The 30th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival (PÖFF) – running from 6-22 November – has revealed the line-up for its First Feature Competition, dedicated to emerging filmmakers presenting their debut works. The 2026 edition brings together 12 films representing 19 countries, with nine world premieres and three international premieres on the cards. All titles will be competing for the Best Debut Film Award, which comes with a €5,000 grant from Tegos.

Selected from among more than 400 submissions sent in from 86 countries, the line-up brings together productions from across Europe, alongside films from the USA, Iran, Israel, Taiwan, the Philippines and Latin America. First Feature Competition curator Malaika Bova described the selection as an effort to draw on PÖFF’s global reach while ensuring that the movies connect emotionally with audiences. “The 12 selected films bring together wildly original stories, exciting debut directors and standout acting talent,” she said.

Among the European titles selected this year, Polish filmmaker Sonja Orlewicz-Zakrzewska’s Exotic follows a writer at a Polish seaside resort whose attempt to master pole dancing gradually becomes a deeper process of transformation and self-discovery. Gigi Betito’s Black Slaughter, a French-Israeli co-production, is set against the backdrop of the 1996 revelations concerning the disposal of blood donations from Ethiopian Jews.

Danish filmmaker Nagieb Khaja makes his feature debut with Lionheart, inspired by a true story and centred on Luan, a 29-year-old former gang member attempting to leave behind both his criminal past and the neighbourhood in which he grew up. Lithuanian director Danielius Minkevičius’ Oblivion turns to a fractured father-daughter relationship, as Maria secretly enters the life of the father she has never known.

Among the other selections is Ray Panthaki’s In Starland, a drama-mystery-thriller starring Clarence Maclin as a 50-year-old small-town American who finds an unexpected sense of belonging among a group of young online influencers. Macedonian filmmaker Andrey Volkashin’s The Sweetness of Bitter Things is a rural drama about a withdrawn doctor whose carefully ordered life is disrupted when her caring for a wounded woman awakens her to a first love. Chabname Zariab’s When She Hears the Bells, meanwhile, is set in Kabul as the Taliban take control of the city and follows a widow who discovers that a kitchen where she works is secretly being used as a Bacha Bazi house.

Here is the complete list of selected titles:

First Feature Competition

Black Slaughter – Gigi Betito (France/Israel)
White as Salt – Murat Eroğlu (Turkey)
Lionheart – Nagieb Khaja (Denmark)
Happy Ending – Atena Mahmoudi (Iran)
Oblivion – Danielius Minkevičius (Lithuania)
Exotic – Sonja Orlewicz-Zakrzewska (Poland)
In Starland – Ray Panthaki (UK/USA)
Status: Rejected – Vahn Leinard Pascual (Philippines)
Princess – Christian Rojas (Ecuador/Mexico/Argentina/Peru/Bolivia)
The Sweetness of Bitter Things – Andrey Volkashin (North Macedonia)
Running Wild – Wang Yi-Ling (Taiwan)
When She Hears the Bells – Chabname Zariab (France/Germany/Belgium)