For its 15th edition, the Venice Production Bridge (VPB) — the business side of the 83rd Venice International Film Festival — will bring together 4,000 professionals from around the world from September 3-9, 2026 at the Hotel Excelsior, at the Biennale Match Point Arena (the venue of the Festival, a few steps away from the Excelsior), and at Lazzaretto Vecchio Island. The latter is home to Venice Immersive (the section of the festival dedicated to Extended Reality, or XR works), which is also celebrating its 10th anniversary, as well as the fifth Venice Immersive Market, which is the marketplace for the immersive media industry.
It is also a time of anniversaries for VPB, and of a brand “new baby”: the VPB Location Market, which VPB’s director Pascal Diot defined as “the missing part of the production chain in our offer to producers.”
Among the 4,000 participants, the 1,400 international producers who are expected to attend are at the heart of the Venice Production Bridge. Services, networking events, panels, and one-on-one meetings are mostly designed for them and for their projects in an advanced production stage, which will be presented in different sections of the market.
Over 370 projects applied for the Venice Gap Financing Market, which is the VPB section dedicated to films that need to “close the gap” of financing. Of those, 66 were selected and will be discussed in one-on-one meetings with industry stakeholders.
Of those 66 projects, 38 are feature-length dramas and documentary films that have secured 70 percent of their budget and need to complete financing through minority co-production quotas. Some of the selected films are directed by renowned filmmakers such as Jessica Hausner (Austria), Lav Diaz (Philippines), Ursula Meier (Switzerland-France), and Rita Baghdadi (USA- Morocco).
Other acclaimed creators are behind the 14 immersive works, which require a secured budget of 30 percent to be selected. These include Jorge Tereso and Fernando Maldonado (Argentina), Samantha Gorman and Scarlett Kim (U.S.), and Hsin Hsuan Yeh (Taiwan).
Fourteen projects were developed under the Biennale College Cinema and Immersive Workshops initiative, through which La Biennale of Venice finances new talents and gives them the opportunity to create micro-budget features and immersive works.
In addition, there are six works in progress for “Final Cut in Venice,” a business program that supports (with different awards) the completion of films from all African countries and six countries in the Middle East: Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, and Yemen.
From the top to the bottom of the film production chain, producers at the VPB can dive into the full catalogs of 30 selected international publishing houses and literary agencies for one-on-one meetings of the Book Adaptation Rights Market (or BARM), September 4-6. Only two of the 30 publishing houses come from outside Europe: BookEnds Literary (U.S.) and Catrina Wessels Rights Management (South Africa).
Film producers can also book meetings at “Meet the Streamers” sessions with invited platforms that include Cinobo (Greece), Justwachtme.tv (Canada), Neterra TV+ (Bulgaria), Netflix EMEA, SRG-SSR (Switzerland), WB-Discovery Spain, and WeShort (Italy).
On the conference side, two panels will focus on “Stories Across Platforms: Crossover Strategies Between Books, Audio and Film” (on September 5 at Excelsior Hotel, Spazio Incontri) and “The Future of Streaming Content: Balancing Originals, Acquisitions and Pre-Acquisitions” (on September 6 at Excelsior Hotel, Spazio Incontri).
The first edition of the VPB’s new Locations Market will take place September 7-8, with 10 international film commissions participating. Producers and location managers will be able to meet with reps from the following film commissions: Asturias Natural Paradise Film Commission (Spain); Azania Mediaworks (South Africa); German Film Commissions; Hellenic Film And Audiovisual Centre – EKKOMED (Greece); Screen Flanders (Belgium); Swiss Film Commission; Tokyo Film Commission (Japan); and Uzbekistan National Film Commission.
Explained Diot: “When we started the conversation, film commissions and sound stage studios immediately showed an interest in taking part in an event where we could arrange one-to-one meetings with so many producers. Also because, apart from Shooting Location Marketplace in Valladolid and Focus London, there are no similar markets, especially inside a film festival.” Diot admitted that attendance could have been stronger, but “as we started to talk concretely about the organization during the last Berlinale, some film commissions were already too late to commit for this year due to administrative reasons. I think we will have many more next year.”
In terms of acquisitions, around 200 international buyers and 100 worldwide sales companies are expected to attend. Deals occupy a minor part of the Venice Production Bridge, which is a very different kind of market compared to the AFM, the EFM, or the Marché du Film.
“We don’t have any B or Z movies, which usually make up the majority of film market selections,” said Diot. “The only buyers here are interested in author-driven films, and most sales companies only come if they have films in one of the festival’s sections.”
The 30 to 40 market’s screenings are mostly dedicated to films in the competition section, especially in the last days of the festival after the VPB is over. Explained Diot: “I am allowing sales agents to show the films beforehand through a private screening, embargoed for the press, while the distributors are here for the VPB.”
The focus countries for this VPB edition are Greece and Switzerland, financed by the Hellenic Film and Audiovisual Centre (EKKOMED) and Swiss Films. A significant delegation from each country will be present at all market events. In 2017, La Biennale of Venice became the world’s first A-list festival to launch a competition for virtual reality works. Five years later, it established the Venice Immersive Market, which Diot emphasized, is “the number one market in the world for immersive content.”
At the time of this writing (August 3, 2026) only one panel has been announced: “AI for Cinema: The 10,000 Parallel Universes Initiative” (on September 5 at the Excelsior Hotel, Spazio Incontri). Diot explained, “We received at least 15 requests for panels on AI, but we limited them because we are hosting a large event dedicated to AI with major players,” the details of which are yet to be finalized.
(By Carolina Mancini)
Audio Version (a DV Works service)
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