This year´s award winners at HUMAN 2026!
On Saturday evening, this year’s award winners at HUMAN were announced!
The awards were presented to the documentaries that excelled in three competition programmes: The HUMAN Award for Best Norwegian Documentary, the Human Rights Human Wrongs Film Award for Best Human Rights Documentary and the Award for Best International Documentary.
Here are the winners:
HUMAN Award for Best Norwegian Documentary
In the Norwegian competition programme, new Norwegian documentary films have competed to win the HUMAN Award for Best Norwegian Documentary and 50 000 NOK. Read more about the nominated films here.
The jury for the Norwegian competition programme consisted of Benjamin Mosli, Chloé Faulkner and Emily Louisa Millan Eide. Read more about the jury here.
The HUMAN Award for Best Norwegian Documentary goes to:
Winner: Memoirs From a Dream
Memoirs From a Dream
Director: Carl Christian Lein Størmer
Producer: IGH
An unsigned rock band from Tromsø is lifted into Hollywood’s inner circle by the legend Eddie Kramer – hailed as ‘the next big thing’ – before everything falls apart. The film is a raw reflection on ambition and the price of chasing the big dream in life.
Jury Statement
We are very grateful for the honour of selecting the Best Norwegian Documentary at the HUMAN International Documentary Film Festival 2026.
This week has taken us on a journey from the jungles of Brazil, to ancient ruins in Irak, via a salmon-river, a warehouse in Tøyen in Oslo, and we’ve gotten a glimpse of the harsh life on the streets in Alaska.
This year’s winner is a well-crafted and taut film, brought to life through a series of unlikely coincidences. Throughout the film, one often wonders, ‘Why on earth did they film this?’, while rooting for the story’s heroes. We hope for a turning point, even though we know from the very beginning how it ends.
Throughout this ulikely ‘happy-tragedy,’ we in the jury were somehow still cheering for things to turn around in the end – perhaps this is the moment the breakthrough finally arrives?
This year’s winner and the award for Best Norwegian Documentary goes to the unlikely adventure behind Hangface: Memoirs from a Dream, directed by Carl Christian Lein Størmer.
Honourable Mention: Det nye museet
Det nye museet
Director: Birgitte Sigmundstad
Producer: Medieoperatørene
The rich documentary provides an unfiltered look behind the scenes of one of Scandinavia’s most ambitious cultural transformation processes. For more than six years, the filmmakers followed the creation of the new National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design.
Jury Statement
The jury wishes to award an honorable mention to a film that literally opens up new spaces for reflection. In a careful, yet humorous and deeply human way, the film depicts a complex and fascinating process, where a new space is created. How do we convey and curate our shared art and culture, and for whom is this culture intended? The film illustrates how thousands of decisions, both large and small, unfold – politically and professionally, but also in very concrete and physical ways in the urban space.
Honourable mention goes to Det nye museet, by Birgitte Sigmundstad.
Human Rights Human Wrongs Film Award
Documentaries about human rights from all over the world have competed for the Human Rights Human Wrongs Film Award and 30 000 NOK. Read more about the nominated films here.
The jury for the Human Rights Human Wrongs competition programme consisted of Dag Andreas Fedøy, Ingrid Fadnes, Mette Cheng Munthe-Kaas. Read more about the jury here.
The Human Rights Human Wrongs Film Award goes to:
Winner: A Fox Under a Pink Moon
A Fox Under A Pink Moon
Director: Mehrdad Oskouei, Soraya Akhlaghi
The strong-willed Afghan 16-year-old Soraya has been trying to flee Iran for five years. She makes artwork made from materials she finds on the escape route. Through imaginative animation sequences, a strong portrait is created of this tough girl’s highly relevant everyday life as a refugee.
Jury Statement
This year’s competition programme for Human Rights Human Wrongs is exceptionally strong. The ten documentary films in competition are diverse in both form and expression, using a range of narrative and artistic approaches to illuminate important human rights issues.
Among the strong films in this year’s competition programme, one stands out for its original cinematic language and intimate, personal perspective. The film offers a rare glimpse into the life of a refugee, told through her own voice and her own eyes. By handing the camera to the main character, the filmmaker allows her to shape the narrative, creating an authentic, intimate, and powerful cinematic experience that draws the audience directly into her world.
Through creativity and vibrant artistic expression, the film confronts us with a dark reality: a young Afghan woman trapped in a violent arranged marriage in Iran, and a refugee making her way to Europe. We follow her on a long and dangerous journey, encountering human traffickers, border guards, and crossing the sea in a rubber boat. In doing so, the film highlights how European policies aimed at limiting migration risk undermining fundamental human rights.
The main character, Soraya, carries the film with her powerful presence, and through her eyes, broad political issues are transformed into deeply human experiences. The result is a moving reminder of the ongoing struggle for women’s rights, the fight against domestic violence, the importance of the right to seek asylum, and the imperative to protect human rights.
This year’s Human Rights Human Wrongs Award goes to the film A Fox Under a Pink Moon and directors Mehrdad Oskouei and Soraya Akhlaghi.
Honourable Mention: Put Your Soul On Your Hand and Walk
Put Your Soul On Your Hand and Walk
Director: Sepideh Farsi
A raw and deeply emotional testimony from inside the atrocities in Gaza from the Palestinian photo journalist Fatima Hassona. A film about human endurance and survival instincts in the darkest of circumstances. he day after the documentary was selected for the Cannes Film Festival, Hassona and her family were killed in an Israeli airstrike.
Jury Statement
We live in a time marked by a growing number of wars and violent conflicts, where international law is repeatedly violated by military powers. The flow of global events is relentless: conflicts that dominate the headlines one moment can quickly fade from public attention as new crises unfold.
One of the films the jury wishes to highlight brings us close to a young woman living in the midst of such a war. Her world is shaped by the killing of civilians, attacks on hospitals and healthcare workers, and the suspension of humanitarian aid and access to food. In this reality, international law is violated day after day. Through conversations and her own photographs, the protagonist shares fragments of her everyday life in Gaza, offering an intimate and powerful testimony from within the conflict.
The jury’s honourable mention goes to the film Put Your Soul On Your Hand and Walk by director Sepideh Farsi.
Award for Best International Documentary
International documentaries have competed for the Award for Best International Documentary. Read more about the nominated films here.
The jury for the international competition programme consisted of Birgitte Sigmundstad, Kari Anne Moe and George Kurian. Read more about the jury here.
The Award for Best International Documentary goes to:
Winner: Steal This Story, Please!
Steal This Story, Please!
Director: Carl Deal, Tia Lessin
A gripping portrait of Amy Goodman, the unwavering journalist behind the independent news program Democracy Now! The film chronicles Goodman’s personal journey into journalism and some of the biggest stories she has covered in her 30-plus-year career.
Jury Statement
The films in the international competition took us on a journey through time and space, through history and to places where the act of bringing a camera is in itself a threat to life.
These films bear witness to the worst of what we can do to each other as human beings while shining a light on the people that stand up to tyranny, and the values we sorely need in these troubled times.
These films are in themselves testaments of courage and integrity. They made us cry but they strengthened our hope. They underscored with cinematic style the need to stand together and stand up for each other.
Needless to say, the act of choosing one of them was a long road of deliberation.
The jury finally settled on two films. Both portray strong people – one who goes out into the world with camera and microphone bringing to light dark deeds and holding power accountable. The other dares to turn the camera inwards portraying generational trauma without compromising on historical accuracy.
The first film tells a story about speaking truth to power — even when it becomes dangerous and deeply uncomfortable. It paints an intimate portrait of an inspiring main character, reminding us that democracy can never be taken for granted.
With great narrative skills, the filmmakers manage to weave together the main character’s personal story with key moments in our history. We follow her not only as a public voice, but as a human being — someone who grows and finds life purpose in standing up for people. Again and again, she chooses to tell stories from the ground — from the streets to fields to open plains — focusing on the real consequences political decisions have for ordinary people, often across deep geopolitical divides.
By resisting hagiography while portraying the courage and talent of its main character, the film becomes more than a portrait. It becomes an invitation to step up. And it leaves the audience with a sense of hope: a reminder that courage, solidarity, and truth still have the power to make a difference.
For its powerful storytelling — and for reminding us why independent journalism matters — the jury awards the Award for Best International Documentary Film to Steal This Story, Please!, directed by Carl Deal and Tia Lessin — a portrait of Amy Goodman.
Honourable Mention: Memory
Memory
Director: Vladlena Sandu
A unique and personal documentary about growing up during the wars in Chechnya in the 1990s. The director’s memories are brought to life using childhood artifacts. The film asks how the war affects children and leaves clear traumatic traces for life.
Jury Statement
The jury gives honorable mention to a film where the director delves deep into how a century of conflict has affected four generations of her family. She makes bold personal artistic choices without compromising on the factual history of the conflicts and their brutality. With the use of strong tableaux and a vivid soundscape, the film opens a window into hidden worlds.
It reminds us how cinema can reveal the human cost of war. And how children are often its silent victims.
The honourable mention goes to Memory by Vladlena Sandu