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Adas Falasteen

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International Short Film Competition

Adas Falasteen

Shamar Taher Lulu, Hamdi Khalil el Husseini

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Filistin

"Palestine Lentils" is a documentary film that tells the story of a Palestinian chef and his role in using his hobby as a shield against the famine caused by the war on Gaza, preserving the spirit of resilience and hope within his community.

Saturday, January 24, 2026

11:00

Fransız Kültür Merkezi

Halal Dreams

International Experimental Film Competition

Halal Dreams

Mohammed Mamdouh

In the sleepless lights of New York, a father's longing becomes the city's quiet heartbeat.
Şeker Tadında (With the Director in Attendance)

International Short Film Competition

Şeker Tadında (With the Director in Attendance)

Adem Giliz

Kuşgözü Grubu Gösterimleri

Belgesel Fotoğraf Gösterimleri

Kuşgözü Grubu Gösterimleri

Kuşgözü

Mosaic

Student Documentaries from Türkiye

Mosaic

Ibrahim Ayoub

Dive into the mesmerizing world of architecture through "Mosaic," a captivating film that pays homage to the intricate patterns and designs that defined an empire. Using innovative stop-motion animation, "Mosaic" invites audiences on a visual journey through the majestic beauty of architecture, where every stone tells a story and every tile is a piece of art. As the camera seamlessly glides through elaborate mosques, palaces, and bazaars, viewers are immersed in the rich history and cultural significance of these architectural marvels. "Mosaic" celebrates the timeless beauty and craftsmanship of architecture. Prepare to be transported to a world where history comes to life in every meticulously crafted frame.
Playing on the Road

Student Documentaries from Türkiye

Playing on the Road

Eminhan Çakır

The documentary focuses on the daily lives of young artists performing in the streets and venues of İzmir. Each artist, with their own unique style and story, meets audiences in public spaces, highlighting the importance of music in their lives. Despite bans, pressures, and hardships, these young musicians strive to sustain their art and lives, seeking support and solidarity. Their stories of resilience and creativity, intertwined with the power of music, not only inspire but also reveal the ways in which they hold on to life and nurture hope.
It Was Nice to Meet You

Documentaries from Türkiye

It Was Nice to Meet You

Jehan Barbur, Güneş Kazdal

World Premiere: Antalya Film Festival Documentary Competition This mid-length documentary follows Deniz (28) and Can (30), two siblings with SMA who are bedridden and live with the support of their mother, Aysel. Highlighting issues such as societal neglect, restricted rights, and equality, the film aims to raise awareness. After losing their home in the Maraş earthquake, the family now resides in a relative’s house in Alaçatı. Through five days of interviews and observations, the documentary sheds light on their lives and perspectives.
Chanting of the Dunes

International Feature Film Competition

Chanting of the Dunes

Mokhless Al-Hariri

Chanting of the Dunes has so far won over 40 awards and 20 nominations! The film takes viewers on a dazzling journey through multiple countries and during momentous world events that extend from the Levant in the 1920s to the U.S. and China in the 1990s. Chanting of the Dunes recounts the life of Wahbi Al-Hariri-Rifai who was an accomplished international artist, architect, archeologist, and author. It is told through the mixed perspective of his wife, Widad Marachi, who married him at the age of 15. The fascinating storyline is full of unexpected turns and is accompanied by a superb award-winning soundtrack. The film is beautifully illustrated through hundreds of meticulously restored black/white and color archival photographs and original footage. According to festival managers, the film exceeds all expectations and represents a new cinematographic genre between narrative feature and documentary. Many have called it “extraordinary, moving, mesmerizing, full of messages...”
Adas Falasteen

International Short Film Competition

Adas Falasteen

Shamar Taher Lulu, Hamdi Khalil el Husseini

"Palestine Lentils" is a documentary film that tells the story of a Palestinian chef and his role in using his hobby as a shield against the famine caused by the war on Gaza, preserving the spirit of resilience and hope within his community.
Maestro’s hands

International Short Film Competition

Maestro’s hands

Aleksey Barykin

He has amazing hands. With the most delicate gestures he directs a symphony orchestra. He worked with great people: Maya Plisetskaya, Rodion Shchedrin, Mstislav Rostropovich. He conducted at the Bolshoi Theater, the Bavarian Ballet, the Royal Swedish Opera. One of the best conductors in the world, Renat Salavatov shares the secrets of his mastery.
A Legend of Foça: Nihat Dirim (With the Director in Attendance)

International Feature Film Competition

A Legend of Foça: Nihat Dirim (With the Director in Attendance)

Hakan Barçın

A Legend of Foça: Nihat Dirim A Legend of Foça: Nihat Dirim is a 60-minute documentary that chronicles the life and legacy of Nihat Dirim, the legendary mayor of Foça, a district renowned for its historical and natural beauty on Turkey's Aegean coast. Serving two terms as mayor from 1989 to 1999, Dirim shaped Foça's identity through his commitment to environmental protection, cultural heritage preservation, and a people-centered governance approach. Despite today's generally adverse climate, his influence continues to be a defining force in the town. The documentary delves into Dirim's profound passion, love, and dedication to Foça, illustrating how this emotional bond contributed to the town's development. His visionary leadership is exemplified by initiatives such as building bridges of friendship with Greece's Lesbos Island and Palea Fokea, leading environmental campaigns against a proposed thermal power plant in Aliağa, and launching projects to protect the endangered Mediterranean monk seals. Beginning with Dirim's childhood, the film explores his journey through his mayoral tenure to his enduring impact on Foça today. This narrative is conveyed through interviews with nearly 40 individuals conducted over a year, led by his close friend Hakan Barçın. These interviews provide deep insights into Dirim's genuine relationships with the public, his leadership style, and his unwavering devotion to Foça.
Bir Ömür Deniz

Özel Film Gösterimleri

Bir Ömür Deniz

Ahmet Özkan, Veyis Polat

This film views the sea not as a landscape, but as a living space. Here, the sea is not a romantic backdrop; it is a life woven with sweat, patience and repetition. We approach Mavişehir Fishermen's Shelter not as a place, but as a memory. This harbour, whose location has changed with the filling of the shores, bears the traces of over a century of labour. Against concrete, time and transformation, we defend the continuity of the relationship established with the sea. This manifesto aims to make the great stories of small boats visible. The labour of fishermen who set sail in boats less than seven metres long is a form of living knowledge that is in danger of being forgotten in the shadow of industrial production. We stand against the loss of this knowledge. Repeating the mending of nets, the threading of needles, the setting out to sea before dawn... Because repetition here is not ordinary; it is resistance. This order, re-established every day, is an expression of the ancient covenant between man and the sea. While telling the story of the fishermen, this film focuses on silence, modesty, and the power of collective production. It sees accepting what the sea provides as a virtue. We take on the responsibility of photography, the camera, and witnessing. We advocate not just looking, but seeing; not just recording, but understanding. A Lifetime at Sea is not an elegy for the past; it is a mark left for the future. As long as this way of life built with the sea continues, cultural memory will also continue to live on. Some lives are not written on land, but in the wake of the waves.
Trains

International Short Film Competition

Trains

Maciej Drygas

TRAINS is a found-footage documentary composed entirely of archive footage and sound design that creates a collective portrait of people in 20th century Europe, capturing their hopes, desires, dramas and tragedies. A train compartment is a place where people are taken out of their everyday context for a while. Sometimes the journey is accompanied by the hope that something will change in our lives upon reaching the destination, or conversely, by a stark absence of hope. And yet the history of the 20th century unfolds in railway carriages in a repetitive refrain. Every few years, hauntingly similar scenes play out in railway stations around the world: carriages full of men leaving for war, only to return wounded or as casualties. This cycle is followed by an exodus of civilians, evacuees mingling with prisoners of war returning from camps, and soldiers of victorious armies leading the defeated, until ordinary passengers reappear at stations.
Sukande Kasáká | Ailing Land

Best International Short Film

Sukande Kasáká | Ailing Land

Kamikia Kisedje, Fred Rahal

Kamikia and Lewaiki, from the Khĩsêdjê people, are forced to abandon their largest village after detecting pesticide contamination that poisons their land, rivers, and food. Surrounded by monocultures of soy, they fight to protect their culture, their families, and their territory, facing an invisible enemy that threatens their very existence.
Mahalleme Dokunma (With the Director in Attendance)

Belgesel Fotoğraf Gösterimleri

Mahalleme Dokunma (With the Director in Attendance)

Emine Kart

Let me tell you a bit about the neighbourhood we didn't want to touch. 100th Year, Workers' Blocks Neighbourhood. Built for workers, squatters have been living there for years. Thousands of buildings have sprung up around it, glass towers, shopping centres, mosque projects offering donation opportunities on credit card instalments, demolitions, constructions, bars and barricades. We didn't want this; we deserved better. The year was 2013... The whole country was united around three or five trees. The wind from those trees enveloped a student and retired neighbourhood in Ankara. Do you know what we wanted? We didn't want them to build that road separating the school from the neighbourhood. We didn't want them to cut down the forest that was home to all kinds of trees and animals. We wanted to throw in your faces every day the image of the workers and women your system killed, and those you slaughtered in the name of labour, peace and democracy, erasing them the very next day. We wanted a tree planted, a field we cultivated together, a garden where we could come together and tend to the crops. We wanted a patch of land open to labour and sustenance, with no lock on its gate.
Not My Film

International Short Film Competition

Not My Film

Astra Zoldnere

What happens if older people challenge stereotypes in films about aging? Six seniors re-perform scenes of poor health, sexual invisibility, and gendered stereotypes of the wise old man and the bad witch. Toward the end of the film, the participants rebel against these cinematic images, proving that older age can be associated with love, sexuality, and self-revelation.
Los Pasaroz Sefaradis (Yönetmenlerin Katılımıyla)

Special Film Screenings

Los Pasaroz Sefaradis (Yönetmenlerin Katılımıyla)

Rose Modiano, Alberto Modiano

The Jews who arrived in Ottoman lands 530 years ago brought many cultures with them. Naturally, this included their language. Over time, this language blended with other cultures to form a new, unique language called “Judeo Espagnol”. Although it is in danger of being forgotten, the older generation continues to preserve it in areas where they live together, primarily in Izmir and Istanbul. The documentary is about the Los Pasharos Sefaradis Group, Kula 930, and many other Jewish musicals that have emerged over more than 30 years, the formation of the group of four people, and the concerts they have given.
Free Fish

Special Film Screenings

Free Fish

Bisan Owda, Carolina Pereira

Free Fish — filmed entirely in Gaza during the ongoing genocide tells the story of two brothers separated by war and displacement, whose daily struggle to fish under blockade becomes an act of survival and resistance. Because in Gaza, even the sea is under siege. Fishing has become an act of defiance — and creation, an essential exercise of freedom.
Fekry's Thoughts

International Short Film Competition

Fekry's Thoughts

Essam Hayder

A contemporary portrait follows the life of an Alexandrian Framemaker born in the 1930s. Through his personal story, the film explores the profound changes in Egypt over the past 80 years, capturing society's transformation through a dedicated craftsman's eyes.
The Stonemason’s Daughter

International Short Film Competition

The Stonemason’s Daughter

Arturo Franco

The film was shot around the place of O Fieiro, a small village of no more than twelve houses and nine inhabitants, among them Rosa. A ninety-year-old woman who dedicates her last years to watching the rain through the window. Her father was a canteiro, a house builder, before the reservoir changed everything. Rosa remembers how her father lifted the stones and the people transported them from one place to another. It is shown as an abstract visual poem where the rain and the stones are the protagonists of the story Rosa tells us.
Tight Lines (With the Director in Attendance)

Student Documentaries from Türkiye

Tight Lines (With the Director in Attendance)

Cihan Berkay Mahçup

“Tight Lines” tells the story of a woman whose life is woven with nets, beginning each day with the sea. She does not merely make a living from the sea; she speaks to it, challenges it, and endures alongside it. Fishing is often perceived as a man’s profession, yet in this documentary, the hands guiding the nets belong to a woman. Rastgele goes beyond the act of casting nets into the water, revealing a quiet yet powerful resistance that makes the unseen visible.
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