CineMart and Darkroom selections unveiled with new strand for Hubert Bals Fund projects

IFFR Pro has unveiled its selection of 21 feature projects for the 43rd edition of CineMart – IFFR’s co-production market, running Sunday 1 to Wednesday 4 February during IFFR 2026, as well as 10 projects for its work-in-progress platform Darkroom. 

CineMart x HBF

New for 2026, six of the CineMart titles have been selected for the inaugural CineMart x HBF lineup – a curated strand of projects previously awarded Development Support by IFFR’s Hubert Bals Fund. The CineMart x HBF projects were carefully selected from the many HBF-supported titles submitted with the same rigorous process applied to all CineMart submissions – formalising a longstanding connection that brings these projects to the market each year.

Introducing Lightroom

This year’s immersive media projects will be presented under Lightroom: IFFR’s new industry platform for immersive storytelling. Lightroom brings together all XR, VR and interactive projects previously presented across CineMart and Darkroom, creating one unified space for immersive work. Designed in close collaboration with the festival’s Art Directions programme and hosted at Katoenhuis, Lightroom strengthens IFFR’s long-running commitment to innovative audiovisual formats by offering a clearer pathway for development, visibility and exchange.

Ellen Kuo, formerly of NewImages Festival and manager and curator at the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, joins IFFR Pro as special consultant for Lightroom, working closely with IFFR’s Eva Langerak, who oversees both Art Directions and Lightroom. The full selection of Lightroom projects will be announced in December, alongside further details of a dedicated symposium on the future of immersive storytelling.

Together, these developments reflect the continued evolution of IFFR Pro, strengthening the festival’s commitment towards alumni and the pathways that connect artistic development, co-production, financing and new forms of audiovisual storytelling across the festival.

“From stories grappling with war and displacement to narratives exploring climate change, queerness and the struggle to define and preserve identities in turbulent times.”

Marten Rabarts, Head of IFFR Pro: “Balancing breakthrough talent and celebrated auteurs at the height of their careers, this year’s selections underline CineMart’s role as a place where discovery and established filmmaking meet. The urgency is palpable: from stories grappling with war and displacement to narratives exploring climate change, queerness and the struggle to define and preserve identities in turbulent times, all amongst bold cinematic creativity and forays into genres including sci-fi, horror and musical.

Alongside these selections, we are pleased to introduce two important developments that strengthen the overall structure of IFFR Pro and deepen CineMart’s connections across the festival’s ecosystem. Our CineMart x HBF strand of six exceptional projects brings our development and co-production activities into closer dialogue, while Lightroom creates a clear home for immersive storytelling within the festival. Together they build on what has long existed within IFFR and bring greater cohesion to the ways we support filmmakers and artists at different stages of their journeys.”

Darkroom

IFFR Pro’s Darkroom offers a platform to present recently or nearly completed films to the international industry seeking gap or completion funding, sales agents and festivals with the support of expert consultancy. Each project has either an attached Rotterdam Lab graduate producer or received previous support from CineMart or the Hubert Bals Fund.

CineMart selections 

Scroll further down to read more details about the selection

Adarna, dir. Lois Patiño, Spain
Produced by: Elástica Films, Matriuska Producciones

after the night, the night, dir. Naomi Pacifique, Netherlands, Switzerland
Produced by: Grom Productions, Lemming Film, GoldenEgg production

Animals, dir. Morad Mostafa, Egypt, France
Produced by: Bonanza Films, Wrong Films

Beirut Baby, dir. Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige, Lebanon, France
Produced by: Abbout Productions, Haut et Court

Hearing, dir. Lê Bảo, Singapore, Vietnam
Produced by: E&W Films, Sensory Ocean Films

Kingdom of the Insomniacs, dir. Kang Bo, China
Produced by: Rediance

LUX, dir. Thomas Elley, Denmark
Produced by: Frau Film 

Neon Phantom, dir. Leonardo Martinelli, Brazil
Produced by: Duas Mariola Filmes

Noodles, Our Love was Instant and Forever, dir. Whammy Alcazaren, Philippines
Produced by: Daluyong Studios, Two Fold

Pale Faces, dir. Chantel Clark, Netherlands, South Africa
Produced by: BALDR Film, Cadence

Portuguese Man O’ War, dir. Ridham Janve, India
Produced by: Bombay Berlin Film Productions, The Film Cafe

Shumari, dir. Toshihiko Tanaka, Japan
Produced by: ColorBird, No Saint. & Bloom

The Dispute, dir. Andrea Ellsworth and Kasey Elise Walker, United Kingdom, United States of America
Produced by: Felix Culpa, Watermark Media, Gilga

The Poet’s Son, dir. Nicolas Graux, Belgium, France, Germany
Produced by: Tarantula, Petit à Petit Production, Yellow Blackbird, Clin d’Œil 

When the Goats Came, dir. Arthur Gay, New Zealand, United Kingdom, Greece
Produced by: In Two Minds Productions, Exa Films, Ossian International

Worse Together, dir. Luis De Filippis, Canada, Switzerland
Produced by: JA Productions Inc., Cloud Fog Haze Pictures

CineMart x HBF selection

Birdwoman, dir. Lipika Singh Darai, India, France
Produced by: Salt For Sugar Films

Coumba, dir. Mamadou Dia, Senegal, France
Produced by: Maayo, Les Films du Bilboquet

Daughters of the Sea, dir. Martika Ramirez Escobar, Philippines, Spain
Produced by: This Side Up, Arkeofilms, Alba Sotorra Cinema Productions

Golden Balls, dir. Lillah Halla, Brazil, Uruguay
Produced by: Manjericão Filmes, Cimarrón Cine, Arissas

Neon Phantom, dir. Leonardo Martinelli, Brazil
Produced by: Duas Mariola Filmes

Vika, dir. Tamar Shavgulidze, Georgia, Netherlands
Produced by: Nushi Film GEO, GoGoFilm

The selection in detail

Essential discoveries to be found at this edition’s CineMart include The Dispute by debut directors Andrea Ellsworth and Kasey Elise Walker, two actors who wrote and starred in a short of the same name that screened at Sundance and SXSW in 2019, acquired by Riley Keough’s Felix Culpa and Donald Glover’s Gilga for feature development – an audacious urban comedy following a failing designer duo from South Central Los Angeles.

Another exploration of friendship from North America is Worse Together by Canadian filmmaker Luis De Filippis, a story of relationships unravelling amid the vibrant trans nightlife scene in Toronto. Produced by three returning Rotterdam Lab alumni (Jessica Adams, Michael Graf and Rhea Plangg), it will be the final installment of De Filippis’s Dolls trilogy, following Something You Said Last Night, winner of the IFFR Youth Jury Award in 2023.

Japanese filmmaker Tanaka Toshihiko is also a returning IFFR award-winner, having won the Tiger Award at IFFR 2024 with Rei. In Japan’s remote northern frontier, his next film Shumari follows an excavation of the remains from victims of wartime forced labour and the moral reckoning it triggers for a professor and his daughter. 

The project signals a strong Asian presence at CineMart 2026, with further selections from Vietnam, China and the Philippines. Lê Bảo follows his Berlinale Encounters Special Jury Award-winning Taste (2021) with Hearing – a poetic, touching portrait of a mechanic whose work is to install decibel meters in homes and public places.

In Kingdom of the Insomniacs, Kang Bo presents a horrific, fantastical vision of the forests of north eastern China, where a family are plagued by insomnia and an aging disease. 

As Earth succumbs to climate change, an alien arrives to reunite a sad and lonely boy with the ghost of his childhood romance, in the audacious yet critical sci-fi queer rom-com Noodles, Our Love was Instant and Forever by debut Filipino filmmaker Whammy Alcazaren (Bold Eagle, Best International Short at the Fantasia Film Festival 2023) and produced by Rotterdam Lab graduate Alemberg Ang. 

Spanish filmmaker Lois Patiño (Samsara, 2023; Ariel, world premiere IFFR 2025) sets his fifth feature Adarna in the Philippines, continuing his transcendental, sensory explorations of death and the afterlife with the story of Denis, who suffers an accident after stealing a rooster believed to have magical powers. Producer María Zamora returns to CineMart after her 2022 selection with Carla Simón’s Romería.

A pet shop owner who tries to keep a dying mermaid alive is one of the three intertwined stories uniting Martika Ramirez Escobar’s Daughters of the Sea, which follows her Sundance-winning Leonor Will Never Die (2022). The project was supported by the Hubert Bals Fund for development in 2023 and is one of the six HBF-backed projects in the forming the inaugural CineMart x HBF market strand. 

Two HBF-supported Brazilian projects feature in the strand. Lillah Hallah (Levante, IFFR 2024) presents the surrealist satire Golden Balls (HBF Development 2024), a dark musical comedy on an ageing ex-con who crossdresses as an alpha-male to save her son from a masculinist cult.

Neon Phantom (HBF Development 2023, NFF+HBF 2023) by Leonardo Martinelli is the follow-up to the short of the same name, which had its premiere at Locarno where it won the short film Pardo d’oro. Tackingly the gig economy in musical style, the film follows a young delivery worker in Rio de Janeiro swept into the rising wave of protests led by fellow workers.

Senegalese filmmaker Mamadou Dia’s HBF-backed debut, Nafi’s Father (IFFR 2020), won the Pardo d’Oro in Locarno’s Cineasti del Presente section in 2019. His latest project, Coumba (HBF Development 2025), explores the place of rituals in an ever-changing society, following a detective returning to her hometown to investigate a murder tied to Coumba, a hoofed spirit, on the year’s first full moon.

Birdwoman (HBF Development 2023) is a passionate love story infused with lucid dreams and magical realism by Indian feature debut filmmaker Lipika Singh Darai, whose short Night and Fear was in competition at IFFR 2023. 

It’s one of two Indian projects in the full CineMart selection, alongside the absurdly comedic colonial reflection Portuguese Man O War by Ridham Janve (The Gold-Laden Sheep & the Sacred Mountain, Bright Future IFFR 2018) which sees a 15th century conquistador wash ashore on a remote modern-day island in Goa. 

Another colonial period piece comes from South Africa in Pale Faces, with debut filmmaker Chantel Clark presenting a vampire horror set in the 18th century Dutch Cape Colony, as a blood disease begins to consume the settlers – produced by Frank Hoeve of BALDR Film (NL) and Cait Pansegrouw of Cadence (ZA).

Powerfully resonating with ongoing conflicts around the world, Vika (HBF Development 2022) by Tamar Shavgulidze completes the CineMart x HBF lineup. Set against the war in Abkhazia in Georgia in 1993 the film follows the displacement of Vika and her heavily injured husband Lado as they flee through the mountains. Shavgulidze is known for her previous film Comets, which premiered at TIFF in 2019, whilst producer Tekla Machavariani’s recent work includes Holy Electricity by Tato Kotetishvili (HBF, Darkroom, CineMart, IFFR 2025). 

Set in Russia at war, The Son of the Poet by Nicolas Graux (Porcupine, short, IFFR 2023 co.dir. Trương Minh Quý) is similarly resonant, telling the story of Senya, a young man who refuses conscription and must choose between loyalty to his father or breaking free in pursuit of his own freedom. 

Celebrated Lebanese filmmakers and artists Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige present Beirut Baby, following a single mother in contemporary Lebanon who cannot pass on her citizenship to her new born child without knowing the identity of the father. Their previous films include A Perfect Day (Locarno 2005, Fipresci Prize), Je Veux Voir (Cannes 2008, starring Catherine Deneuve), and Memory Box (CineMart 2016, Berlinale 2021).

Egyptian filmmaker Morad Mostafa (Aisha Can’t Fly Away, Un Certain Regard Cannes 2025) presents his second feature Animals – produced by Rotterdam Lab graduate Sawsan Yusuf. A journey infused with horror and myth, the film follows Malik, a teenage boy in his twenties, haunted by a crime involving his twin brother.

Several debut filmmakers in the selection explore the complexities of relationships and belonging through intimate personal journeys. The relationship between Leni, a blind woman, and Kevin, her state-appointed companion, is the focus of LUX, the debut from Danish filmmaker Thomas Elley’s (Europa Endlos, short, CPH:DOX 2025; Bølger, short, Clermont-Ferrand 2019) – produced by Lab graduate Maria Møller Christoffersen.

In his feature debut When the Goats Came, New Zealand filmmaker Arthur Elias Gay (When the Geese Flew, short, Quinzaine des cinéastes 2025) explores the love and resentment between Cyrus and his foster mother Flora on the return to their hometown in New Zealand.

Naomi wanders the streets of Amsterdam in search of solace in after the night, the night, the feature debut by Swiss-Dutch artist and filmmaker Naomi Pacifique (after a room, Pardino d’Argento Locarno 2021; looking she said I forget, Locarno 2024, Clermont-Ferrand 2025) – as she confronts the pain of a break-up and the reality of non-monogamy. The project is co-produced by two Rotterdam Lab graduates, Steven Rubinstein and Yan Decoppet.

Contact: IFFR@ddaglobal.com