Balkan Documentary Market 2025 Awards

12-10-2025

Balkan Documentary Market 2025 Awards

By Katerina Lambrinova

credit: Balkan Documentary Market Awards

SOFIA: The Balkan Documentary Center (BDC) supports filmmakers, journalists, and activists across the region through its programmes. For the fourth consecutive year, the Balkan Documentary Market served as a professional platform for regional collaboration, networking, and coproduction opportunities.

Nearly 70 international guests attended this year’s еdition, held in Sofia as part of the sixth Sofia DocuMental Festival.

The event combined BDC’s training initiatives BDC Discoveries and Balkan Watchers, and introduced a new documentary podcast competition in partnership with Storytel, bringing the total prize fund to nearly 100,000 EUR.

Organised by the Balkan Documentary Center within Sofia DocuMental, the Balkan Documentary Market is supported by Creative Europe – MEDIA, the Bulgarian National Film Center, and the Goethe-Institut Bulgaria.

The sixth Sofia DocuMental Festival was held from 30 September to 4 October 2025.

BDC Discoveries Awards:

Best Pitch Award:
A Land that Time Forgot (Germany, Bulgaria)
Directed by Denis Pavlovic

Lightdox Award:
Life on Pause (Bulgaria)
Directed by Antoniy Hristov

Balkan Watchers Podcast Awards:

How They See Us: Balkan History through the Eyes of the Other (Greece)
Directed by Orestis Seferoglou

The House of Armenian-Georgian Border (Armenia, Georgia)
Directed by Marlena Hovsepyan

The Quota (Romania)
Directed by Iulia Hau

Balkan Watchers Film Projects Awards:

From Radvanka (Ukraine)
Directed by Tomi Hazhlinsky

Symbols of War (Serbia)
Directed by Nenad Mikalacki

My Sister and the Eternal Feminine (Georgia)
Directed by Rati Tsiteladze