Past Editions

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Boris Mitić is a documentary filmmaker, producer, and writer whose four films – including In Praise of Nothing and Pretty Dyana – have screened at over 200 festivals, won 25 awards, and aired on 20 international TV stations. Boris teaches ‘real-politics’ of documentary film in Europe, America, Asia and online, and writes satirical columns for magazines Playboy and DOX. He holds lectures and presents case studies about how to produce documentaries and how the documentary industry works. 

Rada Šešić is a festival programmer, film director, critic, and lecturer originally from the former Yugoslavia, now based in Utrecht, Netherlands. She has collaborated with IDFA Amsterdam for over 15 years and has led the Documentary Competition at the Sarajevo Film Festival for 13 years. She co-heads the Docu Rough Cut Boutique and works with the Doha Film Fund and the Trieste Film Festival’s Last Stop Trieste platform. Rada also teaches at the Netherlands Film Academy and mentors at numerous international workshops across Europe and Asia.

Ieva Ūbele, a documentary producer, founded Baltic Balkan Productions in 2019, focusing on personal stories and social issues. Her notable films include homo@lv (2010), the first Latvian documentary at Berlinale, and Inga Can Hear (2018), premiered at Hot Docs 2019. Former Head of Industry at Beldocs IDFF (2020–2023), she holds an MA in Social Anthropology and an Executive MBA. An alumna of EAVE, EURODOC, and Emerging Producers, she is a member of the Documentary Association of Europe and EWA.

Dimitra Kouzi is an award-winning filmmaker, creative producer, journalist, and audience developer. Since 2013, she has led audience campaigns for European documentaries (La Chana, Nowhere to Hide, Siberian Love, Communion, Reconciliation, Radiograph of a Family, The Balcony Movie). She is an audience producer and tutor at BDC Discoveries, Doku Rough Cut Boutique, and Sarajevo’s Docu Rough Cut Boutique pitching workshop, working to support filmmakers in developing their projects and reaching audiences effectively.

Simone Baumann has worked in film production for over 25 years, producing numerous documentaries and feature films. From 1997 to 2010, she was the managing director of LE VISION. Until 2019, she headed the documentary department at Saxonia Entertainment. An expert on Russia and Eastern Europe’s audiovisual markets, she has also been the Eastern Europe representative for German Films since 2005. In April 2019, she became the Managing Director of German Films, overseeing the promotion of German cinema worldwide.

Anna has worked with documentaries since 2013, following a career in banking as a project leader. In 2018, she founded Lightdox, a Swiss-based sales and distribution agency supporting impactful documentaries. Previously, she was a Sales and Acquisition Executive specializing in film marketing, branding, and impact distribution. Lightdox’s portfolio includes Paris Calligrammes (Berlinale Camera Award 2020), The Witches of the Orient (IFFR 2021), Intercepted (Berlinale 2024), and Bye, Bye Tiberius (Venice 2023).

Robert Tomić Zuber is a sociologist, journalist, editor, and award-winning documentary filmmaker with over 20 years of experience in Croatian and international media, including the BBC. He has directed four feature documentaries, including Mila Seeking Senida, winner of the Human Rights Award at the Sarajevo Film Festival. Formerly Head of Documentary Production at Croatian National Television, he now runs his own production house, TOROlab, lectures at Vern’ University, and directs the Rab Film Festival (RAFF) in Croatia.

Tereza Bóna Keilová is a film professional born in Prague, Czech Republic (1982).
Her nearly 20-year long experience includes working on the sets of several independent feature films, feature documentaries, commercials, and TV series. She studied Film Production at the Private Film School Písek and has worked in the film industry since 2003. Her portfolio ranges from working with independent and award-winning producers to major studios like 20th Century Fox. Tereza currently works in the documentary section of HBO Max EMEA on the regional level. She is working on many high-end European documentaries in collaboration with Hanka Kastelicova and producers from Central and Eastern European countries.

Sari Volanen is commissioning editor at Yle (Finnish Broadcasting Company). She works at Yle’s Film Team producing short films mainly with Finnish independent filmmakers and producers. Since 1999 she has been in charge of a strand called “New Cinema” on Yle Teema channel. The main focus of New Cinema is on cinematic, surprising, original and quirky films short films. The films in the strand are acquired through co-productions (main producer Finnish), some international pre-buys and acquisitions nationally and internationally. She has been jury member of many film festivals around the world.

Patrizia is the Head of Industry at Sheffield DocFest, overseeing strategy, the Marketplace, and the festival’s year-round industry programme. She holds a Master’s in History and Critic of Cinema from the University of Rome and has a background in theatre and dubbing. After moving to France in 2010 to work in short film distribution, she joined Sunny Side of the Doc in La Rochelle (2017–2021). In 2022, she returned to distribution as a consultant with Deckert Distribution GmbH and now works as a freelance consultant and jury member for major documentary markets.

Marcella Jelic founded Split Screen in 2022 for festival distribution and film sales. She also collaborates with Restart, a theatrical distributor in Croatia. Previously, she worked at Taskovski Films as a sales and acquisitions executive. Marcella was the festivals and promotion coordinator at the Croatian Audiovisual Centre. She also served as programming director for Klasik TV and DOX TV. With a background in journalism and film criticism, she focuses on documentaries—both shorts and features—with strong storytelling, unique characters, and thought-provoking themes.

Inka Achté is a documentary filmmaker and former sales agent with over 15 years of experience in the film and TV industries. She brings a broad perspective to her work, having served as a director, festival programmer, consultant, and tutor in creative documentary. Inka holds an MA in Documentary Directing from the UK’s National Film and Television School.

She is currently directing two feature documentaries while serving as Head of Programming at DocPoint Helsinki and Head of Acquisitions at Raina Film Festival Distribution.

Snezhana Yoveva-Dimitrova has been the Director of the State Institute for Culture under the Minister of Foreign Affairs since 2019. With extensive experience in cultural management, she has led numerous national and international projects promoting contemporary Bulgarian art. The Institute plays a key role in promoting Bulgarian films globally, supporting their participation in European and international festivals through collaborations with Bulgarian embassies and partner organizations, helping showcase Bulgaria’s rich cultural heritage on the world stage.

Born in a small town in Western Germany near the Dutch border, Susanne developed an early passion for different cultures. She studied languages and literature in Cologne and Clermont-Ferrand while working for various news magazines. After internships at cultural institutions, she joined ZDF in Mainz in 1995. In 1997, Susanne became a commissioning editor and executive producer for ZDF/ARTE Aktuelles. She now oversees the daily reportage slot “Re:,” which explores Europe’s diverse viewpoints, and commissions investigative, geopolitical, and historical documentaries. Recent projects she’s commissioned include Praying for Armageddon, Total Trust, Theatre of Violence, and Politics for Sale?.

Dietmar Schwärzler is the Managing Director for Festivals and Programs at sixpackfilm, a non-profit organization founded in 1990. sixpackfilm is dedicated to the distribution and promotion of film and media art, with a strong focus on experimental and independent work. The organization actively engages in cultural politics and collaborates within social networks to explore new trends in film circulation and presentation, solidarity within the international film and art community.

Anna is an independent documentary consultant with nearly a decade of experience. She recently managed CPH:FORUM at CPH:DOX, a top co-financing event for documentaries. Previously, she was a programmer and project manager at CPH:DOX, and has worked with Nordisk Panorama Forum and the European Documentary Network. She holds a Master’s in Creative Business Management from Copenhagen Business School.

Margje de Koning has been directing documentaries for 12 years and taught documentary filmmaking at the University of Amsterdam. In 2004, she became Commissioning Editor for 52-minute documentaries, focusing on social and moral issues with a human interest angle. The subjects were mainly Dutch but included global topics.She later led IKON’s Television Department and became Head of TV, Radio, and New Media in 2012. After IKON merged with EO in 2016, she became Head of Documentaries at EOdocs. Since June 2019, Margje has been artistic director of Movies that Matter.

Olga Chernykh, born in Donetsk, Ukraine, holds an MA in Cinematography from Kyiv National I.K. Karpenko-Karyi University. She began her career as a cinematographer on documentaries, fiction, and commercial projects before transitioning to directing after completing a post-graduate diploma in documentary filmmaking. Olga has participated in programs like IDFA Academy, IDFA Project Space, Aristoteles Workshop, and Eurasiadoc. Her debut feature, A Picture to Remember, opened IDFA 2023 and won the Heart of Sarajevo and Best Documentary Film at the GoEast Film Festival in Germany.

Zlatko Pranjić is a writer, producer, and director whose work spans literature, theatre, and film. His stories have been published in UK anthologies by Penguin and Dreamcatcher, and in 2007 he won the prestigious Penguin Decibel Prize for short story writing. He has produced and directed both theatre productions and films, including his latest feature Guidance Through the Black Hole. His 2024 project The Sky Above Zenica was selected for CPH:Forum and won the Special Environmental Awareness Award at the Sarajevo Film Festival.

Nanna Frank Møller is a director, cinematographer, and film editor. A graduate of The National Danish Film School in 1999, she debuted as a director in 2007 with Someone Like You, which won awards at DOK Leipzig and Odense International Film Festival. Her 2010 film Shanghai Space won first prize at Guangzhou International Film Festival. In 2024, she co-directed The Sky Above Zenica, which received the Special Environmental Awareness Award at the Sarajevo Film Festival. Nanna has been nominated by the Danish Academy and received The Danish Art Foundation grant.

Apolena Rychlíková is a Czech filmmaker who focuses on social issues, poverty, and inequality. She has directed several documentaries and frequently collaborates with Czech Television and Radio. Her debut feature documentary, Limits of Work (2017), received widespread acclaim, winning the Czech Joy Award at IDFF Jihlava and the Audience Award. In 2017, she also received the Journalist Award for Best Documentary, recognizing her socially engaged work and significant contribution to public discourse in the Czech Republic.

Jane Mote is a Consultant Editor for The Whickers, supporting emerging documentary filmmakers with a global perspective. She has collaborated with Docs by the Sea (Bali), MyDocs (Malaysia), and the Asian Network of Documentary (Busan), and led training in Uganda and at the BFI in London. Formerly UK Managing Director of Al Gore’s Current TV and Executive Editor at BBC London, she has also held roles at Discovery, Turner, BBC Worldwide, UKTV.  She is the Director of beechtobeach ltd.

Ugne Pilkionyte studied political science and international relations at Sciences Po. She gathered professional expertise in policy making and EU mechanisms in a research institute where she investigated socio economic and migration issues. In 2022 she joined Think-Film with a desire to use visual storytelling to lift policy off the page. Think-Film Impact Production is an award-winning film company using powerful and emotional storytelling as a driver of policy discussions and tangible political impact outcomes. As part of the team, she works on impact campaigns for multiple documentaries and fiction films. 

Ivo Trajkov works as a director, film editor, screenwriter and story editor. He was born in Macedonia and graduated from FAMU in Prague. He has written/directed 8 feature-length films in several countries for which he received numerous awards. His last film “The Ballad of Piargy” win 123 international awards. Three of his feature films were Macedonia’s nominee for the best foreign-language film for Academy Awards. As a producer and story editor Ivo Trajkov was involved in more than 120 episodes of a critically acclaimed documentary series “Unexplained Deaths”. He works as story editor and editing supervisor for more than 30 films every year.

Dana Bunescu has been the main editor of the Romanian New Wave. She was awarded a Silver Bear at the 2017 Berlinale for her exceptional artistic contribution to „Ana, Mon Amour“ and has edited documentaries like Andrei Ujică Cannes selection Autobiography of „Nicolae Ceaușescu and Things We Said Today“ and Transilvania International Film Festival-winning Laura Căpățână’s „Here…I Mean There“, as well as iconic fiction films like the Palme d’Or winner „4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days“, Un Certain Regard winner „The Death of Mr Lăzărescu“ and Golden Bear winner „Child’s Pose“.

Ilian Metev, originally trained as a classical violinist, grew up between Bulgaria and Germany before graduating from the UK’s National Film and Television School in 2008. His debut feature, Sofia’s Last Ambulance (2012), offers an intimate look at three Bulgarian medics and premiered at Cannes Critics’ Week, earning a Camera d’Or nomination and the Visionary Award. His second feature, 3/4 (2017), premiered at Locarno and won the Golden Leopard. His films have been widely broadcast, theatrically released, and recognized with 45 awards, including a showcase at MoMA in New York.

Vladimir Rakić is a music composer and performer in the field of film, electro-acoustic, contemporary and improvisation music. He graduated in 2005 as Bachelor of Art and Technology in Sound Design and Applied Composition from the Hogeschool voor de Kunsten Utrecht, Netherlands. For more then 15 years he has been actively working in film, collaborating on many documentary, fiction and animation film projects .The most well known projects he collaborated on are „Moj narobe svet“ (2016), „Telo“ (2023) and „Mostar United“ (2008).

Bina Paul, also known by her married name Bina Paul Venugopal, is an Indian film editor who works mainly in Malayalam-language films. A graduate of the University of Delhi, she completed a course on film editing from the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune, in 1983. She is the recipient of two National Film Awards and three Kerala State Film Awards. She has held several positions including the artistic director of International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK) and the vice chairperson of Kerala State Chalachitra Academy.

Albert Elings is a Dutch documentary maker and film editor. Besides art- and filmschool he did a master cultural history at Utrecht University. Many of his films are characterised by a preoccupation with the aesthetics of temporality. Five of his films were screened at IDFA. Together with Eugenie Jansen he made several documentaries of which ‘Foreland’ won the Jury prize of the Documentary Film Festival in Yamagata. One of the last films he has been editing on is “Four Journeys’ by Louis Hothothot, opening film at IDFA in 2021.

Hanka Kastelicová is the Vice President and Executive Producer of Documentaries for Warner Bros. Discovery, based in Prague. She oversees the development and production of HBO documentary films and series across Europe, commissioning and co-producing content for Max. Her focus is on feature-length documentaries and series that are bold, creative, and thought-provoking, offering fresh perspectives and sparking debate. Hanka also lectures on documentary filmmaking and contributes to masterclasses, industry seminars, and training programs across the international documentary community.

Noemi Schory is an independent producer and director with over 100 documentaries to her name, created for Israeli broadcasters and international co-productions. Her credits include A Film Unfinished, A Snail in the Desert, God Forbid, Israel’s Generals, The Inner Tour, and several chapters of the Tkuma series. She also produced all the historical films for the Yad Vashem museum. Noemi lectures on production at Tel Aviv University and mentors at documentary labs in Goa, Sarajevo, Budapest, and Tbilisi.

Renata Barić has extensive experience as a sports psychologist, working with numerous athletes and trainers of various sports in the field of psychological preparation. She was member of the quad scull’s training team for the London Olympic Games 2012 (silver medal), the Croatian water polo representation for the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro (silver medal), and was a sports psychologist of several athletes of individual sports in Rio 2016. She is the official sports psychologist of the Croatian Water Polo where she works on the psychological preparation of men’s representation, U-20 men’s water polo representation and female representation.

John Appel studied Classical Literature at the University of Amsterdam and graduated at the Netherlands Film Academy in 1987. He directed more than 40 documentaries for cinema and tv and was cinematographer on numerous films. As a mentor he has worked on many films of first time (and experienced) filmmakers. He gives masterclasses all over the world and has been jury member on major film festivals as IDFA, Karlovy Vary, Visions du Reel, Guangzhou. Voting member of the European Film Academy.

Matt Sarnecki is a journalist, producer, and film director at the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project. His documentary Killing Pavel, about the murder of journalist Pavel Sheremet, won the IRE Medal in 2017 and the DIG Award in 2018. He has produced work for VICE and Powder.com. Based in Bucharest since 2013, his latest film, Killing of a Journalist, about the murder of Slovak journalist Ján Kuciak, has screened at Karlovy Vary, Hot Docs, and other festivals.

Radu Ciorniciuc co-founded Casa Jurnalistului, Romania’s first independent media organization, in 2012. He has since worked as a long-form writer and undercover investigative reporter, focusing on human rights, animal welfare, and environmental issues worldwide. His debut documentary, Acasa, My Home, premiered at Sundance (2020), winning the Special Jury Award for Cinematography and earning a European Film Academy Award nomination. He is also the co-director of TATA, which premiered at TIFF and was honored at multiple international festivals.

Ovidiu Vanghele is a Romanian investigative journalist and founder of the Center for Investigative Media (CIM). He co-manages Să fie lumină (Let There Be Light), a reader-funded project exposing ties between the Church and the state, and co-hosts the weekly videocast Judecata de Acum. Vanghele began his career at MEDIAFAX in 2002 and later worked at PRO TV. His investigations focus on major corruption and abuses in mental health institutions. Since 2021, he has co-hosted The Latest Inquest, a weekly YouTube current affairs show.

Vlad Stoicescu is a Romanian journalist, co-founder and editor of the independent media outlet Dela0.ro. He is also co-editor of Să fie lumină (Let There Be Light), a project investigating church-state relations, and co-host of the weekly current affairs videocast Judecata de Acum (The Latest Inquest). Vlad began his career at Evenimentul Zilei in 2008 and founded Dela0 in 2012. He has since led multimedia projects on politics, media ownership, the COVID-19 pandemic, and reproductive rights.

Ana Maria Ciobanu is a journalist and storytelling trainer. She is part of DoR magazine for more than 11 years, writing about social inequity, gender inequality, extreme poverty, racism. She produced the narrative podcasts Satul Mădălinei and Obiceiul pămăntului and was the co-host of the mother podcast. She is currently collaborating with the Museum of Abandonment and creates the script and editing of the podcast On the Tracks of Abandonment. She is teaching narrative journalism at the Faculty of Journalism, University of Bucharest.

Viktoriia Mickute is a multi-award-winning senior producer and director. Based in New York City, formerly in Doha, she has led the production of three Emmy-nominated works—Inaccessible Cities, Living in the Unknown, and Yemen’s Skies of Terror—as well as Still Here, which premiered at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. Her work has been recognized with dozens of international awards, including a Gracie Award, multiple Online Journalism Awards, and honors from Amnesty International, Venice TV Awards, and the Drum Online Media Awards.

Ieva Balsiunaite is a journalist and documentary filmmaker, currently Foreign Affairs Editor at Lithuanian National Radio and Television (LRT). She reports on global issues through live radio, investigative features, and fieldwork in Ukraine and Belarus. Her documentary The Snowball Rolled South premiered at Nordic Film Days in Lübeck. Ieva’s radio work won first prize at the 2022 Bohemia Radio Festival. She holds an MA in Human Rights from Sciences Po Paris and studied cinema at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts.