Doclisboa has announced the complete programme for its 23rd edition, which comprises a total of 211 films from 54 countries, including 93 feature films and 118 short films. The program also includes 39 world premieres and 31 Portuguese works, offering “a comprehensive portrait of contemporary life and its multiple realities and challenges,” organisers write.
The International Competition brings together 12 films, including seven world premieres, three international premieres, one European premiere, and three debut works. The Portuguese Competition will feature 12 titles, including seven world premieres, one European premiere, and four national premieres. (See list of films here).
- One Minute Is an Eternity for Those Who Are Suffering, Fábio Rogério, Wesley Pereira de Castro (Brazil – international premiere)
- Vacances, Victoria Hely-Hutchinson, (USA, France, World Premiere)
- Towards the Light, Vadim Kostrov, (France, World Premiere)
- Letters to My Dead Parents, Ignacio Agüero, (Chile, Portuguese Premiere)
- The Night Is Fading Away, Ezequiel Salinas, Ramiro Sonzini, (Argentina, European Premiere)
- Cinema Kawakeb, Mahmoud Massad, (Jordan, Qatar, The Netherlands, World Premiere)
- Le Lac, Fabrice Aragno, (Switzerland, international premiere)
- Fantasy, Isabel Pagliai, (France, international premiere)
- Tell Me a Fairy Tale, Ebrû Avci, (Turkey, World Premiere)
- B for Bartleby, Angela Summereder, (Austria, World Premiere)
- The Anything, Giorgos Athanasiou, (Greece, World Premiere)
- The Strongest Lightning Strikes Not From Dark Skies, Nate Lavey, (USA, World Premiere)
- Firewood, Manel Raga Raga (Portugal, Spain, World Premiere)
- Água Mãe, Hiroatsu Suzuki, Rossana Torres (Portugal, World Premiere)
- Three of Cups, Enotea, Mário Macedo,(Denmark, Portugal, World Premiere)
- Gil, Let’s Explode São Paulo, Maria Clara Escobar (Brazil, Portugal, European Premiere)
- Andar com Fé, Duarte Coimbra (Portugal, World Premiere)
- The Seasons, Maureen Fazendeiro (Portugal, France, Spain, Austria, Portuguese Premiere)
- Fuck the Polis, Rita Azevedo Gomes (Portugal, Portuguese Premiere)
- Complô, João Miller Guerra (Portugal, Portuguese Premiere)
- Gold and Ashes, Salomé Lamas (Portugal, World Premiere)
- Tiger Bay, Carlos Conceição (Portugal, Angola, World Premiere)
- Ku Handza, André Guiomar (Portugal, World Premiere)
- Nova ’78, Aaron Brookner, Rodrigo Areias (UK, Portugal, Portuguese Premiere)
The New Visions section continues to focus on the contemporary nature of cinema, bringing together films produced between 1896 and 2025, organisers note. The program builds a bridge between early cinematic experiments and more contemporary practices, from the luminous shots and camera movements of Gabriel Veyre, cameraman for the Lumière brothers, to the new films by Hassen Ferhani, Javier Rebollo, Marko Grba Singh, and Margarita Ledo Andión. Egyptian Hala Elkoussy is the guest director, a visual artist turned filmmaker whose work combines an inventive, political, and poetic approach. Her films offer dreamlike worlds, revealing a lucid, formally rich, and deeply human cinema.
Another highlight is Minh Quý Trương, whose multifaceted work reflects his deep connection to Vietnam and its people. Both in his solo works and in collaboration with Nicolas Graux, Trương combines traditions of fiction, non-fiction, ethnography, and science fiction, constructing films of attention and detail, where history, memory, and the materiality of the present time intertwine. This year’s section program also includes Shadowboxing, conceived in a dialogue between Doclisboa associate programmer Cíntia Gil and French programmer and critic Jean-Pierre Rehm. Inspired by the boxing training technique, it proposes an imaginary combat without a counterpart, taking Palestine as its horizon and spiritual, moral, and aesthetic presence.
Additional highlights within the previously announced Heart Beat section are: Cast of Shadows by Sami van Ingen; Andy Kaufman Is Me by Clay Tweel; Barking in the Dark by Marie Losier; Bobò by Pippo Delbono; Paul by Denis Cotê; Toni, My Father by Anna Negri; Megadoc by Mike Figgis, about Francis Ford Coppola’s epic Megalopolis; Strange Journey: The Story of Rocky Horror by Linus O’Brien – and a tribute to Robert Wilson, who passed away this year, with three films: two of his own, Stations and Video 50, and another about one of his theatrical productions, Robert Wilson & the CIVIL warS, by Howard Brookner.
Now highlights within the previously-announced From the Earth to the Moon section are: Pescadores de Bubaque by Pedro Florêncio; Contemplation Deadlock Attempt by Welket Bungué; Aurora by João Vieira Torres; Tales of the Wounded Land by Abbas Fahdel; Angela’s Diaries. Two Filmmakers: Chapter Three by Yervant Gianikian and Angela Ricci Lucchi, and Tôsô by Masao Adachi.
Doclisboa and Cinemateca Portuguesa present a retrospective dedicated to William Greaves (1926–2014), a pioneer of African-American documentary and experimental cinema, whose work reflects a deep commitment to social justice, historical memory, and freedom. Co-programmed by academic Scott MacDonald and Luís Mendonça (Cinemateca Portuguesa), the program will reveal Greaves’ versatility as an actor, director, producer, and editor.
The competitive section Green Years occupies a special place in Doclisboa’s program, revealing new talents and emerging names. The selection brings together cinematic gestures that oscillate between the intimate and the political, where cinema becomes a place of waiting, imagination, and resistance, experimenting with hybrid forms.
Nebulae is Doclisboa’s industry space dedicated to the development of independent cinema and the promotion of new collaborations. Through seminars, round tables, development labs, project presentations, round tables, meetings between producers, and networking events, Nebulae brings together professionals from around the world. abcDoc is also back, in partnership with Apordoc’s educational project, committed to promoting education through cinema, with activities for children and young people, focusing mainly on school audiences.
