ZINEBI CONSOLIDATES ITS POSITION AT CANNES DOCS AS A BENCHMARK FOR DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKING AS THE ONLY FESTIVAL FROM SPAIN THAT PARTICIPATES AS AN OFFICIAL PARTNER IN CANNES DOCS, WITHIN THE CANNES FILM MARKET, THE LARGEST FILM MARKET IN THE WORLD

• This year, ZINEBI co-organized the Spain Showcase together with the Instituto de Cinematografía y Artes Audiovisuales del Ministerio de Cultura (ICAA) and the Instituto de Comercio Exterior (ICEX).
• Three of the four documentary projects presented were born or were awarded at ZINEBI Networking.

The International Festival of Documentary and Short Film of Bilbao – ZINEBI, organized by the Bilbao City Council, returned one more year to Cannes Docs, the largest international showcase of documentary film, as the only festival in Spain present there as an official partner, within the Marché du Film of the Cannes Film Festival.

Since 2021, ZINEBI has maintained a continuous participation in Cannes Docs, which confirms its role as a strategic node for promoting documentary films. ZINEBI plays a key role in identifying talent and promoting Basque and Spanish projects internationally.

For the 2025 edition, ZINEBI co-organized for the second time a Spain Showcase together with the Instituto de la Cinematografía y de las Artes Audiovisuales (ICAA) of the Ministry of Culture and the Instituto Español de Comercio Exterior (ICEX).

It was a selection of four feature-length documentaries in advanced stages of production or post-production. Of the four selected titles, three had already passed through ZINEBI Networking, the industry space of the Bilbao festival, which in recent years has established itself as a key platform for the development of documentary projects in Spain.

These were the projects included in the Spain Showcase at Cannes Docs 2025:

• “If You Wish to Make an Apple Pie”, directed by the Basque filmmaker Nagore Eceiza (participant in ZINEBI Networking 2020), about an interfaith love story in India marked by family tradition.
• “We Were a Great Family”, co-directed by Cristina Rosselló, Chiara Marañón and Juan Soto Taborda, winner of the ZINEBI Networking 2022 Award, and based on domestic film materials that narrate from the intimate a historical transformation.
• “La Pietà”, co-directed by Rafa Molés and Pepe Andreu, a project with an international dimension that relives the memory of seven brothers in the Icelandic glaciers. It was presented at ZINEBI Networking 2023.
• “The Flight of the Stork”, a Spanish-Catarian coproduction directed by Soumaya Hidalgo Djahdou and Berta Vicente Salas, completed the selection.

These projects were presented on Sunday, May 18, at the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès in Cannes, before an international audience of sales agents, festival directors, production companies and specialized distributors. The event was introduced and moderated by the Head of Programming at ZINEBI Rubén Corral, along with the ICEX Head of Cinema Noemí Cuetos, the Director of Marketing Policies at the ICAA Jara Ayucar, and Cannes Docs Coordinator Babette Dieu.

Through this new participation, the Bilbao International Documentary and Short Film Festival reaffirmed its commitment to documentary films as artistic and social tools and to its role as a bridge between creators and the international market.