From the teary, bloodshot eyes of call centre monkeys and threads glowing in the darkness, to the resilience of artistic animated films in times of low-cost AI productions: DOK Leipzig is providing a broad platform for animated filmmaking. Join us in the Animation Perspectives and Animation Night sections, as well as in a DOK Talk and in the DOK Industry events. These events focus attention on unusual artistic styles and standpoints, production conditions and current matters of interest.

Animation Perspectives – two artists’ approaches to navigating experimental narration, black humour, and a world that’s falling apart

On the Thursday of the festival, the Animation Perspectives introduces Niki Lindroth von Bahr and Réka Bucsi, two artists working in animation who take a bold, idiosyncratic and fragmentary approach to crafting their own cinematic environments. The artists’ works venture into unexplored territory involving experimental narration, black humour and abstraction to bring forth the unspoken, the painful – but also the beautiful. In absurd modern fables featuring relatable, anthropomorphic animals, Niki Lindroth von Bahr from Stockholm pulls colourful, glowing threads from the darkness and weaves them into an almost intangible “in-between”: futuristic, surreal, and populated by sophisticated characters that only seem to be cute. Bucsi thus encourages us not to block out the darkness in our own lives but to embrace it: only then do magically glowing plants grow, and orange clouds cry.

Back to The Future: The Video Synthesizer

More than half a century ago, the invention of the video synthesizer revolutionised filmmaking by integrating technology in the creation of art. In the mid-1960s, a new generation of artists seeking for innovative forms of expression discovered they could use the medium of video in their work. On the Friday of the festival, Animation Night curator Ben Sassen will draw on a curated programme of films spanning nearly three decades to highlight the role of the video synthesizer in the history of modern filmmaking and showcase some of the major artistic achievements of this period. Following the film screenings, there will be a performance by contemporary audio/video artists CINEMA.AV (USA) and Processing___ (Canada) who will present their new live work, “MICROWAVE”.

Masterclass and DOK Talk Behind the Screens

In the free Masterclass: In Conversation with Punto y Raya, held during the festival on Thursday, curator Franka Sachse will talk to the team behind Punto y Raya, a festival for animated filmmaking that also serves as an international platform at the nexus of visual arts and new technologies. The festival plays an important part in promoting the visibility of an art form dedicated to the most elementary aspects of audiovisual work: form, colour, motion and sound. On the same day, at the DOK Talk „animation@DOK Leipzig – Behind the Screens“, Jana Kraft, the coordinator of the animated film competition, will talk to directors of animated films and share personal insights into working with animation.

DOK Industry: Tackling challenges constructively

At DOK Industry, the Thursday and Wednesday of the festival will also be dedicated to animation. At our annual short film pitch DOK Short n' Sweet eight exciting short film projects in different stages of production will be presented. The DOK Industry Talk Anidox Lab – The Alchemy of Animated Documentaries will shine a light on the magic of animated documentaries when real-life stories and experiences meet boundless possibilities of animation. The partner event AG Animated Film: "AI in Animation – Curse, Blessing or Both" will explore ways to address the surge of purely AI-generated content on streaming platforms, which, because of its speed, low production cost, and often questionable quality, is transforming both production processes and audience viewing habits. DOK Industry: Jump in! invites professionals from the fields of animation and documentary film to come together and exchange ideas. The DOK Industry Talk Shorts, Screened and Streamed: Connecting Audiences to Short Films will examine how short films can reach their audiences through both international film festivals and online platforms.

The DOK Leipzig programme is complete, and ticket sales can begin! For the 68th edition from 27 October to 2 November, we are presenting a total of 252 films and XR works from 55 countries.

“Most of the films sent to us in the post-pandemic period have dealt with family situations and inner thoughts. This year, however, numerous documentaries and animated films have returned to looking outward,” says festival director Christoph Terhechte. “They address the threat of environmental destruction, resistance to political violence, the fight against exploitation, and strategies for human resilience under extreme circumstances.”

As of today, the entire programme — including all screening times and venues — is available on our website. Tickets are now on sale.

Browse the programme and buy your cinema tickets now: Festival Programme

Our Competitions 2025

A total of 78 short and feature-length films are nominated for the Golden and Silver Doves, including 30 world premieres.

In the International Competition Documentary Film, nine feature-length and eleven short films are competing for the awards. They emphasise, among other things, the value of cultures at risk of being forgotten, or explore the destructive impact of humans on their habitat. Others address themes of sex education, intimacy and experiences of sexual abuse. 

The International Competition Animated Film brings together five feature-length and 23 short films, offering a wide range of artistic approaches and animation techniques. Their stories revolve around more or less radical forms of activism, Indigenous communities, and philosophy. They reflect on experiences of war, probe power structures and the supernatural, explore intimacy and bodily transformation, and grapple with the complexities of being different.

In the German Competition Documentary Film, eight feature-length and twelve short films are in the running. They draw connections between Germany’s past and present or explore how the institution of school is used for state agenda. One film follows a Ugandan feminist who confronts the country’s oppose incumbent head of state using provocative means. The short films recount the experiences of refugees, offer sensitive portrayals of loneliness and emotional pain, and record memories: of disappearing rivers, of state-enforced violence and policies of assimilation.

The Audience Competition features ten feature-length films that premiered at major international festivals. They portray, among others, a small U.S. town that romanticises the history of slavery, follow three drag queens in Ukraine or the leader of an Indigenous community in Brazil. Other films accompany an Israeli comedian who has long worked for understanding between Palestinians and Israelis, or tell the story of a Danish artist who took money from a museum, regarding the stunt a performative work of art.

For more information, please read the press release on the competitions.

Using films as a lens to open minds, uncover lives behind the headlines, and break silences — this is what films in DOK Leipzig’s out-of-competition sections endeavour. These sections run alongside the four competitions for documentary and animated films having a special focus: Central and Eastern Europe, an artistic style that challenge the narrative conventions as well as highlights of the Doc Alliance festival network in Europe.

Panorama

In the section focusing on films from Central and Eastern Europe, the topic of war on Europe’s border is still very present in the documentaries of these regions. “A Simple Soldier” by Ukrainian Artem Ryzhykov and his fellow director Juan Camilo Cruz documents how war destroys dreams and futures of people as it turns them into soldiers from one day to the next. “Trains” by Maciej J. Drygas uses historical footage of trains to show how a vehicle once used to carry people to the countryside became a means of transporting soldiers to the front.

Camera Lucida

Films in this year’s Camera Lucida section zero in on people and their realities in various contexts: in science, prison,and avant-garde cinema.  The four feature films in this section broaden perspectives and encourage thoughtful contemplation. In "Little, Big, and Far," Jem Cohen reflects on on working in academia and the melancholy found in a life of science. "Conbody vs. Everybody“ by acclaimed director, screenwriter, and cinematographer Debra Granik documents the reality of convicted criminals in America, and "Bulle Ogier, Portrait of a Hidden Star“ by Eugénie Grandval centres on a maverick figure associated with the French New Wave.

Doc Alliance Award

And at the Doc Alliance Award, the three feature-length and three short documentaries depict life with parents grappling with alcoholism, caught between love and powerlessness, longing and intoxication (Monica Strømdahl’s “Flophouse America” and Myrid Carten’s “A Want in Her”) or they simply capture the beauty the world holds despite its many conflicts in the fairytale-like, poetic 16mm shots of landscapes in Portugal from“Unstable Rocks” by Ewelina Rosińska.

Find more informationen about the sections in our press release.

This year, we are kicking off the festival season in a very special way. We invite you to DOK Trailerbingo at our festival bar! Players can win free tickets in a fun way and get a first glimpse of the colorful film selection at DOK Leipzig 2025.

DOK Trailerbingo will take place just in time for the programme presentation on 9 October at Liqwe, Rudolph-Sack-Straße 2 in Leipzig. The bar will serve as our festival bar this year. The exclusive DOK cocktail “Rough Cut” will also be on the menu there, which can also be ordered during the festival week.

Here is how DOK Trailerbingo works: We will show short clips from films from this year's DOK Leipzig programme and reveal the film titles. Anyone who finds enough matching film titles in a row on their bingo card and calls “Bingo!” will win a free ticket.

DOK Trailerbingo starts at 20:00. Registration is not necessary. We’re looking forward to kick this festival season off with you!