Presented in world premiere at Visions du Réel 2026, where it received a Special Mention from the Burning Lights Competition Jury, The Case Against Space by British filmmaker Graeme Arnfield won the 2026 Doc Alliance Award for Best Feature Film today during the Doc Day Lunch at the Marché du Film of the Festival de Cannes. Many congratulations to director Graeme Arnfield, producer Boris Garavini and the whole team!
This year’s jury brought together Wouter Jansen (CEO of Square Eyes), Maria Palacios Cruz (festival director of the Open City Documentary Festival), and film critic, filmmaker and producer Mark Peranson.
The Doc Alliance network of documentary film festivals supports emerging talent in European documentary cinema. Each of the seven member festivals — CPH:DOX, Doclisboa, DOK Leipzig, FIDMarseille, Ji.hlava IDFF, Millennium Docs Against Gravity FF, and Visions du Réel — as well as guest festival Golden Apricot Yerevan International Film Festival, nominated one short and one feature-length documentary from their recent programmes. Each festival will showcase at least three films from the Doc Alliance Award selection in its next edition.
More about the winners and nominees on docalliance.org
Best Feature Film: The Case Against Space by Graeme Arnfield
The Doc Alliance Award for Best Feature Film, endowed with 5,000 EUR, was presented to The Case Against Space (UK/France) by Graeme Arnfield. In the film, Arnfield reconstructs the world’s first strike in space in 1973—based on transcripts of exchanges with the control center on Earth—and paints an iconoclastic portrait of the astronaut as overworked labourer.
Le jury a salué un film qui « conjugue un important travail de recherche à une interprétation spéculative. Tout en s’inscrivant dans la continuité du précédent travail du cinéaste autour des images d’archives, ce film marque également une nouvelle direction, tout aussi radicale. D’une grande audace formelle, il adopte une esthétique lo-fi claustrophobe qui met au premier plan les témoignages humains. »
“Whilst drawing on the filmmaker’s previous work with found footage, this film represents a step in an equally uncompromising new direction. Formally bold, it commits to a claustrophobic lo-fi aesthetic that foregrounds the human testimonies,” praised the jury.
Best Short Film: Some of You Fucked Eva by Lilith Grasmug
The Doc Alliance Award for Best Short Film, endowed with 3,000 EUR, went to Some of You Fucked Eva (France) by Lilith Grasmug—the story of a typical cheerleader and the social and cultural landscape of an American high school, told through a montage of visual archives gathered from YouTube.
“All the images are sourced from pre-existing archive taken from the internet, and skilfully distorted and re-arranged to build an atmosphere steeped in teen angst. The film recalls cinematic conventions from high school movies to David Lynch, and manages to built a compelling and gripping story,“ stated the jury.
Beyond this, the feature-length documentary Fantasy (Fantaisie | France) by Isabel Pagliai was awarded a Special Mention by the jury in recognition of the director‘s “unique ability to create inedible and unforgettable images”.
A selection of more than 30 films previously nominated for the Doc Alliance Award is available to stream worldwide on DAFilms.
Film stills for download: Filmstills Doc Alliance Awards Winners
More information about the guest festival 2026: Golden Apricot IFF
See also
