Summary
- Camerimage has unveiled five more films for its 2026 Main Competition.
- The new entries are Behemoth!, Fatherland, La Bola Negra, Through the Wall and Wild Horse Nine.
- The official images also highlight the five cinematographers.
- The Golden Frog places their visual artistry in the spotlight.
Five more films are competing for the Golden Frog at ToruńCAMERIMAGE 2026, putting the cinematographers behind their images at the centre of the latest announcement.
On October 21, the festival named Behemoth!, Fatherland, La Bola Negra, Through the Wall and Wild Horse Nine as new Main Competition entries at its 34th edition. The announcement follows an initial group of five films unveiled on October 19.
The five new entries and their cinematography
Behemoth!
Gifted cellist Alex Serian returns to Los Angeles after twenty years on the road. Music has shaped his entire life, and a new adventure turns that lifelong relationship into a personal journey.
Cinematography: Damián García.
Fatherland
In the summer of 1949, Thomas Mann and his daughter Erika drive across divided Germany, from American-controlled Frankfurt to Soviet-controlled Weimar. Returning after sixteen years in exile exposes both political divisions and tensions within the family.
Cinematography: Łukasz Żal.
La Bola Negra
Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi, known as Los Javis, connect three generations of men at different points in Spanish history. Desire, identity, memory and a family secret shape a story linked to an unfinished work by Federico García Lorca.
Cinematography: Gris Jordana.
Through the Wall
During Stalinist repression in Poland, political prisoners Wiesia and Jerzy communicate between neighbouring cells in Morse code. Unable to see each other, they develop a bond under brutal prison conditions. The film is based on a true story.
Cinematography: Jolanta Dylewska.
Wild Horse Nine
Shortly before the 1973 Chilean coup, CIA agents Chris and Lee travel from Santiago to Easter Island. Their pasts, and Chris’s new connection with two rebellious students, complicate the mission.
Cinematography: Ben Davis.
Why the Golden Frog matters
Unlike festivals that foreground direction or acting, ToruńCAMERIMAGE puts the cinematographer’s work at the centre. For filmmakers interested in framing, lighting and visual storytelling, its Main Competition offers a chance to examine how very different productions build their images.
That attention to cinematographers also connects with the broader interest in emerging cinematography talent around the world, alongside established artists working on major productions.
What we think
The names behind the camera deserve as much attention here as the directors. Łukasz Żal, for instance, already has a distinctive history with black-and-white imagery, while the five frames shared by the festival show just how different the visual language can be from one film to another.
For anyone shooting films, it is worth studying the contrast in Fatherland and Through the Wall, then comparing it with the warmer palette of Wild Horse Nine. A few stills cannot tell us whether a whole film works, but they can sharpen the questions we ask when we eventually watch it. Camerimage is one of the rare festivals where that conversation about images takes centre stage.
