Business Doc Europe

Veteran Israeli artist and director Amos Gitai returns to Venice with his latest feature documentary, The Road to Jericho, a poetic meditation on conflict in the Middle East and the diminishing prospects for peace. The director tells Business Doc Europe how he regards culture as “one of the only channels which is remaining to create a dialogue.” That is why he so opposes cultural boycotts. “If you block any form of dialogue, then, OK, let’s go to the next war. I think channels of dialogue always should remain open.”

UK director Louise Lockwood discusses her new feature doc Bel, which closes EIFF on August 19 and which profiles the prodigiously talented Kenyan-Scottish artist-musician-singer Beldina Odenyo who took her own life in 2021. “What an utter tragedy that that talent has been stopped. It’s obviously heart-breaking for the family, a human loss, but that raw, raw talent was totally the same. Bel and Amy [Winehouse] were very similar in that respect,” Lockwood tells BDE.

Dublin-based former Yugoslavian filmmaker Dragana Jurišić talks to Business Doc Europe about her debut documentary, a film both joyous and heart-rending, which tells the stories of maverick filmmaker Hari Džekson, a director of westerns, and his home town of Bijeljina, where the war in Bosnia started in 1992. In the feature doc, Jurišić also sets out to create her own western in the style of Hari. “When we were filming, everyone came together - Serbs, Roma, Muslims, Croats. It was such a joyful happy atmosphere, and there was absolutely no reason why these people shouldn't be friends - except for these man-made identity structures that are imposed on them.”

In his new feature doc, world-premiering in Sarajevo, Damir Markovina urges his father, politician Roko Markovina, both to return to the Bosnian city of Mostar from which he exiled himself over 30 years ago, and to acknowledge the repercussions of the personal and political choices and decisions he took back then. “If you don't deal with a problem, your children will have to deal with it, in one way or another,” the director tells BDE.

Dutch producer Renko Douze discusses Ukrainian Helena Maksyom’s feature doc Don't Ask Me If I Killed, sold by Esther van Messel’s First Hand Films, that chronicles the director’s life as a soldier in defence of her country. “It’s such a special and individual story. It’s really her story - and a very human perspective on the frontline,” Douze says of the film, receiving its International Premiere in Sarajevo Documentary Competition.

In her new feature doc, world-premiering at Sarajevo FF, Dutch-based Croatian director Tatjana Bozic discusses the business of loneliness, and being a stranger in a strange land. “It explores the loss of roots, community, and identity through the lens of migration and motherhood. As I discovered while making the film, the feeling of not belonging often begins long before we cross borders, it starts within our own families.”

Filmmakers Juan Francisco Donoso and Aline Juaréz discuss their urgent new feature documentary, about the existential struggle of two communities on either side of the globe against lithium extraction, and the far-reaching ambitions of one of the world’s largest mining corporations. “We feel immense relief and proud that we overcame significant hurdles to bring this story to the big screen,” the filmmakers tell BDE. “We fulfilled our promise to the communities to present their struggle with dignity, rigour, and cinematic care.” The film was the headline title of Sarajevo Film Festival’s Human Rights Day.

Organisers of the 69th DOK Leipzig (26 Oct to Nov 1) have announced first details of this year’s programme, which include the new ‘Positions’ section which is designed to create more space for exchange and debate. “The selection of films is intended as a starting point and catalyst for dialogue and exchange – listening to one another, having conversations, accommodating differing views and contradictions, and questioning our own convictions,” the festival writes.

Press accreditation for the 12th edition of MIA | Mercato Internazionale Audiovisivo - one of the leading global audiovisual markets, bringing together the international film, drama, documentary, animation, and entertainment industries on a single international platform for business and networking - is now open. MIA will take place from Monday, October 19 to Friday, October 23, 2026, in Rome and on the MIA Digital platform.

The Prague-based dok.incubator workshop has announced its final film selection for 2026. “From a world-renowned blind pianist redefining independence, to stories bound to the oldest marathon in Europe, and a new generation of Ukrainian youngsters documenting their own lives during wartime, the films selected for this year's workshop explore how individuals navigate the forces that shape their lives in stormy times,” organisers write.

The awards of the 32nd Sarajevo Film Festival were presented August 21 at the National Theatre Sarajevo. Biljana Tutorov and Petar Glomazić’s To Hold a Mountain was handed the Heart of Sarajevo for Best Documentary Feature Film. On August 22, the Audience Award for Best Documentary Film went to We Shall Live Together, directed by Damir Markovina, with an average rating of 5.000.

A total of 24 feature-length documentary projects will be presented during the second edition of Flanders Film Days, running October 6-7 in Ghent, Belgium. The doc component will comprise six new project pitches, nine works in progress and nine completed films, and the event will include new doc works by the likes of Olga Lucovnicova, Maarten Stuyck & Lennart Stuyck and Pieter Van Eecke.