that the film producers did not sugarcoat the atrocities and cruelty of the war which many of us Singaporeans (of a certain generation) heard so much about from our parents and/or grandparents who survived the war and which we also learnt from history books. 

To its credit, The Violinist offers a good reminder that war benefits no one and brings nothing but suffering to the common folk.

4. Real Life War Hero Remembered

Though primarily a fictional story, The Violinist does pay tribute to a real life national war hero, Lim Bo Seng, the only individual to have a war memorial dedicated to him in Esplanade Park, Singapore. During World War II, the Singaporean businessman turned resistance fighter fought alongside allied forces to reclaim Japanese-occupied South-east Asia.

In The Violinist, Kai joins Lim’s spy network in Ipoh, Malaya and the film provides the audience with a harrowing glimpse into the dangers resistance fighters had to face in order to secure freedom for all during World War II .

5. Detailed Landmark Buildings

Another impressive bit of the film is how the aesthetics of buildings and locations of 1930s Singapore are depicted rather accurately.

These include instantly recognizable landmark locations in Singapore—some of which still exist today—such as Boat Quay, Chinatown, and the iconic Peranakan-style terrace houses.

Even the colonial 2-storey house of Fei’s upper middle-class family is intricately detailed in how a “rich man’s house” would look like in the ‘30s— heavily lined with treasured artefacts, antique furniture and even a piano, which along with violins, are considered as luxury items back in the day.

Whilst making the festival rounds, 'The Violinist' will hit theaters worldwide in the coming months.

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