Pordenone Docs Fest Day 4
Saturday, March 28, sees Pordenone Docs Fest come alive with its fourth day, as Cinemazero hosts a rich program crossing perspectives, geographies, and cinematic languages.
The day opens at 10:00 with Fiume o morte! by Igor Bezinović, a member of the jury of the 19th edition and present in the theater. Awarded Best European Documentary at the European Film Awards 2026, the film goes beyond historical reconstruction, offering a profound reflection on the roots of extremism by intertwining D’Annunzio’s visions with contemporary nationalist tensions. The screening will be followed by a masterclass in which the director will guide the audience into the heart of his creative process, exploring the construction of reality and the relationship between aesthetics and politics.
At the same time, the festival expands into professional dialogue with the industry event Vero! Connecting Docs, bringing together filmmakers and representatives of international festivals to showcase selected works and create new opportunities for circulation and exchange between creativity and industry. This dialogue continues in the afternoon with a panel dedicated to new documentary distribution strategies, focusing on collaborative networks, shared platforms, and alternative circuits capable of broadening audiences and reshaping the sector’s ecosystem.
The international dimension is also reflected in the premieres, such as Wise Women by Nicole Scherg, scheduled at 10:30 (free admission for schools). The film follows five midwives in different parts of the world, offering a powerful and necessary portrait of those defending the right to safe and conscious childbirth. Presented in collaboration with Voce Donna ETS, Carta di Pordenone, and the Order of Midwives, the film highlights how childbirth is both an individual experience and a collective issue, deeply connected to rights, culture, and social justice.
In the afternoon, at 14:30, the section dedicated to emerging Italian talents presents intimate and experimental works such as Night Blooms and Sueña Ahora, exploring the boundary between reality and imagination, desire and isolation, and bringing new narrative forms and contemporary sensibilities to the screen.
The journey through historical and political memory continues with a retrospective on the Spanish Civil War, featuring Il disincanto by Jaime Chávarri, in which the widow and three children of a Francoist poet recount their stories with joyful and unsettling frankness—effectively dismantling fascist patriarchy. The focus on the siege of Sarajevo also returns with the section curated by Alessandro Del Re, presenting at 17:30 Retour à Sarajevo by Philippe Grandrieux and Images from the Corner by Jasmila Žbanić.
The Balkans are further explored in Peacemaker by Ivan Ramljak, presented as a national premiere at 15:45 in collaboration with Bottega Errante and Meridiano 13. The film reconstructs the forgotten figure of Josip Reihl Kir, a neglected hero who, on the eve of the Croatian–Serbian war, tried to stop the horror before violence erased all hope.
Alongside cinema, the festival also embraces other languages and practices. At 16:30 in the Mediateca, GameZero will explore the video game Horses, inspired by Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Salò, described by Wired as the most controversial video game of the year. At 17:00, also in the Mediateca, the Mediacreativa workshop for younger audiences begins, focusing on instant photography and inviting participants to slow down their gaze and rediscover the value of images as concrete and unrepeatable experiences.
A special event not only of the day but of the entire festival is the screening of Moana with Sound, the 1926 masterpiece by Robert Flaherty—the film that gave birth to the term “documentary.” Portraying the “distant world” of Polynesia, it offers today—especially in its 1981 sound version created by the director’s daughter—a reflection on anthropology and visual colonialism.
This screening also marks the launch of a new journey titled Guardare il reale, a series dedicated to century-old masterpieces of documentary cinema. The initiative aims to bring key films in the history of cinema—fundamental for stylistic evolution and of exceptional aesthetic value—to wider audiences. Each year, one volume and one film (in the best available version) will be presented, accompanied by a guidebook and the possibility to stream the film in high quality thanks to the national platform CGTV.
The day is also enriched by further premieres addressing urgent and universal themes. Tensions in the Middle East return in Far from Maine, scheduled at 17:30 in collaboration with Un Ponte Per. Israeli director Roy Cohen, present at the screening, revisits his adolescence alongside his Palestinian friend Aseel, who was killed by police during a demonstration. In the 1990s, both were part of a youth delegation aspiring to become seeds of peace in the Middle East. In the film, Roy reflects on grief and responsibility in an increasingly radicalized Tel Aviv.
Finally, the festival closes the day with a focus on female resistance in contemporary Turkey through 32 Meters, where a shooting competition becomes a symbolic act of emancipation. Presented at 21:00 in collaboration with Voce Donna ETS and Carta di Pordenone, the film will be introduced by director Morteza Atabaki and cinematographer Zeynep Secil.