Nick Cunningham

104 projects from 43 countries were selected to take part in the Co-Production & Gap Financing Market and Work-In-Progress sessions. The MIA Development Award for Outstanding Doc Project went to Loving Ika (Sweden) by Emilio Di Stefano and Fabian Sigurd. “We close this edition of MIA knowing that we have taken an important step in the market’s evolution,” comments Gaia Tridente, Director of MIA.

“The anniversary encouraged us to reflect not only on what Ji.hlava has achieved, but also on our responsibilities towards the future of documentary filmmaking,” the Ji.hlava Head of Industry tells BDE before doors open on the festival’s 30th edition. “At a time when artistic freedom, cultural institutions and public funding are increasingly under pressure, I believe festivals have a responsibility to support independent filmmaking and the communities around it.”

New director Ola Staszel talks to Business Doc Europe before the 69th roll-out of world’s oldest docfest. “As a very young person, I was really touched and moved by Kieślowski and by Łoziński,” the Polish Staszel underlines her credentials. “In my early age, I realised what it means to create films about people telling universal stories. That's why I think it's crucial to show, to create, to discuss documentaries, because they’re really life-changing. You see small slides or pieces of reality and you realise, okay, life’s so big.”

Marek Hovorka reflects on 30 years of Ji.hlava IDFF, one of the key staging posts for the international doc community, and arguably the loudest advocate for the export of great docs out of the CEE region. “Things have changed dramatically over those three decades,” he tells Business Doc Europe. “In the beginning, filmmakers submitted their films by sending us VHS tapes [and] one of the first big upgrades to our office was buying a fax machine. On the other hand, we already had our first website in 1999! So yes, thirty years is a long time.”

The 30th edition of Ji.hlava IDFF kicks off October 23, featuring more than 350 films from around the world. The festival will open with the European premiere of Return to a Strange Land, directed by Olga Malířová Špátová, about internationally acclaimed choreographer Jiří Kylián. This year's festival trailer was created by Naomi Kawase as an appeal against war. Czech documentary filmmaker Helena Třeštíková and Vietnamese-American filmmaker Trinh T. Minh-ha will receive the Award for Contribution to World Cinema.

Iconic Italian physicist Fabiola Gianotti is a woman on a mission. Having completed her historic tenure as Director-General of CERN, during which time the Higgs Boson particle was discovered, she is now facing her most complex battle yet in advocating for the Future Circular Collider (FCC), the multi-billion-dollar successor to the Large Hadron Collider, and which represents “humanity’s next attempt to answer some of the universe's greatest remaining mysteries.”

Sergei Loznitsa’s Imperium was handed the Best Film Award in Official Competition while Asmahan Bkerat’s Concrete Land picked up the Grierson Award in Documentary Competition, with Theo Rollason received a Special Mention for Queer Edward II. Of Imperium the London FF jury noted how they were “immensely proud to honour such a powerful and singular piece of work.”

Described as Scotland’s leading documentary talent development scheme, and supported by Screen Scotland and Northern Ireland Screen, the 29th edition of Bridging the Gap will enable 12 talents from Scotland and Northern Ireland to develop their documentary ideas and take the next steps in their practices. The flagship programme “combines professional development, production funding, and international festival distribution to launch emerging careers in documentary filmmaking,” organisers write.

International sales company Odd Slice Films, which is handling the EFA shortlisted title, La belle année, has brought Linda Venturini on board as festival manager and acquisitions consultant, less than a year after the company’s launch by Martina Droandi. Venturini brings experience from Cinema Troisi in Rome, where she was Head of Talents and Partnerships, and from Be For Films, where she was Festival Manager from 2023 to 2025.

The shortlists for the 39th European Film Awards, which take place 16 January 2027, were unveiled October 14 by the European Film Academy. These include 15 films that will compete for the Best Documentary award, joining the 45 films that are selected for the fiction shortlist, and eight on the animation shortlist. “Together, they celebrate the excellence, diversity and creativity of European cinema, reflecting its many cultures, languages and perspectives while exploring some of today’s most pressing issues, from migration and cultural clashes to minority communities, gender and political freedom,” writes the EFA.