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dok.incubator preview is an exclusive showcase of eight perfectly balanced documentaries just before their premiere. This year, the event takes places in Amsterdam on November 17 and online on November 28 (invitations only).
A Georgian mother turns to surrogacy to secure a roof over her daughter’s head. What begins as a quick way to earn cash transforms into a profound sacrifice, questioning how far a mother can go.
In Tbilisi, a homeless mother, Zhana, resorts to surrogacy to provide a safe life for her teenage daughter, Elene. While trying to keep her pregnancies hidden from Elene, Zhana's financial struggles persist. With no proper regulations in place, she pushes her body to the extreme through multiple childbirths, taking a dangerous toll on her organs and risking her life. As Zhana’s health declines, Elene matures and eventually confronts her mother about her choices and their consequences. Through the director’s decade-long friendship with the duo, the film explores the evolving dynamics of the mother-daughter relationship and raises questions about the extent of a mother’s sacrifice.
Director: Ketevan Vashagashvili
Editors: Veronica Scotti, Bernadett Tuza-Ritter
Producers: Nino Chichua, Anna Khazaradze
Co-producers: Martichka Bozhilova, Sylvia Nagel
Producer's contact: nino@1991productions.com
Sales contact: TBA
Produced by: 1991 Productions
Co-produced by: Agitprop, Vincent Productions
Estimated date of release: February 2025
A cinematic allegory of a boy becoming a teenager in rural China. Searching through an emotional landscape of growth, he reflects on the poetry of his solitary childhood.
Gong Youbin was born into a poor Chinese family. He hasn’t seen his mother since he was three months old. Inspired by a poetry class in school, he embarks on an emotional journey, learning to write poems through imagination and exploration. By observing his upbringing in the Hunan countryside, shaped by dreams and the harsh realities of his family’s struggles, ALWAYS is an allegory for the loss of innocence, as Gong inevitably must grow out of childhood and face reality.
Director: Deming Chen
Editor: I-Chu Lin
Producer: Hansen Lin
Producer's contact: veritiestudio95@gmail.com
Sales contact: N/A
Produced by: HandsOn Studio Films
Co-produced by: SaNoSi Productions
Estimated date of release: May 2025
After a lifetime of longing, Sang, an unwanted child from the Vietnam War, finally meets his newly found father in the U.S., leaving his beloved family behind—but nothing goes as expected.
Sang is one of countless children left behind by American soldiers after the Vietnam War—unwanted, discriminated against, and scarred by a war that took more than just his father. When Sang unexpectedly locates his gravely ill father in the U.S., he becomes determined to meet him, even though it comes at a price. The only way to fulfill this need is to move to the U.S. permanently, leaving behind his beloved wife, daughter, and grandson. In this foreign land, he struggles to find his place—not only in a society that sees him as an outsider but also within an American family that never knew of his existence. Cultural barriers and unspoken pain collide when the past catches up with the present.
Director, producer: Weronika Mliczewska
Editor: Marcin Sucharski
Producer: Chi-Minh De Leo
Co-producers: Michal Sikora, Antonio Russo Merenda
Executive producers: Bao Nguyen, Jim Stark
Producer's contact: studioyaman@gmail.com
Sales contact: N/A
Produced by: Ya Man Studio Sp. z o.o.
Co-produced by: Clubhouse, Lonely Production, Ginestra Film
Estimated date of release: January 2025
In a land falling apart from conflict and moral decay, Roy, an Israeli journalist and activist becomes a father. Now, he and his family have to decide - stay and resist war, or leave?
How do you raise a child and protect your loved ones in a country that is under the illusion that it can save itself by destroying its neighbors? Roy lives with his American husband and their daughter in Tel Aviv, arguably the most gay-friendly city in the world. Is it the right place for them after all? After the October 7th Hamas attack and Israel’s destruction of Gaza, Israeli society is doubling down on violence. Roy looks for a hint of hope in his past when he belonged to a community of Middle Eastern peacemakers. Were they all naïve? He meets with his Palestinian and Israeli friends, searching for signs of what the future will be like. The story is told in Roy's first-person narrative, documenting his dilemmas as an Israeli leftist of Arab-Jewish descent during the current war.
Director: Roy Cohen
Editors: Alex Bakri with Karolina Bengtsson
Producer: Serge Gordey
Producer's contact: serge.gordey@gmail.com
Sales contact: N/A
Produced by: Temps Noir
Co-produced by: Dune Productions, Akka Films, The Piranesi Experience, campfilm
Estimated date of release: August 2025
In this absurd tragi-comedy, Blanka is on a mission impossible: to change her eccentric artist father, a macho relic from the previous century. Can she overcome her anger and find serenity?
An absurd heartfelt tragi-comedy in the rich tradition of Czech cinema. Blanka, a successful film editor and mother of three, confronts her artist father, Kula — always loud and an enfant terrible. Amid his refusal to grow up, Blanka seeks to break the family cycle of dysfunction. Through surreal yet honest confrontations, where laughter and tears mix like raindrops in a puddle, the film explores the tension between art, family, and eccentricity, blending humor and drama as they attempt to reshape their destinies.
Director: Filip Remunda
Editor: Blanka Kulová
Producer: Tereza Horská
Co-producers: Hanka Kastelicová, Peter Kerekes
Producer's contact: email@hypermarketfilm.cz
Sales contact: N/A
Produced by: Hypermarket Film
Co-produced by: kerekesfilm, HBO Europe
Estimated date of release: February 2025
Many people believe Malby, a famous shaman and spiritual healer, possessed supernatural powers. His own son Mathu, does not.
Mathu, a medical doctor, grew into the complete opposite of his father, a spiritual healer. While Mathu is an ascetic loner, Malby was a hedonistic womanizer. Mathu's controlled reality unravels when Anna, a Malby devoted believer, tries to convince him that his father saved her life through telepathic healing. He is now forced to come to terms with his family trauma, while challenging Anna’s beliefs. The confrontation turns into an exploration of the opposite beliefs between Science and Magic.
Director: Ventura Durall
Editors: Júlia R. Aymar, Maria Castan de Manuel, Nikan Salari
Producer: Maria Colomer Canyelles
Producer's contact: maria.colomer@nanouk.tv
Sales contact: N/A
Produced by: Nanouk Films
Co-produced by: Harald House, Massala Production
Estimated date of release: February 2025
Why do so many people from the Middle East become refugees? With a legendary European TV reporter, I investigate the long-term effects of western interference in countries where war never ends.
With 40 years of experience in the Middle East, TV reporter Ulrich Tilgner returns to the conflict zones in Afghanistan, Iraq and Rojava in Syria. Together we meet witnesses, survivors and resistants to war and oppression. They want to stay in their homeland, but many have to leave. I question my own convictions and perspectives, being confronted with the consequences of US and European implications in this circle of violence. In these ongoing wars, women make the biggest sacrifices. But women also play an essential role in the hope for a self-determined society.
Director, producer: Edgar Hagen
Editor: Christian Büttiker
Producer: Mathias Hefel
Associated producer: Gudula Meinzolt
Producer's contact: mail@vollbild-film.ch
Sales contact: N/A
Produced by: Vollbild Film GmbH
Estimated date of release: May 2025
In Kurdistan, the last residents of an ancient town watch helplessly as centuries old traditions disappear when the Turkish government floods their land.
Hasankeyf, a town with millennia of history, disappears under water by Erdoğan’s orders, swallowed up by a massive and prestigious dam project. Promises of modern life strip the people of their identity and old homes, replacing them with new buildings cast in concrete. Rengin, a Kurdish shepherd, and Burak, the local barber, find themselves trapped in a political game where survival depends on obeying strange new rules: unmarried residents lose the right to a house, and farmers are forced to give up their animals. Each new restriction reminds them that their lives will never be their own—they are merely pieces in a system that demands obedience and submission. Everything they once knew has been torn away forever, leaving behind only family pride and a fragile sense of dignity.
Directors: Natalia Pietsch, Grzegorz Piekarski
Editor: Alan Zejer
Producer: Katarzyna Kostecka
Producer's contact: k.kostecka@larmo.film
Sales contact: N/A
Produced by: LARMO
Co-produced by: Polish Film Institute, Polish National Television, Maczu Piczu
Estimated date of release: January 2025
