PARTENER INTERNAŢIONAL

The international partner for Ceau, Cinema! in 2026 is the Oulu International Children’s and Youth Film Festival in Finland.

The festival offers a unique opportunity to see numerous films that cannot be seen anywhere else in Finland. The event presents new international children’s and youth film production, diversifying the cultural offering in the Oulu region. The target group is especially local children, young people and their families.

The festival has five competitions: Children’s Film Competition, Youth Film Competition, Finnish Competition, Best European Children’s Film (ECFA Award) and Best European Children’s Short Film (ECFA Award). More festival films are screened in special programmes, which are e.g. Shorts, Kaleidoscope, Classics, and other changing themes.

The festival organises the Oulu Children’s Film Forum. This is a unique international film industry event in Finland, featuring both a domestic section and an international section. Northern Script is a Nordic short film scriptwriting program for young people across the Nordic and Baltic countries. The Creative Class seminar offers insights and tools for promoting media education and multiliteracy as part of media education in schools, youth work, and libraries.

Every year, the festival collaborates extensively with other cultural events, associations and businesses in the region. Especially the strong cooperation with local schools makes it possible for school and kindergarten groups to attend the screenings at the festival venues each year.

Nowadays the festival offers free online screenings for kindergartens and schools throughout Finland. The screenings and study guides support media and film education in the school curriculum.

The Children’s and Youth Film Festival has been organised since 1982. The festival has established itself in the cultural field of the Oulu region and on the international children’s film festival scene. The November event is organised by the Oulu Film Centre.

The festival will be represented at Ceau, Cinema! by Mika Anttolainen and Marja Seppänen.

Mika Anttolainen is the director of the festival. His work focuses on developing young audiences and promoting children’s cinema in Finland and at the European level.

Marja Seppänen is the producer at the festival. She works with schools and kindergartens and various other cooperation partners. She also assembles the children’s and youth juries.