At its core, the Territorial Focus at RIDM is an exercise in reciprocity: where films travel, conversations follow and new forms of collaboration emerge. The Western Balkans Focus is a natural outcome of this approach. Since 2022, RIDM has developed close relationships with this territory's most dynamic documentary festivals, notably DokuFest in Kosovo and Beldocs in Serbia. We first invited Veton Nurkollari, Artistic Director of DokuFest, to join our jury in 2022, an encounter that led to a Canadian film showcase at DokuFest the following year. More recently, Marko Grba Singh, Artistic Director of Beldocs, joined RIDM’s international jury, sparking conversations that resulted in a Focus of Canadian films at Beldocs in May 2026. This year, we are pleased to welcome Darko Nabakov, Artistic Director of MakeDox in North Macedonia, also as a jury member. 

Bringing these festivals into conversation at RIDM therefore feels less like the creation of a new partnership than the continuation of an existing dialogue. Yet the RIDM Focus extends beyond a celebration of regional cinema, it is also an invitation for us, together with our RIDM audience, to reflect on the very notion of territory itself. The Western Balkans is a region shaped by contested borders, unresolved questions of statehood and histories marked by war, migration, memory, exile and displacement. Rather than approaching the region as a fixed geographical entity, this program understands it as a constellation of interconnected histories and perspectives, where ideas of belonging, identity and national sovereignty remain in constant negotiation. In many ways, the Western Balkans functions as a microcosm of broader global questions surrounding borders and coexistence, making it an especially resonant territory through which to examine the relationship between personal experience and geopolitical history.

The political realities of the region remain complex. Tensions, particularly between Serbia and Kosovo, continue to shape public life and collective memory. Yet it is precisely within this complexity that cinema reveals its unique capacity to create spaces for dialogue. Rather than simplifying historical narratives or offering singular perspectives, the films presented in this focus embrace plurality, allowing multiple voices to coexist and challenge one another. Together, they reveal how individual lives are shaped by larger historical forces while demonstrating the remarkable diversity of contemporary documentary practices emerging from the region. 

At the heart of this Focus is a curated selection of six feature films and six short films, offering a multifaceted portrait of one of the most dynamic documentary landscapes in Southeastern Europe. The program brings together intimate personal narratives, formally adventurous works and films deeply engaged with questions of memory, identity, labour, migration and political history, including from Kosovo: The Beauty of the Donkey, I Have Never Been on an Airplane, I Believe the Portrait Saved Me and Worker’s Wings.

From Serbia: Promised Spaces, Sunset, This Desirable Device, The Divine Feminine and  Inventory. And from North Macedonia: Disturbed Earth, The Tale of Silyan, Mushrooms Grow in Memory.

Beyond the screenings, this Focus is conceived as a space for dialogue and artistic exchange. Screenings will be accompanied by Q&As with invited filmmakers, while roundtables will bring together filmmakers, programmers and festival directors from across the territory to reflect on contemporary documentary production, collaboration and circulation in the Western Balkans and beyond. We hope to transmit this participation within the RIDM Forum; these exchanges will also extend to the industry, creating opportunities for filmmakers and professionals from Canada and the Western Balkans to meet and develop new relationships.

One of the most compelling aspects of the Western Balkans Focus is how collaborative cinema can transcend political divisions, highlighting a powerful paradox: while physical borders may divide territories, cinema has the power to blur and to reconnect them.

This year, to celebrate the Western Balkans Focus and extend these conversations beyond the festival, a dedicated seven-episode podcast series will be produced as part of the second season of CHOQ’s Le monde dans mes oreilles. Created by Caroline Marcoux-Gendron, the series will offer another space to listen to, share and deepen the voices, stories and perspectives emerging from the region.