Documentaries
Equal Dust
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Jani Peltonen
- Screenwriters
- Jani Peltonen
- Producers
- Kaarle Aho
- Release year
- 2025
- SES grant
- 52 000 €
- Budget
- 79 000 €
- Production companies
- Making Movies Oy
NATO’s nuclear exercise, a tracking shot through nocturnal Helsinki and the Finnish Eurovision Song Contest entries show what the end of the world looked like in the 1980s.
The Smuggler
- International co-production SE-FI
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Sylvelin Måkestad
- Screenwriters
- Sylvelin Måkestad
- Producers
- Ina Holmqvist, Juha Löppönen
- Release year
- in production
- SES grant
- 41 000 €
- Budget
- 552 000 €
- Production companies
- Mouka Filmi Oy
Redlight to Limelight
- International co-production IN-FI
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Bipuljit Basu
- Screenwriters
- Bipuljit Basu
- Producers
- Nilotpal Majumd, John Webster
- Release year
- 2025
- SES grant
- 25 000 €
- Budget
- 352 000 €
- Production companies
- JW Documentaries Oy
The dream of telling their own stories brings sex workers and their children together to form a tiny self-taught film unit in a Kolkata brothel. The amateur but resilient film crew eventually scales the battle up to resist prostitution among girls and makes the brothel a better place to live.
In Cod We Trust
- International co-production NO-FI
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Guro Saniola Bjerk
- Screenwriters
- Guro Saniola Bjerk
- Producers
- Benedikte Bredesen, Pasi Hakkio
- Release year
- in production
- SES grant
- 45 000 €
- Budget
- 303 000 €
- Production companies
- Wacky Tie Films
In Cod We Trust is a meditation on home and belonging. The film portrays Båtsfjord, one of the northernmost fishing villages of the world. This self-contained world, wild fish-Klondike of the north, has gathered people from all over the world to live side by side. We dive into the village, making you feel like you are there, among the warmest people with the most outstanding humor. A mosaic of people as unpredictable as the weather and sea surrounding them.
D is for Distance
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Chris Petit, Emma Matthews
- Screenwriters
- Chris Petit
- Producers
- Mika Taanila, Jussi Eerola
- Release year
- 2025
- SES grant
- 111 500 €
- Budget
- 216 000 €
- Production companies
- Elokuvayhtiö Testifilmi Oy
D is for Distance is a montage of contemporary footage, archive and cinema history, creating an inquiry into the age of post-truth and how one young man’s illness became representative of the woes of the world and how he triumphed against adversity to produce his vision through singular paintings that are a result of his countless ‘trips’ into the other world.
All the Light That Remains
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Moona Pennanen
- Screenwriters
- Moona Pennanen
- Producers
- Ida Karoskoski
- Release year
- in production
- SES grant
- 47 300 €
- Budget
- 100 000 €
- Production companies
- Illume Ltd. Oy
All the Light That Remains introduces the old mining village and seasonal worker Oleksandr, who arrives in Finland from Ukraine and lives in an in-between state, waiting for the end of the war. All the Light That Remains tells a poetic story about the village of Mätäsvaara, located in North Karelia, near the eastern border. It is a former mining village whose history has been forgotten. Through Oleksandr, who arrives to work in the area, the history of the village and the question hovering over the future of the mine begin to open up.
Paradise in Hel
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Mika Mattila
- Screenwriters
- Mika Mattila, Nino Poppius, Dylan Pashley
- Producers
- Axel Högström, Satu Majava
- Release year
- in production
- SES grant
- 130 000 €
- Budget
- 541 000 €
- Production companies
- Parad Media Oy
The documentary series Paradise in Hel tells the story of mystic Ior Bock, the mythology he told, and the people who followed him. The series weaves together the three timelines: Ior’s own tragic life-story from beginning to end, the rise and fall of the Bock-Saga cult born in Goa in the 1980’s, and the rebirth of the Saga in modern times–as well as the followers’ attempts to prove its authenticity. The overarching theme of the series is new-age spiritualism and the innate human desire for connection and belief.
Perstuntuma
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Peter Lindholm
- Screenwriters
- Peter Lindholm
- Producers
- Mika Ritalahti, Niko Ritalahti
- Release year
- in production
- SES grant
- 167 000 €
- Budget
- 250 000 €
- Production companies
- Silva Mysterium Oy
Silent Legacy
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Jenni Kivistö, Jussi Rastas
- Screenwriters
- Jenni Kivistö, Jussi Rastas
- Producers
- Ella Ruohonen
- Release year
- 2025
- SES grant
- 147 000 €
- Budget
- 500 000 €
- Production companies
- Väki Films Oy
Sibiry, a choreographer from Burkina Faso now living in Finland, struggles with the unrealistic expectations from his original home country, while also seeking connection in his new country. Viewed as a privileged European back home yet an outsider in Finland, he longs to be seen as an equal. Through dance, the film explores identity, migration, and colonial legacies, shedding light on complex societal pressures faced by African migrants and ultimately how the European filmmakers’ presence unintentionally ends up affecting the reality.
Riding with Death
- Category
- Documentaries
- Directors
- Nina Forsman, Sakari Suuronen
- Screenwriters
- Nina Forsman, Sakari Suuronen
- Producers
- Markku Tuurna
- Premiere
- 7.11.2025
- SES grant
- 156 000 €
- Budget
- 281 000 €
- Production companies
- Filmimaa Oy
- Distribution companies
- Pirkanmaan elokuvakeskus
The tuberculosis sanatoriums were heaven and hell. Riding with Death is a documentary film that shows the emotional impacts of the TB outbreak and reveals the rich sanatorium culture between 1920–60. The film alternates between the present and the era of the sanatoriums. Patients in the sanatoriums had an immense social life: theater plays, spiritism, zines with macabre humor, and secret clubs for drinking and smoking. For patients, the secluded life meant a new heightened sense of living, as you never knew how long you would live. Lifelong love stories were born, as well as friendships, survival stories, and carefree sex.