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Albert Serra’s Afternoons of Solitude; Fiume o morte! by Igor Bezinović; Riefenstahl by Andres Veiel; Songs of Slow Burning Earth by Olha Zhurba and Kamal Aljafari’s With Hasan in Gaza were unveiled November 18 as the five nominees in the European Documentary category of the 38th European Film Awards. All five are also nominated in the European Film category. The winners will be revealed in this year’s award ceremony on 17 January in Berlin.

A 5-day training initiative designed to strengthen the children’s doc sector kicked off November 17 at IDFA, with a cohort of 15 filmmakers from across Germany, Flanders, Poland, and the Netherlands. The stated aim of the program is to ‘foster international co-productions, encourage mutual exchange within the industry, and strengthen the children’s documentary genre as a whole.’

The Whickers announced November 16 that it is increasing its Film & TV Funding Award from £100,000 to £120,000, and its runner-up development award from £20,000 to £25,000. The announcement was made at IDFA during the launch of the organisation’s annual Cost of Docs survey for which filmmakers are invited to share the true cost of documentary production. The deadline for applications for The Whickers Film and TV Fund is January 30, while the deadline to submit responses to the survey is December 16.

The November 17 Polish Docs Pro Showcase will present five new docs in progress to the professionals in attendance at IDFA Industry. At Docs for Sale, industry guests can watch and assess some the most successful Polish docs of the last 12 month, including Silver by Natalia Koniarz – a multiple winner at Krakow FF, Child of Dust by Weronika Mliczewska and What the...Hen? by Joanna Deja, as well films from the IDFA 2025 official selection, such as Confession of a Mole by Mo Tan (Envision Competition), and Passion According to Agnieszka by Wojciech Staroń (Luminous).

Eight new documentaries nearing completion and developed at dok.incubator 2025, will be pitched November 16 during the organisation’s annual showcase at IDFA. “This year’s collection of films offers an extraordinary range of styles, from musical and comedic documentaries to deeply personal auteur films, including a film which is also being turned into an HBO docu-series,” says Andrea Prenghyová, CEO of dok.incubator. “These are profound works shaped by years of devoted filmmaking.”

“Chile arrives at IDFA with a vibrant and diverse presence that celebrates both new voices and master documentarians, reaffirming the creative strength and international recognition of our cinema,” Flor Rubina, Deputy Director of Chiledoc, comments of her country’s presence in Amsterdam this year. Highlights include Blue Silence (by Matías Rojas Ruz) in International Short Film Competition, and two films in Signed; Letters to My Dead Parents by Ignacio Agüero and Invisible Life by Bettina Perut and Iván Osnovikoff.

As doors open on 2025 IDFA Forum 2025, one of the most delicate and emotionally resonant titles in the Rough Cut line-up is Bugboy, the new documentary by Greek director Lucas Paleocrassas. The film is produced by Anemon Productions (Greece) in co-production with Toolbox Film (Denmark) and Flach Film Production (France), with world sales being handled by Austria's Autlook. Shot over three years, it examines the growing bond between a sensitive teenager, Yorgos, and the insects he cares for - an unlikely friendship that gradually becomes a map of the boy’s inner world.

In Benjamin Bucher’s debut feature, Joyce, a 22-year-old African-Chinese dancer, tries to find her way in Europe – torn between artistic and identity-related self-discovery, and financial dependence on her mother’s TikTok business. “The film deals with universal themes that many of us can relate to, such as the search for independence, migration and globalisation, identity and the attempt to preserve real moments in an increasingly staged world,” producer Olivier Zobrist tells BDE.

With Getting the Message, Neasa Ní Chianáin steps inside the heart of political power at a moment when public trust in institutions is eroding and the climate emergency is accelerating. Over 18 months, Ní Chianáin gained unprecedented “fly-on-the-wall” access to Ireland’s Green Party leader and Minister for the Environment, Eamon Ryan, capturing both the mechanisms of democracy and the private moments that reveal the human cost of political life. The project is one of the Rough Cut presentations of this year's IDFA Forum, and will be presented November 16.

In his new feature documentary, Danish docmaker Michael Madsen seeks to explore, together with visionary architect Daniel Libeskind, “the edge of human creativity” through the completion and recording of six architectural challenges over six days. “On the one hand, Architecture as Invention will aim to be a creative playground; and on the other, it will aim to be a portrait of this century as envisioned by Mr. Libeskind: the chaos, the wars, the destruction, the Holocaust; but also, the love, the memories and the dreams,” producer Per Damgaard Hansen tells Business Doc Europe.