Durban FilmMart closes with 39 awards as three projects lead the field
Three unfinished films from Tanzania, Sudan and Palestine took the top haul at the 17th Durban FilmMart, which closed with an awards ceremony on Monday night, 12 October, according to Variety. Thirty-nine awards with a combined value of more than $120,000 were handed out to projects still in development or production.
Tanzania's "The Ones With the Tempered Flowers" led the night. It won five prizes, the most of any project, Variety reported. Directed by Neema Ngelime and produced by Ivy Kiru, it took best non-fiction film from South Africa's National Film and Video Foundation, the country's public film funder. It also collected support linked to three documentary festivals: DOK Leipzig in Germany, Sheffield DocFest in Britain and Visions du Réel in Switzerland.
Sudan's "Where Do I Belong?" won four prizes. It is directed by Ibrahim "Snoopy" Ahmad, who co-directed last year's Sundance-premiering documentary "Khartoum", according to Variety. The project is described in the Durban FilmMart dossier as an intimate first-person road film about inherited displacement and the reversal of care between parent and child.
Palestine's "On the Sea Road" also won four awards. It is the debut feature from director Fitnat Waked and is a documentary about friendship between two Palestinian women separated by borders, according to Variety. Its prizes included the Al Jazeera Co-production Award, a development deal with the broadcaster, with Nour Obaid listed as a participant.
Nigeria's "The Boy Who Spoke Static" won three prizes. Made by the Agbajowo Collective, it took best fiction film from South Africa's National Film and Video Foundation, Variety reported.
Other winners covered animation, documentary and natural-history storytelling. Algeria's "The Thread and the Wall" by Mouni Bouallam won the JustFilms Documentary Award from the Ford Foundation. Libya's "The Birth of Derna" by Hussein Eddeb won the Climate Story Labs Award. Ethiopia's "Sunday Morning" by producer Nahom Abiy and director Minasie Terefe won best animation from the National Film and Video Foundation.
Two Southern African selections also picked up targeted support. South Africa's "Daddies" by producer Catharina Weinek and director Sean Mongie won the Inkaba Award from Stained Glass TV. Tunisia's "A Touch of Paradise" by producer Sarra Ben Hassen and director Houcem Slouli won the NEWF Natural World Storytelling Grant, which backs films about nature and conservation.
The Durban FilmMart is a pitch and finance forum, a market where film-makers present early-stage projects to potential funders, broadcasters and distributors. The 2026 edition ran from 9 to 12 October at the Southern Sun Elangeni & Maharani in Durban, under the theme "Shifting Worlds – Turning Towards Ourselves", according to the Durban FilmMart site.
What makes this stand out is the spread of backers. Festivals, broadcasters, public funds and non-profit foundations all put money and services into the same slate, giving the winning teams several different routes to get their films finished and seen.
