27th Thessaloniki International Documentary Film Festival: Competition

The 27th Thessaloniki International Documentary Film Festival has announced the films competing in its three sections: International, Newcomers and >>Film Forward. The documentaries, which will have their world, international or European premieres at the festival, are up for official and independent awards, many of which carry cash prizes. The winner of the Golden Alexander will be automatically eligible for the Academy Awards in the Documentary category.

The 30 films in competition, including 9 Greek productions, address current and urgent issues, explore generational traumas, dream of emancipation from oppression, reflect on the future of humanity, examine our relationship with the environment and challenge discrimination and prejudice.

International Competition

The ten films participating in the International Competition are eligible for a number of awards, including the Golden Alexander, accompanied by a cash prize of €12,000, and the Silver Alexander, accompanied by a cash prize of €5,000. As TiDF is an Oscar® qualifying festival, the documentary that wins the Golden Alexander will be eligible to apply for the Academy Awards in the Documentary Feature category. The jury for this section is composed of Dimitris Athiridis (photographer, documentary filmmaker, producer and editor), Lauren Greenfield (filmmaker) and Signe Byrge Sørensen (producer). The selected films are the following:

• Bull’s Heart (Eva Stefani, Greece, 2024, 78’ – World premiere)
  This documentary produced by Onassis Culture focuses on Dimitris Papaioannou‘s performance ‘Transverse Orientation’. Filmmaker Eva Stefani follows the preparation of the work and its tour of theatrical stages in Europe, closely observing Papaioannou and his collaborators as they strive to give shape and life to their work. For two years, his camera captured scenes from rehearsals at Onassis Stegi during the pandemic, as well as performances in Paris, London, Vilnius and other cities, until the final performance in San Francisco. The documentary highlights the idea of art as a form of resistance in the face of futility and as a means to restore meaning to our lives.

• Sculpted Souls (Stavros Psillakis, Greece, 2025, 89’ – World premiere)
  For 26 years (1972-1998), Swiss dentist Julien Grivel treated leprosy patients in Greece free of charge. An inner journey that helped him to see the world and life differently. ‘By adopting the language of the Greeks, I unconsciously adopted their way of thinking,’ says Grivel. His friendship with former patient Manolis Fountoulakis was a catalyst in his transformation.
• The Goals of August (Dimitris Koutsiabasakos, Greece, 2025, 116’ – World premiere)
  An impressionistic portrait of daily life in a village in the mountains of southern Pindos, Greece, during an impromptu summer football tournament. Through observation, the documentary captures the vitality of the community, with its lights and shadows, in a combination of charm and rawness.
• Child of Dust  (Weronika Mliczewska, 2025, 92’ – World premiere)
  Sang is one of thousands of marginalised and unwanted children who were abandoned by US soldiers after the Vietnam War. At 55, Sang must confront his own weaknesses, internal conflicts and the deep scars of war that have haunted generations. His journey to the United States forces him to question his identity and face the challenge of bringing together two radically different worlds and cultures.

• Coexistence, My Ass!  (Amber Fares, USA-France, 2025, 95’ – Inernational premiere)
  Comedian Noam Shuster Eliassi creates a personal and political monologue about the struggle for equality in Israel/Palestine. When the elusive coexistence he has worked for all his life begins to seem like a bad joke, he challenges his audience with hard truths. Based on her brilliant stand-up routine developed at Harvard and filmed live, the documentary follows the evolving perspective of Eliassi – a former UN diplomat turned comedian – as well as the realities in the region.

• Free Leonard Peltier  (Jesse Short Bull & David France, USA, 2025, 110’ – International premiere)
  The directors of Lakota Nation vs. the United States and How to Survive a Plague, present the story of Leonard Peltier, one of the surviving leaders of the American Indian Movement, who has been in prison for 50 years after a controversial conviction. A new generation of Native activists vows to fight for his freedom before it is too late.

• GEN_ (Gianluca Matarrese, France-Italy-Switzerland, 2025, 103′ – European premiere)
  At Milan’s Niguarda Public Hospital, the unconventional Dr Maurizio Bini and his team provide medical care to couples aspiring to become parents through IVF, as well as to people seeking gender-reaffirming surgery. These doctors and nurses struggle against the constraints of a conservative government and an aggressive market eager to commodify the human body. At a time when reproduction and gender identity often become battlegrounds of political controversy, it is easy to overlook quintessence.

• Kick-off, (Roser Corella & Stefano Obino, Germany, 2025, 77΄- World premiere). In the remote village of Kök-Tash, Kyrgyzstan, where conservative norms confine women to domestic chores, an activist organises a women’s football tournament to challenge these patriarchal traditions. Visually captivating and highly evocative, Kick-off demonstrates how athletics has the power to break taboos, opposing the norms of traditionalism while promoting gender quality in rigidly patriarchal societies where women have no choice but to occupy the margins of inflexible and highly restrictive roles.

• Sobrenatural (Ventura Durall, Spain-Belgium-France, 2025, 81΄- World premiere). Mathu, a doctor, has become the opposite of his father, a spiritual healer. While Mathu is a reclusive ascetic, Malby was a hedonistic womaniser. Mathu’s controlled reality crumbles when Anna, a devout believer in Malby, tries to convince him that his father saved his life through telepathic healing. The confrontation becomes an exploration of the opposing beliefs between Science and Magic.

• Bajo las banderas, el sol (Juanjo Pereira, Paraguay-Argentina-USA-France-Germany, 2025, 89΄- World premiere). In 1989, the fall of Alfredo Stroessner‘s 35-year dictatorship in Paraguay marked the end of one of the world’s longest authoritarian regimes, but also the abandonment of the audiovisual archives that had cemented its power. These images, created to shape a national identity and celebrate the regime, disappeared from memory. Decades later, a treasure trove of unpublished images has been recovered in Paraguay and abroad, revealing the hidden mechanisms of power behind Stroessner’s rule.

Newcomers competition

Ten films over 50 minutes in length, created by young filmmakers, will compete for the Golden Alexander ‘Dimitri Eipides’ (10,000 euros in cash) and the Silver Alexander (4,000 euros). The Jury is composed of Inka Achté, filmmaker and programmer, Tina Mandilara, journalist, and Tünde Skovrán, filmmaker. The films participating in Newcomers are the following:

• Lo (Thanassis Vassiliou, Greece-France, 2025, 70΄- World premiere) ‘A year after my mother’s death I return to the empty Athenian flat of my childhood to deal with a troubled inheritance. Fragments of my family’s memories emerge from the now bare surfaces of the flat, intertwining my personal history with the collective trauma of the Greek junta.’ (T.V.)
• Super Paradis (Steve Krikris, Greece-Germany, 2024, 87΄- World premiere). In the last 50 years, Mykonos has undergone radical transformations. How did total freedom and self-expression give way to something so different? Were the seeds of what it became in the 1970s planted? Was it about the people and their unquenchable thirst for freedom or was it something else?
• Τhey Talk About Worship Here (Byron Kritzas, Greece, 2025, 88΄- World premiere). Poetic, dramatic, funny, MTV kids growing up on the Greek island of Corfu, Kore. Ydro. conquered the Greek indie pop/rock scene as only a few bands did, receiving both adoration and derision. The documentary follows their journey, focusing also on the importance of being special, without feeling ashamed.
• How to Build a Library (Maia Lekow y Christopher King, Kenya-United States, 2025, 102΄- International premiere). Shiro and Wachuka are trying to turn an abandoned, rubbish-strewn library in the heart of Nairobi into a vibrant centre of culture and creativity for the city’s inhabitants. The building in question, the historic McMillan Memorial Library, built in 1931 by British colonisers, was reserved exclusively for whites until 1958.

• My Sunnyside (Matylda Kawka, Poland-USA., 2025, 92΄- World premiere). Jo and Allie, a trans couple from Sunnyside, Queens, have built a life together that defies easy categorization. Their journey begins with a chance encounter on a dating app in 2016, which leads them to marry two years later, but their path is filled with challenges they never could have anticipated. As they navigate their transitions, careers and family dynamics, resilience, support and wholeness prevail.

• Queens of Joy (Olga Gibelinda, Ukraine-France-Czech Republic, 2025, 90΄- World premiere). Amidst the maelstrom of war in Ukraine, three drag queens – Diva Monroe, Marlene and Aura – refuse to leave their homeland. Instead of fleeing, they choose to fight: for freedom, for the LGBTQ+ community and for their own existence. The film is a story of self-discovery, love, hope and the power to find joy even in the darkest of times.

• Pet Farm (Finn Walther & Martin A. Walther, Norway, 2024, 83΄- International premiere). Joakim is a 40-year-old Norwegian who has had a dream since he was a child: to set up a farm, where he would raise foxes to tame and then sell as pets. With the grandeur of Scandinavian nature as a backdrop – exquisitely portrayed in the film’s stunning photography – and accompanied by an evocative and melancholic string soundtrack.

• Resilience (Tomas Elsik, Czech Republic, 2025, 80΄- World premiere). Amidst the immense greenery of the Czech countryside, Pavel quietly tends spring meadows damaged by deforestation, preserving rare plant species, while Klára, who works with the Czech Ornithological Society, scours the land for illegal bait traps with the help of her loyal dogs, discovering threats to the local wildlife.

• The Secret of Me (Grace Hughes-Hallett, UK, 2025, 96΄- European premiere). The year is 1995 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. During a feminist studies class, college student Kristi opens her textbook to discover something that turns her world upside down. Demanding her medical records, she is finally confronted with an extraordinary and disturbing secret that goes far beyond her own life, leading to the discovery of a psychological experiment on a pair of twins.

• The Treasure Hunter (Giacomo Gex, United Kingdom-Philippines-Mexico, 2025, 84΄- World premiere). Yamashita’s gold is a mythical and incalculable treasure, supposedly buried by the Japanese army throughout the Philippine archipelago during World War II, with the prospect of recovering it in the future. According to legend, most of it remains hidden underground to this day. Treasure hunters from all over the world have tried to obtain it, including Jack and his father, who have dedicated their lives to the quest, spending millions of dollars in the process.

>Film Forward

This selection brings together ten films that defy convention with a bold and daring cinematic language. The prizes are the >>Gold >>Film Forward Alexander, worth €6,000 in cash, and the >>Silver >>Film Forward Alexander, worth €3,000 in cash. The jury is composed of Nadja Argyropoulou, curator and art historian, Grant Keir, producer, and Anne Marie Kürstein, festival consultant. These are the selected films:

• Death Plan for a Dog and a Man (Christos Karakepelis, Greece, 2024, 66΄- World premiere). In a state of hibernation, an outcast, like an invulnerable superhero, plans an epic escape for himself and his dog; he wants to escape the deadliest virus: life itself.
• NovaMax SkyLand (Dionysia Kopana, Greece, 2025, 78΄- World premiere). Fragmented images, sounds and fleeting, incomplete stories emerge between Athenian balconies. The seasons change, the significant intertwines with the insignificant, and beauty and ugliness coexist.
• The One Who Hopes (Stratis Chatzielenoudas, Greece, 2025, 67΄- World premiere). In the twilight of a post-apocalyptic era, an intergalactic traveller searches for the sacred language of the birds on the last remaining planet. With an artificial mind as his companion, he learns that even in the stillness of silence, the desire to communicate endures, unyielding and eternal.
• Endless Cookie (Seth Scriver & Peter Scriver, Canada, 2025, 97΄- European premiere). It explores the complex bond between two half-brothers – one indigenous, one white – who travel from the present in isolated Shamattawa to bustling 1980s Toronto. Seth and Peter Scriver’s endearingly handcrafted animated film sweetly addresses issues of race and identity, making observations about life in the city and on the reserve with large doses of humour.
• Erreplika (Pello Gutiérrez, Spain, 2024, 74΄- International premiere). ‘In 1979 the Virgin of Zikuñaga disappeared, leaving its inhabitants without her iconic image. A gap in the niche. A collective void. This is a film about voids. My father, the filmmaker Juanmi Gutiérrez, passed away a few years ago. Now, from a distance, I return to his films in an exercise of personal memory through the image, or rather, through his absence’.
• Meanwhile (Catherine Gund, USA, 2024, 89΄- International premiere). This docu-poem in six verses about artists breathing through chaos shows, through a dynamic collaborative process, artists’ expressions combine with historical and observational images to unveil a rare cinematic meditation on identity, race, racism and resistance as they shape our shared breath.

• Museum of the Night (Fermín Eloy Acosta, Argentina, 2025, 88΄- World premiere). 1968, midnight. The Argentinean artist Leandro Katz attends a performance of Theatre of The Ridiculous in a pornographic cinema in New York. The actors, exuberant, act in drag, undress and recite texts that mix high literature with queer slang. Fascinated by the experience, Katz decided to join the company as a collaborator. Between 1970 and 1976, he takes photographs, helps with lighting and creates experimental works on film.
• Seeds (Brittany Shyne, USA, 2025, 122΄- International premiere). In Seeds, one of the most moving observational documentaries of recent years, the camera lens captures the ethereal essence of the concept of legacy. Through an intimate look at the lives of an African-American farm family in the rural South, Brittany Shyne’s exceptional directorial debut captures how these people courageously resist systemic racism to maintain dominion over their land, and be maintained by it in return.
• Where Do You Call Home? (Ana Pérez-Quiroga, Portugal, 2025, 73΄- International premiere). ‘Where do you call home?’ was the question faced by nearly 3,000 Spanish children exiled in the Soviet Union during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). This film tells the story of one of them, Angelita Pérez, who lived in Russian boarding schools from the age of 4 to 24 until she completed her medical studies in Moscow. It is a story of resilience, love and identity, interweaving past and present, history and memory.
• Zodiac Killer Project (Charlie Shackleton, USA-UK, 2025, 92΄- International premiere). The omnipresence of the true-crime genre is due to people’s endless fascination, revulsion and – strangely – search for solace in genre conventions that continue to have the capacity to generate complex emotions despite their predictability and familiarity. Having tried and failed to make a documentary about the infamous Zodiac killer, filmmaker Charlie Shackleton guides the viewer through what his film would have looked like and why, using Bay Area landscapes, re-enactments, film and television clips, and voiceover.