Baltic Sea Docs 26

D might be for doc, but P is for piano, as evidenced in Vladimir Loginov’s latest opus that chronicles the instrument’s construction, from the felling of a tall pine in an Estonian forest to the tinkling of its ivories in a concert hall. “The film completely dispenses with talking heads, traditional interviews, and background music,” producer Janika Möls tells Business Doc Europe. “Instead, the raw industrial rhythms of the workshop—hammering, wood-carving, metal casting, and internal vibrations—form the film’s actual music.”

“Concrete Grassland is a very personal story that…opens onto a larger reality of contemporary Georgia,” producer Elene Margvelashvili tells BDE of Shorena Tevzadze’s new documentary, pitched in Riga. “It is about what happens when institutions weaken, when informal power takes over, and ordinary people are left to find their own ways forward—and how solidarity matters when this happens.”

For the audience, the value of the project lies in turning upside down a story that everyone believes they know,” producer Raffaele Brunetti of Rome-based B&B Film tells Business Doc Europe of his new project, pitched in Riga. “Nadia Comăneci is not presented as the icon who achieved the first perfect 10 in the history of gymnastics, but as the involuntary protagonist of a state surveillance system. [It] is a spy story that intertwines sport, power, propaganda and personal freedom.”

“At its centre, Cords of Bliss is first of all a film about my brother Bakyt and the relationship between us. I have known him all my life, of course, but in many ways I still do not know him,” director Janyl Jusupjan tells BDE of her new feature project, pitched in Riga. Bakyt may have had hearing loss since childhood, but he is still one of Kyrgyzstan's most respected performers, researchers and teachers of the kyl-kyyak, an ancient two-string bowed instrument deeply connected to Kyrgyz nomadic culture.

The call for documentary projects is now open for the 30th edition of Baltic Sea Docs, the region’s leading documentary co-production pitching forum, taking place in Riga, Latvia on 6–11 September 2026. In addition to projects participating for the first time, up to four projects previously pitched at Baltic Sea Docs and now in post-production will be presented in the Coming Soon session.

“What began as a playful creative experiment developed into a deeply personal story exploring the mother-son dynamic, the concept of home, and rebuilding distant family relationships,” explains Estonian producer Merili Laur of Beautiful Stupid Thing, directed by Carlos E. Lesmes and selected for Baltic Sea Docs. In the film, which is currently in post-production, Carlos and his mother Angela reunite after she takes the transformative decision to migrate from Colombia to Estonia.