Rekordstort antal danske byer inviterer til dokumentarfilmfestivaler
Den 10.-25. marts 2026 står i dokumentarfilmens tegn. CPH:DOX’ landsdækkende initiativ, DOX:DANMARK, hvor mere end halvdelen af landets kommuner arrangerer deres egne lokale dokumentarfilmfestivaler, åbner nemlig biografdørene til mere end 400 filmvisninger, 200 events og et hav af spændende samtaler omkring dokumentarfilm i verdensklasse.
Interessen vokser hvert år
Siden CPH:DOX søsatte DOX:DANMARK tilbage i 2021, hvor ni kommuner deltog, er interessen i dén grad taget til. I år deltager 61 kommuner, og i hele festivalperioden vil biografer såvel som kulturhuse, kirker, højskoler, museer, forsamlingshuse, efterskoler, musikhuse og universiteter være engageret i dokumentarfilmenes univers.
”DOX:DANMARK har på mindre end fem år vokset sig til en størrelse, hvor vi som kulturbegivenhed kan siges at være landsdækkende. At danskere fra Bornholm til Skagen kan tage del i både filmvisninger, samtaler og events, udvider de perspektiver, festivalen ønsker at facilitere. Jo flere, der er med, jo bedre,” fortæller Niklas Engstrøm, der er kunstnerisk leder ved CPH:DOX.
I år er disse 61 kommuner en del af DOX:DANMARK: Albertslund, Billund, Bornholm, Brøndby, Brønderslev, Dragør, Esbjerg, Faxe, Fredensborg, Fredericia, Furesø, Faaborg-Midtfyn, Gentofte, Gladsaxe, Glostrup, Gribskov, Guldborgsund, Haderslev, Halsnæs, Hedensted, Helsingør, Holbæk, Holstebro, Horsens, Hvidovre, Høje-Taastrup, Hørsholm, Kalundborg, Kolding, Lejre, Lemvig, Lolland, Lyngby-Taarbæk, Mariagerfjord, MIddelfart, Morsø, Nordfyn, Næstved, Odense, Randers, Rebild, Ringsted, Roskilde, Rudersdal, Silkeborg, Skive, Slagelse, Struer, Svendborg, Syddjurs, Sønderborg, Thisted, Tønder, Varde, Vejle, Frederikshavn, Hjørring, Viborg, Ærø, Aalborg, Aarhus. Dertil kan man opleve CPH:DOX i København og på Frederiksberg fra den 11. til den 22. marts.
Helt særlige oplevelser i vente
”DOX:DANMARK er meget mere end dokumentarfilm vist i lokale biografer. De lokale arrangører har virkelig taget opgaven til sig og er med til at lave alt fra paneldebatter til fællesspisninger omkring de forskellige dokumentarer. Vi er virkelig glade for, at så mange danskere på tværs af landet kan deltage i de vigtige møder og samtaler, som dokumentarfilmene giver anledning til,” fortsætter Niklas Engstrøm.
Er man til GLADSAXE:DOX, kan man for eksempel opleve hele Danmarks stormvejrsekspert Jesper Theilgaard i forbindelse med dokumentarfilmen Stormbound. VEJLE:DOX inviterer til visning af marinebiolog-dokumentaren A Life Illuminated på byens gamle vandværk, og ved visningen af We Want The Funk dokumentaren i VENDSYSSEL:DOX kan man møde Ida Nielsen, der var bassist for legendariske Prince. Derudover kan man blandt andre møde Knud Romer, Brian Holm, Peter Aalbæk, Karen Mukupa og Casper Schrøder til events under DOX:DANMARK.
Fra Astrid Lindgrens verden til fristaden Christiania
De byer, der deltager i DOX:DANMARK, kan frit vælge mellem en udvalgt perlerække af de dokumentarfilm, der er på programmet under CPH:DOX. Dokumentarerne er både danske og internationale, og de berører emner om alt fra videnskab til politik og personlige historier.
Blandt de udvalgte film til DOX:DANMARK er A World Gone Mad – The War Diaries of Astrid Lindgren, som giver indblik i en helt ung Astrid Lindgrens virkelighed, Petrolheads, som er en ny roadtrip-dokumentar af Emil Langballe, og ikke mindst Christiania, der fortæller historien om hele Danmarks fristad. I alt er 24 dokumentarfilm på programmet til DOX:DANMARK. Byerne vælger selv, hvilke film de vil vise.
Fokus på en yngre målgruppe
Som noget helt nyt har DOX:DANMARK et særligt fokus på at ramme en yngre målgruppe. Dette kan både ses i filmudvalget og gennem samarbejde med blandt andet DFUNK, Sind Ungdom og ungdomshuse i flere byer. Efter den prisvindende dokumentarfilm A Fox Under A Pink Moon kan man opleve unge herboende flygtninge fortælle deres egne personlige historier, og i forbindelse med den animerede queer-dokumentar Bouchra vil der være fællesspisning med en lokal LGBTQ+-ungdomsforening.
Årets DOX:DANMARK-program er en sammensat bruttotrup af nogle af årets største dokumentarfilm på CPH:DOX-festivalen. De 61 satellit-udgaver af festivalen har frit kunne vælge imellem følgende dokumentarfilm:
A World Gone Mad – The War Diaries of Astrid Lindgren, Merckx – Race of a Champion, Alle os og siloen, Petrolheads, Patriarken, Myseriet om Menopausen, Christiania, Intelligence rising, We Want the Funk, Watching People Watching Birds, Everyone Is Lying To You For Money, A Fox Under a Pink Moon, Cambodianske Øldrømme, Techplomacy, Stormbound, Our Land, Bouchra, Molly vs the Machine, Museum, Tingbjerg-eksperimentet, Hjemsøgt, Mariinka, Little Sinner og HEX.
Nederst i denne pressemeddelelse findes beskrivelser af de enkelte film.
Programmet for de enkelte byer kan findes via oversigten her.
DOX:DANMARK er støttet af Kulturministeriet, DFI, Danmarks Radio, Spar Nord Fonden, Øernes Kunstfond, Lundbeck Fonden, Novo Nordisk Fonden, kommunernes kulturpuljer og/eller lokale fonde samt Udenrigsministeriet og CISU.
The program “Prisoners of Conscience + A Friend in Prison, Me Next to the Prison” will be shown Saturday the 14th at 13.00, more Georgian films follow, check the website https://wolfberlin.org/de.
From February 14 to 15, in cooperation with the Georgian Film Institute—a non-governmental initiative supporting independent Georgian filmmakers—we (Wolf Kino) will be showing a joint program of selected Georgian films from recent years for the second time.
What is happening cinematically in a country that has experienced a radical regression toward authoritarianism within just a few years? Georgia—a country with a deep-rooted cinema tradition that has produced poetic, rebellious images even under censorship—is currently undergoing a political and cultural upheaval. After years of democratic development and European orientation, the country is once again being subordinated to Russia against the will of its population: ruled and monopolized by an oligarch modeled on Putin. In response to increasing censorship, Georgian filmmakers have taken a united stand against the state. They are boycotting state funding structures so as not to become instruments of propaganda, and refusing to recognize a cinema that compromises with oppression. By 2023, over 450 filmmakers had already signed up to this boycott.
And yet Georgian cinema lives on. Despite a lack of financial structures, films continue to be made – driven by independence, solidarity, and resistance. Conscience of Georgian Cinema, which is also the institute’s motto at the EFM of the Berlinale 2026, brings together current films that reflect Georgia’s political and social processes through cinema. The short film program Prisoners of Conscience combines works by Salomé Jashi, Nutsa Salomé Alexi, Keti Machavariani, Elene Naveriani, and others about politically imprisoned people in Georgia. The films counter the state’s criminalization of pro-European protests with a cinematic counter-public sphere – as an act of witness and truth. On Another Stage by Teo Jorbenadze portrays the Georgian opera singer and world star Paata Burchuladze and his journey from the big stage to protest. The film was shot before his arrest in October 2025. He now faces up to nine years in prison.
Alexandre Koberidze’s epic experimental road movie Dry Leaf is about a father’s search for his missing daughter. The director’s father plays the lead role, and the score was composed by his brother. The film premiered in the main competition at the 2025 Locarno Film Festival and received a Special Mention.
The series is complemented by two new documentaries: Ketevan Vashagishvili’s 9-Month Contract, a haunting exploration of motherhood and surrogacy under precarious social conditions, and Kote Kaladze’s Nobody in Sight, a sensitive portrait of a young man hoping for a different life as part of addiction therapy.
Current feature films are also represented, including Luka Beradze’s social satire Congratulations Once Again, a fairy-tale-like short film about a New Year’s celebration that gets out of hand. The program is complemented by other works with an original, personal cinematic language, including Anka Gujabidze’s TemoRe, a humorous black-and-white photo adventure, and Dea Cholokava’s What Does the Mud Whisper, a sensitive cinematic portrait of the perceptual world of a six-year-old girl. The series concludes with Tato Kotetishvili’s docu-fiction film Holy Electricity, which won a Golden Leopard at Locarno and accompanies a teenager and his uncle on an odyssey through Tbilisi, addressing themes such as grief and masculinity with wit and profundity.
All screenings will be introduced by Mukhran Makharadze’s short animated film Saturday Cleaning, and after the screenings, the filmmakers in attendance will present their films and engage in conversation with the audience.
Accompanying the film series, 8000 Vintages will be presenting Georgian wines in our bar!
The film series was co-curated by Nana Ekvtimishvili (Georgian Film Institute) and Eva Buchmann (Wolf Kino).
The film program is presented in two parts: Prisoners of Conscience (Georgia 2025, 62 min) is a collection of eleven short films that brings together leading voices in Georgian documentary filmmaking, such as Salomé Jashi, Anna Dziapshipa, Tiku Kobiashvili, and others. Here, individual film portraits capture the political prisoners, the so-called “სინდისის პატიმრები/Sindisis Patimrebi” (English: prisoners of conscience), and their dramatic fate.
A Friend in Prison, Me Next to the Prison by Mari Gulbiani (Georgia 2025, 24 min) tells the story of Dato, whose friend is arrested at a demonstration and sentenced to 10 days in prison, whereupon Dato goes to Zahesi Prison and begins a solo protest. Soon his sister Salomé joins him. Standing side by side in the cold, their silent determination becomes a powerful symbol of friendship, freedom, and courageous commitment to the truth.
The screening will be followed by a Q&A with directors Keti Machavariani and Salomé Nutsa Alexi.
directors: Keti Machavariani, Anna Dziapshipa, Salomé Jashi, Sandro Katamashvili, Tiku Kobiashvili, Levan Shubashvili, George Varsimashvili, Elene Naveriani, Vajiko Chachkhiani, Kote Chlaidze, Salomé Nutsa Alexi, Mari Gulbiani
Marketed as safe tools of public order, less-lethal weapons circulate globally. ARTIFACTS OF WAR moves between Europe’s arms fairs, archival material, and a forensic algorithm to explore how force is shaped, regulated, and audited.
Jorge Caballero / Anna Giralt Gris & Diego Pino Anguita / Artefacto Films / CangrejoFilms / Spain & Chile
At a turning point in history, two world leaders from very different backgrounds strike up a strange friendship and set out to change the world. This is the story of Bill & Boris – told through archival footage and in their own words.
Arthur Franck / Sandra Enkvist, Anders Lindström, Rémi Grellety, Sara Skrodzka, Esther Nissen & Thorvald Nilsen / Polygraf / IndieFilm Bergen, Warboys Films & Final Cut For Real / Finland, France, Denmark & Norway
In a devastated Slovak town poisoned by magnesite mining, six Roma children refuse to accept their harsh reality, finding refuge in imagination, friendship, and their dreams that become their only form of resistance.
Roman Ďuriš / Richard Šimeček, Michal Sikora & Albin Bourgeois / Svjetski Films / Lonely Production & Weplus / Slovakia, Czech Republic & France
COSMOFONIA intends to perform a shift in the very conditions of perception. At its core lies a radical cinematic gesture: a film whose soundtrack is composed almost entirely of sounds never heard before by human ears.
Véréna Paravel / Florence Cohen / Anna Lena Films / France
With the 2026 World Cup on the horizon, a banned betting influencer and a relentless investigative journalist expose how sports manipulation has evolved from scandal to business model, now threatening to destroy the game itself.
Lauren DeFilippo & Sam Soko / Amanda Pollak / Insignia Films / LBx Africa / Sweden, Kenya & United States
A group of young Palestinian filmmakers in Gaza overcome the tragic killing of their friend and use their tools of creative resistance to document their own genocide and their communities beyond the colonial lens of rubble and cardboard boxes.
Shourideh C. Molavi & Shrouq Alaila / Shourideh C. Molavi, Henry Plavidal & Laura Poitras / SCM Research / Palestine & Canada
FACE VALUE examines how advances in cosmetic medicine, digital culture and AI are reshaping global beauty norms and transforming algorithmic aesthetic ideals into increasingly compulsory standards that redefine women’s identity, agency, and self-worth.
Faye Tsakas / Riel Roch-Decter / MEMORY / United States
A fabled island of ruins has survived for generations thanks to an unlikely saviour – seaweed. Panchavarnam has spent a lifetime collecting this treasure. She now fights to save her sisterhood of seaweed, even as her daughter chooses another life.
Archana Phadke / Shaunak Sen, Aman Mann & James Wilson / Kiterabbit Films & Valentine Films / India & United States
In Mexico’s avocado capital, prosperity and violence grow side by side as communities fight to hold on to their land, their livelihood, and their future.
Ivonne Serna & Selim Benzeghia / Geoffrey Livolsi, Alex Pritz, Will N. Miller & Selim Benzeghia / Koudéta Films / Documist / France & United States
For Joud, a German-Palestinian-Syrian journalist, turning 40 means choosing love at all cost. Living across Berlin, Beirut, and Damascus, he documents his gender confirmation and political exile, negotiating a life where legal recognition, family history, and romance are divided by borders he must constantly cross.
Diana El Jeiroudi / Diana El Jeiroudi & Orwa Nyrabia / No Nation Films / Docmakers / Germany& Netherlands
In Nigeria’s ferocious fashion scene, three designers fight to escape erasure and reach Lagos Fashion Week’s runway — where visibility means survival. A story about who gets seen, who remains invisible, and the fragile ecosystem that depends on them all.
Nosarieme Garrick / Chioma Onyenwe / Black Gazelle Productions / Raconteur Productions / United States & Nigeria
LETTER TO ALVIN uncovers the life and work of Alvin Baltrop – a largely unrecognized but profoundly important African American artist who chronicled the LGBTQ+ experience at the fringes of New York’s waterfront in the 1970s and 1980s.
Göran Hugo Olsson & Hilton Als / Tobias Janson, Melissa Lindgren, Yona Backer & Joslyn Barnes / Story / Louverture Films & Third Streaming / Sweden & United States
Nobel laureate Oleksandra Matviichuk follows the scars of war across Ukraine’s wounded landscapes, carrying her own trauma into a global fight to recognize ecocide as a war crime. As her resolve meets the fragile promise of justice, she inspires us to find hope — and act.
Lea Glob / Sigrid Dyekjær, Eric Holland & Konstanze Speidel / Real Lava / Flare Film & DIM Filmhouse / Denmark, Germany & Ukraine
A genre-defying, cinematic documentary that explores the radical and under-explored transformations that occur in pregnancy and early motherhood, adapted from the groundbreaking book by Lucy Jones.
Kathryn Ferguson / Rosie Crerar & Eleanor Emptage / Tara Films & barry crerar / United Kingdom
Ewa lives in the shadow of her father’s crime — the assassination of an anti-apartheid leader in South Africa. Despite this, she fights for his release. When he returns to Poland after 30 years and joins the far right, she is forced to confront him.
Łukasz Kowalski / Łukasz Kowalski, Anna Mazerant & Signe Byrge Sørensen / 4.30 Studio / Final Cut For Real / Poland & Denmark
In a ballroom in Queens, NY, senior Asian American immigrants are transported through dance, revisiting worlds left behind and creating lives anew.
Hansen Lin & Siyi Chen / Siyi Chen, Hansen Lin, Clara Vuillermoz & Laurence Buelens / Queens Disco Production / SOLENT Production & Rayuela Productions / United States, France & Belgium
As the US dismantles decades of climate change legislation, an environmental activist strikes up an anonymous, online conversation with a climate skeptic. Shifting between the personal and scientific, can this dialog reveal any common ground?
Ra’anan Alexandrowicz / James Doolittle & Thomas Lennon / All Ages Productions / Once in a Blue Moon Films / United States
The film explores our passion for defeating death by tracing the Russian Cosmism – a 100-y-o movement influencing today’s biohackers and longevity enthusiasts. It is not only a film about how we can live forever but about what happens if we do.
Piotr Winiewicz / Henrik Underbjerg / Stray Dog Productions / Pressman Film / Denmark & United States
In a dreamlike 1950s town square built inside a warehouse, we will investigate our memory care crisis, the healing potential of filmmaking and the fragility of reality itself.
Robert Greene / Bennett Elliott, Susan Bedusa & Douglas Tirola / 4th Row Films / Square Peg Films / United States
An artist persuades his son to make a film about him — but as their visions collide the project unravels into an exploration on masculinity, the need to be seen, and cinema’s elusive promise of redemption from the ghosts that haunt and bind them both.
Beniamino Barrese / Harry Vaughn & Beniamino Barrese / Real Lava / Denmark
Over 3 years, beginning in 2023, a group of Palestinians and Israelis travel to Northern Ireland to learn how bitter enemies made peace. But as their own divided homeland descends into deeper violence, they struggle to make peace amongst themselves.
Yuval Orr & Aziz Abu Sarah / Margaux Missika & Liel Maghen / No Man’s Land / Upian / France, Palestine & Israel
An all-archival adventure documentary that explores the creation of the American Museum of Natural History. Through the interconnected histories of its extraordinary artifacts and the people behind them, the museum becomes a mirror for humanity’s longing to freeze time, amass treasures, and reflect on our place in the world.
Marley McDonald / John Cardellino / Unimerical Studios / future perfect / United States
The definitive story of Niki de Saint Phalle, a pioneering artist who blasted into the art world with a rifle, and became the architect of her own reality with her self-funded visionary masterpiece, the monumental Tarot Garden.
Matt Wolf & Svetlana Zill / Emmanuelle Lepers / Haut et Court Doc / France
THE SILENT NETWORK uncovers an organized movement that builds and spreads political and economic influence through hidden financial networks, revealing a Europe-wide threat to democratic institutions and human rights.
Pernille Rose Grønkjær & Noa Agnete Metz / Vibeke Vogel, Nina Leidersdorff & Malthe Koch / Danish Documentary / Up North Films / Denmark& Norway
A group of Palestinians investigate their personal histories in UNRWA’s formerly hidden archives. Interwoven with Israel’s assault on UNRWA, the film shows that preserving memory is an act of resistance, defying erasure.
What does the world look like for those standing exactly where history begins to fracture? Do they cling to the past, or reach for the future? The film tells the story of a political meteor strike — the chaos that follows, and the challenges of finding direction in a new and unfamiliar world.
Christoffer Guldbrandsen / Peter Engel / Wingman Media / The Ark / Denmark, Germany & Norway
I’m Niniko, an aspiring comedian dreaming of London. My cousin Kakha, Georgia’s beloved actor, refuses to leave. Political turmoil awakens our shared trauma: my dream becomes escape while he fights in the streets—our relationship caught between love, resentment, and survival.
Niniko Lekishvili / Ana Kvichidze, Irina Gelashvili & Estelle Robin You / Moonbow / Radium Films & Grande Ourse Films / Georgia & France
When her mother dies, Anghelina loses the voice that defined what it meant to be a good woman. Caught between her mother’s faith and duty and her daughter’s life as an artist, she must decide which values endure and which end with her.
Ana Gherciu / Ana Gherciu / Narrativa Studio / Sud-Est Media NGO / Moldova
Everyday, miners dig deep into the Earth’s crust, extracting minerals, destroying nature – while in a parallel reality cosmic dust invades human minds, astronauts appear in Armenia’s desert-like landscapes, and the land itself begins to transform into Mars.
Mery Aghakhanyan / Karina Simonyan / Edgar Baghdasaryan Film Production / Armenia
At 86, Vali prepares for the final journey of his life to see his former home and his family’s graves, even though his family opposes the trip and the border remains closed.
Ulviyya Ahmadova / Nijat Dadashov / Cineart Group / Azerbaijan
Pavlo (18) escapes Russian occupation and, with a teacher and imprisoned collaborators, exposes a school system designed to groom children for war. Pavlo’s mission is not over until his brother Ivan (10) is out – before propaganda claims him for good.
Under the shadow of autocracy, the city whispers and roars. An unexpected act elevates an unknown woman into the face of the protest. SOUNDS OF REVOLUTION is a symphony of resistance, where Georgia’s people rise together — but the triumph of collective demands sacrifice.
Nikoloz Bezhanishvili / Nikoloz Bezhanishvili & Victor Ede / NIKADOCFILM / Cinephage / Georgia & France
Following young Ukrainians pulled into the wartime shadow economy, the film immerses us in their inner worlds as fast money turns into addiction. Bound together in a fragile community, they must face the question: what will their escape truly cost?
Oleksandra Horiienko / Kateryna Yahodka & Alex Shiriaieff / EuroArctic Media Group / 2Brave Productions / Sweden & Ukraine
In a world where women are taught to run or endure, Zara, a fearless human rights defender, launches a rehabilitation program for abusers, where she confronts the source of violence, after years of managing its aftermath.
Lilit Movsisyan / Sona Margaryan / Motif Films / Armenia
In a few months, two years will have passed since the death of Thomas Heise, a key figure of European documentary and auteur cinema over the last fifty years. Heise was remembered in Bolzano one month ago during two very intense days, when, together with FAS – Film Association South Tyrol, the three films of the Halle-Neustadt Trilogy (STAU – JETZT GEHT’S LOS / NEUSTADT / KINDER. WIE DIE ZEIT VERGEHT) were screened in the cinema, and a masterclass was organised in his memory. The masterclass retraced his artistic path, from the years of the GDR to the reunification of Germany, and highlighted the importance of what Heise called an “archaeology of memory” in his cinema – a way of working in which the past continues to cast its shadows on the present.
During these days, long-time collaborators of Heise joined us, bringing a living and personal memory of the great German filmmaker. Among them were the cinematographer and lifelong friend Peter Badel, and his first producer during the years of the Wende, Katrin Schlösser.
We would like to open this newsletter by once again taking time – and offering it to you – to pay tribute to a great filmmaker, for a very simple reason: Thomas Heise was an artist who was never afraid to face the contradictions of his time. He was never afraid to “get his hands dirty” and to enter places that were uncomfortable or difficult: whether filming inside a police station in Berlin during the GDR (when all his previous films had already been rejected by the regime), or spending time with a group of neo-Nazis in the town of Halle just after the collapse of the GDR, or even meeting his own brother after many years to reflect on the role that one of their closest friends had played within the Stasi.
Heise loved the spoken word in his films, but many of them will be remembered above all for their silences: for the sighs of the people on screen, and for the deep sense of empathy that Heise was able to create with everyone he met. Very few filmmakers have reached such emotional closeness to the people they filmed. It is worth remembering here another great German filmmaker, Helga Reidemeister, who passed away five years ago and was also born in Halle, before the GDR. In films such as LICHTER AUS DEM HINTERGRUND, VON WEGEN “SCHICKSAL” and GOTTESZELL – EINE FRAUGEFÄNGNIS, she touched the living heart of the people she worked with.
Thomas Heise’s cinema was built around key historical moments and nourished by materials that document important passages of the twentieth century. It is a cinema that does not impose a point of view, but instead asks essential questions to a community. It is a cinema that enters the cracks of History and personal stories and asks: what happens to a community when a social and political balance breaks? Within this work, Heise searched for the physical presence of silence – of sighs, pauses and waiting – creating moments of deep intimacy with the people he filmed. Through Heise’s films, we learn to use words not only to give information, but also to feel and touch emptiness and suspension: in History, in a farewell, in a wound, in a relationship.
Heise’s films should be watched again today more than ever, in a time of easy and tragic oppositions, a time in which everything is shouted, and everyone seems to be the protagonist of something somewhere, while in reality we are more and more victims of History. Heise teaches us to get our hands dirty – and this is the best wish we can make for our young filmmakers.
Emanuele Vernillo Zelig, Head of the Three-Years Training
Miecia is the “Queen of Łeba”, a seaside resort at the Baltic Sea, the Sea, so well known for a Dane, who has tasted lots of smoked fish on the Island of Bornholm. Miecia has had her smokehouse for 40 years and it is quite a popular place near the beach with a neighbouring amusement place that offers carousels and swings. Everybody knows Miecia, who is a nice old lady and a grandma and a warm caring boss towards the young people, who help her in her stall, selling and smoking the fish. A boss who wants people to keep their promises, which is difficult if alcohol is involved. She gives advice on how to live life, wonderful.
As you can interpret from the poster above working with smoke has its consequences. Combined with the cigarettes Miecia lights constantly. She has trouble breathing and good for her she gets a spa trip; it seems she likes it, but still she is on the phone to her employees to check how is everything in the smokehouse. She is welcomed back and she says that now her team will take over and “I will sit on the bench”.
The film is beautifully shot, the editing is focused on bringing out the personality of Miecia, it works, to have her – sometimes pretty direct – humour mixed with the recording of what a traditional smokehouse is and of course you wonder if that can go on, when Miecia and her commitment is no longer there?
The director is from 2000, this is her first feature documentary, more than well done, opening film at Krakow FF last year and in competition at the recent Fipadoc. And pitched at Baltic Sea Docs in 2024.
The long-awaited documentary ‘MARIINKA’ directed by acclaimed Belgian filmmaker Pieter-Jan De Pue, has been selected as the opening film of the 23rd edition of CPH:DOX taking place March 11–22, 2026 in Copenhagen. The film will celebrate its world premiere at the CPH:DOX 2026 opening gala in the concert hall of the Royal Danish Academy of Music on March 10 at 19:00, in the presence of the director and the film crew, including two of the main protagonists in the film.
Shot on 16mm and nine years in the making, ‘MARIINKA’ is the second feature documentary by Pieter-Jan de Pue after the highly praised ‘The Land of the Enlightened’ (2016). The film will be screened in the festival’s main competition, DOX:AWARD, honouring films that combine exceptional storytelling, innovative filmmaking, and cultural as well as social relevance.
‘MARIINKA’ begins long before the world watched the full-scale invasion. In eastern Ukraine, the film traces several young Ukrainians whose lives have been forever shaped by more than ten years of war and conflict in the Donbas region.
Amidst the war a promising boxing talent turns military paramedic, a girl is smuggling unexpected goods across the frontline to survive, and as in a Greek tragedy, two brothers now fight on opposite sides of the front line – against each other – while their youngest brother lives in safety far from the war with a foster family in the United States. Through letters, video calls and silent meetings, a story unfolds about belonging, national loyalty and the fault lines where political conflicts can trump even the bonds of blood.
“’MARIINKA’ is a film that insists on our attention at a time when attention itself has become a scarce resource. Pieter-Jan de Pue has spent nearly a decade staying with this story – not chasing the news cycle, but listening to lives shaped by a war that began long before it filled our headlines and continues as the world’s gaze threatens to drift elsewhere. The result is a remarkable cinematic achievement that refuses both distance and simplification, presenting the Russian invasion of Ukraine as lived reality, carried in bodies, relationships and impossible choices. Shaped through European co-production – and years of engagement with CPH:DOX’s industry platforms – the film reminds us why documentary cinema matters: not to offer easy answers, but to confront us with urgency, nuance and the complex human realities behind events often reduced to headlines,” says Niklas Engstrøm, Artistic Director of CPH:DOX.
“I am very happy and honored that the years-long journey of this film has ultimately led to a world premiere as the opening film and competition entry at the renowned CPH:DOX festival, which has always supported us during the development and rough cut phase of the project,” says Pieter-Jan De Pue, director of ‘MARIINKA’.
‘MARIINKA’ is directed by Pieter-Jan De Pue and produced by Bart Van Langendonck and Pieter-Jan De Pue (Savage Film), in co-production with Christian Beetz (Beetz Brothers Film Production), Femke Wolting and Bruno Felix (Submarine), Vincent Metzinger, Emilie Blézat (Dark Riviera), Naoko Films, Shelter Prod, and ZDF in collaboration with ARTE, with the participation of RTBF Documentary Unit, VRT, VPRO, and SVT.
The film is supported by the Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF), the Belgian Federal Tax Shelter, the Netherlands Film Fund, the Centre du Cinéma et de l’Audiovisuel de la Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles, the Creative Europe MEDIA Programme, the King Baudouin Foundation, and Eurimages, in collaboration with the Belgian Embassy in Ukraine.
It’s looking at you, the bull. From the big screen in the cinema Grand in Copenhagen. Together with an almost full hall on a Wednesday afternoon, the first day of CPH:DOX 2025, I booked a ticket for Catalan Albert Serra’s first non-fiction film. Admired for his fiction films, considered a true auteur, he had a masterclass last year at DocsBarcelona, that I missed but I understood that he and editor Artur Tort told that they had spent 9 months of editing the two hour long bullfighting documentary! And that Serra said that it would have been impossible to find an actor for the role of torero. That’s why he decided to leave fiction for this film. He found Andrés Roca Rey, see photo.
You also hear the breathing of the bull. It’s ready for the fight that in most cases ends with its death. And in some cases with blood on the torero, again see photo of Roca, as they call him, in a hotel room undressing after a fight assisted by what you could call his butler. The same man is the one who – in a precious scene – dresses Roca starting with feminine underwear and pink socks before the heavy colorful outfit is settled on the body of the young man.
A fight yes, but also a show, that Serra has his focus on. No spectators are seen, but they are heard, we see Roca in the arena alone with the bull with his red cloth, moving, inviting the bull to attack, the sound is strong, Roca communicates with the bull, he gets advice from his team and praise, all is hearable and even more so when they are back in the car, the sole other location, “you’ve got balls”, “you are the best”, simple dialogues in this world of men.
It’s all about the image. I don’t remember having seen so poignant closeups of a bull suffering; with blood all over it keeps the attack until Roca delivers the death blow with his sword after the bull has received lances in its body. Serra comes back with detail after detail of Roca, bull after bull, taking dancing steps with inviting sounds toward the animal and a face that changes expression depending on how close we are to the final sword thrust. In some sequences Roca performs as a kind of Shakespearean character supported by strong music, classical.
I would never enter a bullfighting arena, it’s disgusting animal cruelty what is going on there to entertain us – Serra is not telling us what to think about this cultural phenomenon – up yo you, but I was caught by the drama as it was magnificently conveyed on the screen by a filmmaker, who knows his métier. One man in the arena.
Dear Tue Steen Müller ,At a moment when Greenland is increasingly framed through the language of geopolitics, resources and strategic interests, the European Film Academy dedicates its newest _UNDERSCORE edition to Greenlandic cinema. We have several Greenlandic members and it is important for us to offer a different entry point: one grounded in stories, memories and lived experiences by Greenlandic filmmakers.The selection, now available on the Academy VOD platform, brings together landmark works spanning more than two decades of filmmaking, from the country’s first feature to recent, internationally acclaimed shorts and documentaries.
WATCH NOW: The Greenland edition of _UNDERSCORE is more than a curated programme. It is a gesture of trust, solidarity and recognition at a moment when Greenland’s voice risks being overshadowed by louder geopolitical narratives. By foregrounding cinema as a space of self-definition and narrative sovereignty, the European Film Academy offers audiences not a commentary on Greenland, but an invitation to listen.You will find the collection of nine Greenlandic films on the Academy VOD Platformuntil 22 February.
The Barcelona International Documentary Film Festival – DocsBarcelona 2026 will award scottish-irish filmmaker Mark Cousins the Docs of Honor Award and dedicate a retrospective to his work during the next edition, which will take place from May 7 to 17. During his visit to Barcelona, Cousins will also present the spanish premiere of the first episode of his new series, The Story of Documentary Film, after its world and European premieres at the Sundance and Berlin festivals respectively. Cousins will also offer a masterclass and will headline the opening conference of the DocsBarcelona Pro professional market. This tribute is possible thanks to the valued collaboration with the Filmoteca de Catalunya.
With the new series The Story of Documentary Film, Cousins expands the universe of The Story of Film: An Odyssey, a monumental 15-hour project with which he has redefined the dissemination of film history, reaffirming his status as one of the great audiovisual storytellers of world cinema. In addition to being among the most prominent contemporary film theorists for his academic and essayistic approaches to the seventh art, Cousins also possesses a remarkable artistic, personal, and auteur-driven side, focused on emotions and perspective, materialized in films such as I am Belfast (2015) and Stockholm, My Love (2016).
DocsBarcelona wanted to recognize Cousins for his unquestionable contribution to cinema, culture and audiovisual education, as well as for a career that champions art and cinema as a tool for cultural transformation and critical thinking, open to the world and its complexities, and for his continued work in the dissemination, preservation and renewal of cinematic language, exploring and expanding its limits.
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