EFP Future Frames 2026 returns to Karlovy Vary with Europe’s next generation of filmmakers

EFP Future Frames – Generation NEXT of European Cinema returns to the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in 2026 with a new selection of emerging directors whose short films point toward the evolving landscape of European cinema. Presented by European Film Promotion (EFP) in cooperation with Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, and supported by Creative Europe – MEDIA Programme of the European Union, the initiative continues to operate as one of the most visible international platforms for recent European film school graduates.

The 2026 edition also marks the arrival of Allwyn as the programme’s new main partner. The company will continue its commitment to emerging talent by awarding one selected filmmaker a one-month scholarship in Los Angeles, chosen by a jury of US talent agents from Range Media Partners and United Talent Agency.

Selected by EFP and KVIFF

The filmmakers were nominated by their national film promotion institutes, which are members of EFP, and selected by Karel Och, Artistic Director of KVIFF, together with the festival’s programming team. During the festival, the selected directors will take part in a curated programme of promotion, industry meetings and networking opportunities designed to connect new European voices with international professionals.

The selection reflects a wide spectrum of styles, geographies and concerns, with films addressing family memory, social pressure, identity, folklore, adoption, grief, the body and intergenerational trauma. Each title arrives with a distinct formal approach, underlining the strength of short film as a space for experimentation and authorship.

The 2026 EFP Future Frames directors

The 2026 line-up includes:

1. Helmi Donner, Finland, with The Lightning Rod
2. Jozo Schmuch, Croatia, with Shallow Ground
3. Arnas Balčiūnas, Lithuania, with Past the Hill of Napoleon’s Hat
4. Hae-Sup Sin, Switzerland and Korea, with Ban Dal (Half-moon)
5. Júlia Coldwell Serra, Spain, with Nobody Barks
6. Marie Lukáčová, Czech Republic, with Orla
7. Teilo Quillard, France, with Zampano
8. Ollie Launspach, Netherlands, with Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
9. André Vaara, Sweden, with Sister of Mine
10. David Champaigne, Slovenia and United States, with Self-Sown

Memory, family and unresolved histories

Among the most prominent threads in the programme is the persistence of family history. Finnish filmmaker Helmi Donner presents The Lightning Rod, selected for La Cinef, the Cannes Film Festival section dedicated to short films made in film schools. The poetic horror drama follows a young mother escaping a toxic relationship and reconnecting with her grandmother, a woman marked by wounds of her own. The film is Donner’s MA graduation work at ELO Film School Finland, Aalto University.

Croatian director Jozo Schmuch, a graduate of the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb, brings Shallow Ground, centred on an elderly mother whose son, missing since the war three decades earlier, suddenly appears at her door unchanged. Lithuanian filmmaker Arnas Balčiūnas, of the Lithuanian Theatre and Music Academy, explores emotional distance in Past the Hill of Napoleon’s Hat, where a son brings his father home from a psychiatric hospital to a family unwilling to engage with him. Balčiūnas was recently selected for the Cannes Critics’ Week Short Film Competition.

In Ban Dal (Half-moon), Swiss-Korean director Hae-Sup Sin, trained at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK), examines international adoption through the journey of a Swiss adoptive mother and her son as they travel to South Korea to meet his biological mother.

Formal invention and genre as a critical lens

Several films use playful or hybrid forms to address personal and social questions. Spanish director Júlia Coldwell Serra, from ESCAC, presents the award-winning Nobody Barks, an absurd comedy shaped by guilt, folklore and a desperate attempt to hide the accidental death of a nephew’s dog.

Czech filmmaker Marie Lukáčová, from UMPRUM, combines live action, 2D and 3D animation, and rap-inspired musical sequences in Orla, an eco-feminist fairytale that had its world premiere at IFFR Rotterdam. French director Teilo Quillard, trained at La Fémis, draws on his own circus background for Zampano, a dreamlike story about vertigo, inheritance and the intense bond between father and son.

Bodies, identity and the pressures of youth

Questions of identity and growing up also shape the selection. Dutch director Ollie Launspach presents Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, his graduation film from the Netherlands Film Academy, which premiered in the IDFA Competition for Short Documentary. Built around conversations with his girlfriend, Sterre Mulder, the film offers an intimate portrait of transition, insecurity and love.

Swedish filmmaker André Vaara, of Stockholm University of the Arts, presents Sister of Mine, a coming-of-age story centred on ten-year-old Noel and the pressures of 2000s boyhood, jealousy and sibling rivalry. Slovenian-American director David Champaigne, from the University of Ljubljana’s Academy of Theatre, Radio, Film and Television, completes the selection with Self-Sown, set in a summer-scorched district of Ljubljana, where teenage Nikola moves between street life, caring for his mother and confronting his own vulnerability.

A long-term commitment to emerging European cinema

The 2026 edition also strengthens Future Frames’ professional trajectory through a new partnership with Les Arcs Industry Village, which will offer one participant a wild card entry into the Talent Village programme in December. The final choice will be made by the Industry Village team.

With Variety as main media partner, and Cineuropa and FRED Film Radio as additional media partners, EFP Future Frames 2026 confirms its position within the European film ecosystem: not as a showcase of isolated discoveries, but as a structured bridge between film schools, festivals and the international industry.