The Baltic countries will return to the Clermont-Ferrand International Film Festival to let the fulsome festival audiences experience new and lauded Baltic shorts and to present new talents and industry professionals from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania to those attending the Market.

The festival’s International Competition will screen Estonian short film SAUNA DAY by directors Anna Hints and Tushar Prakash. The film invites you into the world of Southern Estonian men who go to the dark-intimate space of a smoke sauna after a hard day’s work. Beneath their tough exteriors lies a desire for connection, veiled in secrecy. The film premiered as part of Cannes Critics’ Week and has screened at a number of high profile festivals since.
Screening in the festival’s Young Audience Program is Latvian animation HOOFS ON SKATES from director Ignas Meilūnas. In a winter wonderland two friends are having a blast ice-skating on a frozen lake when suddenly a strange and unfamiliar world cracks open underneath them: now they must learn how to deal with the otherness, not letting the fear rule.

The festival’s Market Picks, highlighting films from the more than 9000 submissions to the festival, will include two Estonian projects: ON WEARY WINGS GO BY from animator Anu-Laura Tuttelberg and documentary THE HOUSE directed by Carl Olsson The delegation of Baltic Shorts at the Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Market 2025 consists of representatives from PÖFF Shorts (Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival), the Estonian Film Institute, Riga International Short Film Festival 2ANNAS, Riga International Film Festival, the newly created Latvian Short Film Agency, Latvian Animation Association, the National Film Centre of Latvia, Vilnius Short Film Festival, and the Lithuanian Short Film Agency “Lithuanian Shorts”. They will be on hand for the duration of the festival at the dedicated Baltic stand to promote shorts from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania to the more than 3500 delegates attending the Short Film market.

Euro Connection, the two-day pitching and networking event aimed at fostering partnerships between European and international production companies, will see the Lithuanian project MADONNA NON GRATA directed by Elžbieta Latėnaitė, as one of the 12 new short film projects being pitched to industry professionals. Gaining its place at Euro Connection after being selected at the Baltic Pitching Forum in 2024, the film is an uncommon story of apostasy – the abandonment of a religious belief. Aiste, a bright transgender woman from Vilnius, Lithuania, decides to leave the Catholic Church. To do so, she must return to her little hometown and meet the local priest (a requirement for apostasy seekers in Lithuania). Once a firm believer, Aiste now struggles with the Church’s position towards LGBTQIA+ individuals like her. She confronts the priest she knew in childhood, the same one her strict grandmother took her to for Sunday Mass. Now, Aiste identifies as a woman, while the priest has lost his vision, complicating their encounter on multiple levels.

On Wednesday, 5th of February the market will screen Baltic Shorts 2024, a film collection containing the freshest short films from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Seven animation and fiction films will be made available for industry professionals to experience the brightest and freshest new films from the region. Many of the films are work-in-progress or just recently finished and looking for distribution, sales opportunities or festival premieres. The screening will be followed by the Baltic Shorts “Meet & Greet”.