Nick Cunningham

Guardian Documentaries and arte.tv have joined forces to support filmmakers making documentary shorts, exploring the theme of Democracy at Stake in Europe. Announced at Sheffield DocFest, the initiative invites filmmakers from across Europe to pitch character-led short documentaries examining the challenges facing democratic societies today. The deadline for submissions is September 14.

Directed by Farid Ahmad, a 2022 Berlinale Talent, Waiting for Winter is produced by Noyakar Productions (Bangladesh) and House on Fire (France) and receives World Cinema Fund support of €25,000. Of the nine funding recommendations, made from 373 submitted projects from a total of 75 countries, Waiting for Winter is the sole doc recipient. Total funding amounts to €365,000 euros.

The 21st edition of the Sole Luna Doc Film Festival has concluded with the Best Documentary and Audience Awards going to Dea Gjinovci for The Beauty of the Donkey. Hidden by Monika Kotecka received the Best Director Award, while the Best Editing Award was presented to Do You Love Me by Lana Daher, which retraces the history of Lebanon through archival footage and personal home videos.

NLWave returns September 30 to October 2 2026 with a curated selection of upcoming documentaries from the Netherlands, as well as feature films and animation. Following the successful first edition of the Dutch film showcase in 2025, first doc selections for this year’s roll-out include new projects by Renzo Martens, Aliona van der Horst, Suzanne Raes and Menno Otten. “Each of these filmmakers brings a distinct voice and a strong track record, reflecting the depth and ambition of this year’s line-up,” organisers write.

DokuFest (Kosovo) has announced the full slate of films in competition for its 25th jubilee edition, running 7 to 15 August. The programming team has selected 104 films across eight competition sections from a record number of 3687 submissions, with many enjoying World, International and European premieres. This confirms DokuFest as “an important launching pad for both documentary and narrative short films in this part of the world,” write organisers.

For the third consecutive year, Ji.hlava International Documentary FF will support outstanding auteur filmmaking from Central and Eastern Europe. The new call for applications is now open, with a deadline of August 31. Jihlava's 30th anniversary is reflected in this year's visual identity of rippling waves emanating from a fixed point, which itself points to the festival's core retrospective in 2026 of documentaries whose impact reached far beyond the cinema screen.

Prague-based sales company Filmotor has acquired international sales rights to If Luck Will Come, the debut feature documentary by Danish filmmaker Camille Bildsøe, ahead of its international premiere in the Kids Screenings section of the 79th Locarno Film Festival. The acquisition follows the film's world premiere at CPH:DOX 2026, where it screened in NEXT:WAVE Competition.

World-premiering at Doc Edge (NZ), the feature documentary Return to a Strange Land is described as “a visually striking portrait of the internationally acclaimed choreographer Jiří Kylián and his lifelong muse and love, Sabine Kupferberg… A personal reflection on human existence and the relentless passage of time.” The film is sold by Anisya Kazakova of ANTIPODE Sales International.

The final edition of Sunny Side came to a close June 24. A new international documentary market, supported by the CNC, the City of Strasbourg, the Eurométropole de Strasbourg and the Grand Est Region, will be held in Strasbourg as of June 2027. “After 37 years of championing documentary film, it is time for the long-term future of the documentary market in France to be placed in the hands of the industry itself,” commented Roman Jeanneau, President of Doc Services, which organised SSD since its inception in Marseille in 1990.

CIRCLE Doc Accelerator has unveiled the ten projects chosen for its upcoming edition. The three-module CIRCLE program provides women and gender-expansive filmmakers a space to “nurture their projects, elevate their careers, and navigate existing film power structures.” The programme kicked off June 22 in Edipsos, Greece, continuing through Portorož, Slovenia (October 2026, in partnership with the Slovenian Film Centre) and Trieste, Italy (January 2027, in partnership with When East Meets West).