And still, it remains

Director: Arwa Aburawa, Turab Shah

Year: 2026

A personal meditation on the intimate ways our lives are shaped by ongoing colonial histories, how we make sense of this knowing and finding joy. Official Selection CPH:DOX 2026 Centered around the filmmakers’ local park, this film is a celebration of London and the resilience of migrant communities that have shaped the city from its beginnings. It’s about the British Empire Exhibition of 1924-25 and a line which stretches all the way from then to today. It’s about Palestine, which sits along this colonial continuum, and a park full of dancing, BBQs, birthday parties and joy. Through a hybrid form that combines documentary, archival footage, and direct animation this film meditates on the colonial remnants lodged in our lives and asks what it means to celebrate, play, and belong amid the rubble of empire. Official Selection CPH:DOX 2026

Director: Tatiana Collet Apraxine

Year: 2028

You awaken on a fog-shrouded shoreline and meet Echo, a strange child with a hole in their stomach. Together you cross a lantern festival where the veil between worlds is thinnest, sail into an ocean that opens beneath you, and descend through a portal into the Underworld. The Underworld moves through different facets of grief: a rave where silhouettes dance in slow motion, indifferent to Echo's attempts to reach them; a frozen sea where giant statues crack open to release a buried memory of a lost mother; a shadow theatre where an anger monster is unleashed, reducing everything to embers. From the embers, a boat carries you into a vast darkness, where Mother appears, and they are finally reunited. You sail together to the Tree of Life, a bioluminescent, cosmic jungle. Echo begs her to return to the World of the Living, but ancestors appear and surround you. She cannot come back - the journey was never about bringing her back. Echo, revealed to be your own child self, dissolves around you as the hole fills with light.

Director: Saoirse Crean

Year: 2026

Led by renowned vocal coach Jennifer John, Folk to Folk follows a group of women in Liverpool who use traditional folk songs to build unexpected connections across cultures. As they learn and sing in Gaelic, Romansh, Boro and other languages, the sessions uncover shared themes that unite us. The songs rise like ghosts from the past, stirring memories, laughter and tears, and opening a safe space for the women to reflect together. “This project proves that music is a universal language. It allows us to feel, to be emotional, and when we do that together… that’s where the power lies” - Jennifer John