DocsBarcelona 26

Before the Fire follows a Mapuche community in southern Argentina defending their ancestral land and traditions. Their daily life is shattered when hired killers murder one of their members, igniting a struggle for memory and justice. “Crafting a narrative in which a people such as the Mapuche recount their struggle to ‘be’ and, at the same time, to ‘reclaim’ their territory, is not only relevant to Argentina but also to a concept of ‘community’ that is becoming increasingly urgent in the world we inhabit,” says German co-producer Natalia Imaz of parabellum film.

“We don’t separate cinematic quality from impact,” DocsBarcelona’s Èric Motjer tells BDE before doors open on the festival’s 29th edition. “We value both. We look for films that connect with the world we live in and that have cinematic value. I would say that giving value to the collective cinematic experience is central to how we think about the programme.” The festival runs May 7 to 17. Motjer is joined in interview by co-Artistic Director Maria Colomer.

Siblings Mohamed Jabaly, Rima Jabaly and Ibrahim Jabaly made a highly emotional presentation of their feature doc project My Sister Gaza during the Public Pitch session of DocsBarcelona. In the film, as bombs fall over Gaza, Rima and Ibrahim find in filmmaking a way to document their family’s displacement, capturing months of struggle to survive and the shattering of lives. Meanwhile a desperately worried Mohamed, in exile in Norway, stays in daily contact. The project is described as “a raw, intimate story of war, love, resilience, and the unbreakable bonds of family.”

Frustrated teenager, talented artist, battered wife. Mehrdad Oskouei’s remotely directed Afghan niece Soraya is all these things, while she tenaciously tries to enter the EU from Iran and Turkey, hoping to reunite with her mother in Austria. In this nuanced and intimate documentary we follow Soraya as she films herself (hence her co-director credit) during her desperate odyssey. Visually, the whole experience is enriched by beautiful, painterly animations which are clearly fantastical, but convincingly integrated into the documentary reality.

“It's a film about someone who turned tragedy into a driving force,” Polish director Dorota Roś told the professional audience during her pitch for the feature documentary Diary of Experiences, produced by Telemark. It is a film that details a man’s determination to speak again, through AI, after losing his voice to larynx cancer. For Konrad, the quest is not just about restoring speech, it’s also about reclaiming intimacy, belonging and identity.

With incredible creativity, care and integrity, Maria Esteve Silvia has made a film that is as compelling as it is harrowing, about the traumatic impact of abuse within the Catholic Church and the exhausting struggle for justice. From the very first moment, we are seized by the combination of images and materials that are masterfully edited into a flowing, gripping and balanced tale.

In Lucía Flórez’s feature doc project, a boy from a fishing family and a pioneering female marine scientist set out to tag whale sharks for the first time in Peru. Together they forge an unlikely bond, reshaping both the fate of the species and the boy’s future. “We started working on this film in 2023, we are currently in production, and we want to complete the film by the end of 2027,” the director told the Barcelona audience. “We think that by connecting a young protagonist's journey with a scientific and conservation story, we invite audiences to see the complexity of how we relate and coexist with the ocean.”

Five years after the horrific racist murders in the German town of Hanau that made headlines around the world, survivors and relatives are still searching for answers and, above all, recognition as equal members of society. Meanwhile, in Germany, the far right is on the rise, and support for the AfD shows no sign of abating...

No Friend but the Mountains wins the DocsBarcelona Award for Best Project. Crossed wins the 3Cat Award for Best Project, the highest-value award at DocsBarcelona Pro (15,000 euros). My Sister Gaza won the ARTE European Talent Development Award and the Al Jazeera Documentary Co-production Award for Best Forum Project, each valued at 10,000 euros. All awards…

In 2026 DocsBarcelona Pro will double the value of its awards to nearly 60,000 euros, of which 42,500 euros are paid in cash. The event will run May 9 to 14 during the 29th edition of DocsBarcelona (May 7 to 17, 2026). Professionals from around the world can apply for sic initiatives which include the Public, Rough Cut and New Tech pitches. The deadline for submissions is January 30, 2026, through Docs&Me.