Davide Abbatescianni

At the upcoming European Film Awards, host Mark Cousins will veer away from what he sees as the growing emptiness of formula-driven cultural rituals. But rather than reject the awards format outright, Cousins aims to work through it, he tells BDE, retaining the core business of giving out prizes while puncturing the overall predictability of such events. “This is almost like taking our vows again, our cinematic vows, reminding ourselves why this art form is so extraordinary,” he says.

As doors open on 2025 IDFA Forum 2025, one of the most delicate and emotionally resonant titles in the Rough Cut line-up is Bugboy, the new documentary by Greek director Lucas Paleocrassas. The film is produced by Anemon Productions (Greece) in co-production with Toolbox Film (Denmark) and Flach Film Production (France), with world sales being handled by Austria's Autlook. Shot over three years, it examines the growing bond between a sensitive teenager, Yorgos, and the insects he cares for - an unlikely friendship that gradually becomes a map of the boy’s inner world.

With Getting the Message, Neasa Ní Chianáin steps inside the heart of political power at a moment when public trust in institutions is eroding and the climate emergency is accelerating. Over 18 months, Ní Chianáin gained unprecedented “fly-on-the-wall” access to Ireland’s Green Party leader and Minister for the Environment, Eamon Ryan, capturing both the mechanisms of democracy and the private moments that reveal the human cost of political life. The project is one of the Rough Cut presentations of this year's IDFA Forum, and will be presented November 16.

France-based filmmaker Nolwenn Hervé arrives at IDFA Forum 2025 with The Cord, a rough-cut project produced by Estelle Robin You for Grande Ourse Films. The documentary follows Carolina, a fearless activist operating in the crumbling health system of Maracaibo, Venezuela—an environment where, as the director notes, “life hangs by a thread,” and where women are forced to fight daily for their own survival and that of their babies.

Iranian helmer Marjan Khosravi brings Dreams of the Wild Oaks to IDFA Forum 2025 as a rough-cut project, now in post-production and produced by Milad Khosravi for Seven Springs Pictures, with French and Spanish co-production partners on board in the form of Avant la Nuit and Lukimedia. Set within a Bakhtiari community in southwest Iran, the film follows Samaneh, a young girl racing against time to save her freedom. Caught between a forced marriage and the ancestral ritual of Cease Blood Sacrifice, she embarks on a quest to find rare and endangered birds—a path that challenges her beliefs and tests the limits of her father’s love.

IDFA’s focus programme Dead Angle returns this year with a far-reaching thematic deep dive into the structures that shape civic life. This year, programmer Joost Daamen turns the spotlight on institutions — democratic, administrative, medical, colonial — and on the frictions, contradictions and aspirations that define them. The focus is also placed squarely on archives. “Archives tell us a lot about how a society sees itself… how it shapes a narrative,” Daamen tells BDE.

Filmmaker Antonio Palumbo and co-writer Mariangela Barbanente talk to BDE about their urgent new project which demands justice for a horrific murder committed over 40 years ago. “We do not want to merely recount a crime story,” the creative team tells BDE. “We want to honour Palmina’s life, showcasing her dreams and aspirations as a young girl against the backdrop of poverty in Puglia during the 1970s and 1980s.”

The theatrical distribution of documentaries in Europe has entered a phase of both unprecedented opportunity and increased complexity. At the MIA panel Getting Docs to Theatres: Strategies and Opportunities held on October 9, industry professionals shared insights on marketing, audience engagement, and innovative distribution models that are reshaping the sector. Business Doc Europe reports.

Presented at the Italians Doc It Better showcase, the new documentary by Elisa Motta and Matteo Ferrarini offers a sensorial and poetic journey through sound, while exploring the power of listening as a path to reconnection. “OTO is a film that inverts the traditional hierarchy between sound and image, disrupting the usual grammar of documentary,” the creative team tells Business Doc Europe.

The Lithuanian 4x52’ documentary series Hijacked Life revisits one of the most extraordinary and disturbing true stories of the Cold War era: the first hijacking of a Soviet plane. The project, directed by Andrius Lekavičius, was pitched at this year’s MIA Market. “Blending investigation, cinematic storytelling, and striking visuals, Hijacked Life explores how the dream of freedom can slowly transform into a prison of its own,” Lithuanian producer Jurgita Rakauskaitė explained to the Rome audience.