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At Berlin’s EFM, one of this year’s conversations about documentary form and legacy focused on Barbara Forever, Brydie O’Connor’s debut feature portrait of pioneering US experimental filmmaker Barbara Hammer. After bowing at Sundance last month, the film is celebrating its international premiere in the Forum Special sidebar of the Berlinale. BDE reports.

After its highly successful launch in 2025, NLWave, the showcase for upcoming feature films, documentaries and animation from the Netherlands, returns to Utrecht for its second edition on 1 and 2 October 2026. At last year’s inaugural edition, eight feature doc projects either at early stage or as works-in-progress, were presented. Additionally, three recently completed feature docs were screened.

The 45 participants come from 32 countries and 5 continents worldwide. During the 27th program, lasting eight months, all participants will develop their documentary projects, slates and their careers. This year’s first residential session will take place in Porto (Portugal) in March, the second session will be run in Tallinn (Estonia) in June and thw final session in Strasbourg. Numerous EURODOC alumni have projects at Berlinale 2026 within Forum Special, Forum and Panorama sections, as well as EFM.

From 6 to 15 March 2026, the International Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights (FIFDH, Geneva) returns “at a time of accelerating authoritarianism, weakening international law and growing repression. Civilians, and especially marginalised groups, are bearing the brunt of these shifts. FIFDH responds by highlighting resistance, solidarity and collective action,” the festival writes.

The seventy-four titles, “hand-picked from thousands of submissions from around the world,” features 53 world premieres, 17 international premieres and 4 European premieres. At the heart of the festival are six juried competition sections judged by leadinginternational experts, as well as a €10,000 Audience Award. The program is anchored by the flagship competition section, the DOX:AWARD, which comes with a €10,000 prize for which 12 films will compete.

Organisers of Cinéma du reel have announced the 37 films selected for Competition in 2026. Running 7 to 117 minutes, and sourced from across the globe, the films “will once again showcase contemporary documentary in all its diversity, as world, international or French premieres,” the festival writes. The 48th edition of the Paris-based event runs March 21-28.

Movies that Matter will “move forward with a single-director structure” as of 16 April 2026, the festival says in an online post. Margje de Koning will take on the role of Managing Director-Trustee. Laurens Korteweg, who has served as Business Director-Trustee since September 2023, will leave the organisation following a carefully planned transition period. The decision has been taken in response to ongoing financial pressure and is aimed at safeguarding the organisation’s future, the festival writes.

Oscar-nominated actress Fernanda Torres talks to Petra Costa, herself nominated for a feature Doc Academy Award in 2020 for The Edge of Democracy, about the latter’s latest work, Apocalypse in the Tropics, nominated in the Bafta Best Documentary category 2026. The film examines the influence of evangelical Christianity on far-right politics in Brazil, especially during Jair Bolsonaro’s term of office (2019-23). In 2025 Bolsonaro was sentenced to 27 years in prison after he was found guilty of orchestrating a coup d'état to overturn the 2022 election results.

In her feature doc Angelica Ruffier recalls a teenage crush she had on a particular teacher, while at the same time dealing with the recent death of her father. “The director, through an amazing craft of acting and directing, gives us a perceptive on womanhood too rarely portrayed in cinema…[she is] a very unique voice who made us travel through generations charged with loneliness with absolute honesty and radical tenderness.”

After nearly fifty years under wraps, the film, which was conceived and shot by the legendary William Greaves and directed by his son David Greaves, spotlights footage from a 1972 gathering of luminaries of the Harlem renaissance. Last month, NEON received 18 Oscar nominations for the 98th Academy Awards, the second highest amount for any motion picture studio.