Psychonauts
dir. Niko Radas | Croatia | 8 min | Animation
World Premiere: 65th Annecy International Animation Film Festival
Leaving their human hosts, mental disorders take on anthropomorphic forms and find new refuges.
Director Biography
Niko Radas was born in Zagreb in 1980. After finishing the High School of Applied Arts and Design, he graduated from the Sculpture Department of the Zagreb Academy of Fine Arts. Since 2004, he has been working at the University Psychiatric Hospital Vrapče, facilitating art as a therapy programmes. Alongside with a variety of classical art techniques that he uses in his work, Niko initiated a music and a film workshop, in which he writes scrips, designs scenography for animated films and documentaries, which he then produces together with patients.
Inanna
dir. Dragos Badita | Romania,Canada | 24 min | Animation
World Premiere: Vancouver International Film Festival
"Uncanny" is an understatement in this AI-processed dream-poem inspired by the ancient Sumerian goddess of death and rebirth.
Director Biography
Dragoș Bădiță (b. 1987) is a contemporary multi- media artist living and working in Bucharest, Romania. Graduated from the University of Art and Design in Cluj- Napoca, Bădiță works mostly in physical media such as oil or ink and recently began experimenting with generative art and animation. His experimental videos and animations have been screened in cities such as Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca, Taipei, Stockholm, Figueres, Paris, Las Vegas, and Belgrade, in exhibitions and video festivals. His artword has been exhibited in Cluj, Bucharest, Taipei, London, Copenhagen, Athens, Ghent, Mallorca, Rome, Leipzig, Stockholm, Como, and Berlin.
Bădiță's work originates from fleeting, lived moments that become infused with existential and sometimes mystical themes and states of mind. His pieces reflect on the transience of experience and its connection to a broader understanding of reality - bringing forth ideas about our relationship with nature, the body, other people, the shifting nature of the self, the inevitability of decay and dissolution, and the limits of grasping the inner worlds of others.
Nara and Her Camera
dir. Jérémi Roy | Canada | 7 min | Animation
World Premiere: Tirana International Film Festival
In the small town of Holcá, in the Yucatán, 8-year-old Nara wanders through her hometown, guided by her curiosity and her new camera. As she films her surroundings, the ordinary becomes magical, and the act of looking turns into a playful, cinematic discovery.
Director Biography
Jérémi Roy is a Québécois filmmaker and producer based in Montreal. At the age of 21, his debut independent short film premiered at the Slamdance Film Festival, confirming his deep attraction to D.I.Y. and resolutely independent cinema. He has since continued to explore this approach to film through five additional short films marked by quiet realism and poetic sensitivity. His work has screened internationally at festivals including Slamdance, BFI FLARE, NewFilmmakers Los Angeles and the Vancouver International Film Festival. In 2020, he co-founded Les Productions Beau travail with longtime collaborators Camille Demers-Lambert and Dominick Rustam. In 2023, he participated in the Creators Lab: Apichatpong Weerasethakul. His current projects include a poetic short film shot on 16mm and his debut feature film.
Eyes of the Forest
dir. Anna Veisman| Estonia | 25 min | Short
World Premiere: PÖFF Shorts 2025
Inan isolated 18th-century Estonian village, Elo struggles to survive in a community that offers her neither safety nor kindness. Pious villagers fear the dark forests surrounding them, believing supernatural spirits lurk among the trees. But when Elo finds herself betrayed by those she once trusted, she begins to question who she should really be afraid of – unseen spirits in the woods or the people at home.
Director Biography
Anna Veisman is an Estonian filmmaker whose mixed heritage and rural upbringing shape the textures of her storytelling. Born in South Estonia and later moving to Tallinn, she studied languages and audiovisual media before stepping into the world of film as a set designer and line producer. Her creative path took a detour into the music industry as media and PR manager for the popular Ukrainian electro-folk band Go_A, for whom she also produced and directed a music video that drew over a million views on YouTube. In 2025, Anna returned to her first calling — cinema — with her debut independent project, Eyes of the Forest, now beginning its journey through festival screens.
Grandpa has a broken eye
and mom is an adventure
dir. Marita Mayer | Norway | 8 min | Animation
"How can you think if you cannot speak?" Four kids, age 5 to 15, share their thoughts on aphasia and show us how they communicate and interact with someone, who has difficulties expressing themselves verbally.
Director Biography
Marita Mayer is a German director based in Germany and Norway. She has a background in Cultural Management and Education from the University of Hildesheim and specialized in drawn animation at the Animation School Hamburg. Marita has worked on several 2-D and stop-motion productions since and was a program manager for five editions of Fredrikstad Animation Festival in Norway.Her debut animation short film 'I'm not afraid!' premiered at the Berlinale in 2022 and was screened at over 150 festivals around the globe and qualified for the Oscars.
Visitor
dir. Vojtěch KONEČNÝ | Czech Republic | 20 min | Short
A young writer Jakub is being visited by an unknown man in his dreams. Jakub contacts his estranged sister and therapist Sara since she has the ability to enter his dreams. Through a strong audio-visual language, this mysterious film with horror elements explores the unpleasant experience with sleep paralysis.
Director Biography
Vojtěch is a Czech writer-director. He is a graduate of the BA and MA Film Directing course at FAMU in Prague. He also graduated from University of the Arts London, where he focused on directing and screenwriting. Vojtěch has participated in mentoring programs with Béla Tarr and was an AD trainee on the film set of Thomas Vinterberg. He was also a student juror at international film festivals such as the 75th Venice IFF (Giornate degli Autori) or the 24th Ji.hlava IDFF. He established the film production company nukleon frame with his two friends from FAMU in 2022.
Vojtěch's short film It Can Be Any Day was the finalist for Magnesia Award at the annual film awards Czech Lions for Best Student Film 2023. He also has two shorts coming in 2025 – a mysterious drama Visitor and police drama First Patrol. Vojtěch's feature debut in development Now and After received a financial grant from the DILIA agency for debut authors and financial development support from the Slovak Audiovisual Fund.