Latvian Oscar submission Ulya will open the 2026 Nordic Film Days Lübeck
Lübeck, October 2, 2026. On November 4, 2026, the 68th Nordic Film Days Lübeck will open with Ulya (2026, orig. title Uļa) by Latvian director Viesturs Kairišs. The drama about Latvian basketball legend Uljana Semjonova is Latvia’s submission for the 99th Academy Awards in the category Best International Feature Film.
With the film, which had its world premiere in the Un Certain Regard section of this year’s Cannes Film Festival, the NFL will celebrate the opening night of the 68th festival on Wednesday November 4, 2026 at the CineStar Stadthalle cinema. We expect to welcome some of the film’s crew to celebrate its German premiere.
Director Viesturs Kairišs had this to say, “It is an incredible honour for me that our film ‘Ulya’ will open this year’s Lübeck film festival. Lübeck is one of my absolute favourite festivals in Europe – not only because almost all my films have screened there, but also because the NFL has a very special atmosphere.
In this co-production between Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, and Poland, Kairišs uses black-and-white images to retrace the life of Uljana Semjonova. As an unusually tall youngster, she left behind the safety of rural family life and joined the women’s basketball team TTT in Riga, where she advanced to become one of the best basketball players in the world. No straight-up biopic, the director also casts his gaze on the concepts of being different, physicality, and self-discovery. It was the movie’s lead, Kārlis Arnolds Avots, who had the initial idea for Ulya and pursued its development for many years. Avots had the pleasure of meeting the two-time Olympic champion personally. Her death in January 2026 triggered a wave of mourning in Latvia, where she was a revered icon.
The Nordic Film Days Lübeck tradition of finding, promoting, and celebrating talent
“Inviting ‘Ulya’ to the Nordic Film Days follows the festival’s long tradition of bringing new talents to Lübeck early in their careers, supporting their development, and periodically inviting them back to celebrate their progress”, says Hanna Reifgerst, the NFL’s new artistic director. Viesturs Kairišs has been a regular guest in Lübeck for more than 20 years, starting in 2002 with his debut narrative feature Leaving by the Way (2001, orig. title: Pa ceļam aizejot) and most recently in 2025 with his documentary short Cohabitants (2024, orig. title: Eluteelised). Lead actor Kārlis Arnolds Avots, in turn, is familiar to 2024 festival-goers from the Latvian hit series Soviet Jeans (2024, orig. title: Padomju džinsi). Even Guntis Trekteris was an early visitor to the NFL, with his producing debut on another Kairišs' film, Romeo and Julia (2004).
Viesturs Kairišs is one of Latvia’s leading stage, opera, and film directors. Born in 1971 In Riga, he studied theatre and film directing at the Latvian Academy of Culture (LAC), and has 15 narrative and documentary films under his belt. His stage productions have been mounted at the Vienna Festival, Berlin’s Hebbel theatre, the Avignon festival, and Bonn’s Biennale, among others. Kairišsis also the artistic director of the state Dailes Theatre in Riga.
The 68th Nordic Film Days Lübeck will run from November 4 – 8, 2026.
The Nordic Film Days Lübeck, first mounted in 1956, are among the film festivals with the longest tradition in the world. They are the only large-scale audience festival and important gathering spot for the German and European film industry that specialises in presenting films from the north and the northeast of the continent. The Nordic Film Days Lübeck is mounted by the Hanseatic City of Lübeck and supported by the state of Schleswig-Holstein, Creative Europe MEDIA, the Possehl Foundation, the Gemeinnützige Sparkassenstiftung (non-profit savings bank association), and the Wessel Stiftungen, the non-profit Friends of the Nordic Film Days, and broadcaster NDR as media partner. Other supporters and sponsors of the 62nd Nordische Filmtage are Cinestar, Lübeck public utilities, STAWAG utilities Aachen AG, Sudden Death, Gradwerk, skanbo, Diakonie Nord Nord Ost, real estate society Trave, Convotis, tsj-architekten gmbh, Waldzimmer, Theater Lübeck, MOIN Film Fund, Norwegian embassy, Kaufmannschaft zu Lübeck, Deutscher Verband Frau und Kultur e.V., the von Keller Foundation, Die Gemeinnützige Foundation, Superkunstfestival, Ver.di, Lübeck Protestant-Lutheran church district, Baltic Films, and the festival venues Cinestar Stadthalle and filmhaus, Kommunales Kino KOKI, KOLK 17, Theater Lübeck, InfinityDome, European Hansemuseum, Lübeck Academy of Music, and Lübeck cathedral.
