Lili
Award
🌿 2026 Nominees 🌿
~ Best Feature: Elephants in the Fog, 3670, 9 Moons, Labrador Autopsy of Silence
~ Best Documentary: #TwoMoms, Niñxs, Out Laws, The Hidden Face of the Earth
~ Best Short Film: Coyotes, Girl-Boy, Them That’s Not, Transmunity
MIX CPH’s awards for Best Feature, Best Documentary, and Best Short Film are named after Danish transgender artist Lili Elbe who became a pioneering figure for gender-affirming care and rights in Denmark. The Lili Award is granted to remarkable films in their category that challenge existing norms of sexuality and gender. These films are nominated by MIX CPH’s programmers and selected by our international jury panel.
Jury
FELIX MUFTI (he/they)
Felix Mufti is a Scouse writer, performer and socially engaged artist from Liverpool. He is best known for playing “Roman” in Netflix’s iconic Sex Education. Working across theatre, film and participatory practice, their work centres working-class lives, queer experience and community storytelling. He is currently working on a book project exploring youth homelessness.
THINH NGUYỄN (she/her)
Thịnh is a Vietnamese-born, and Denmark-based film director and designer. She has a deep passion for creating films with sophisticated and complex narratives, but within a limited and minimalistic animation style and naive character design. Used to working with conceptual films, she is now in the process of developing her first feature film, Bitter Melon Soup, which will be her first effort into exploring a more narrative style of storytelling.
MELANIE DASTMALCHI (she/her)
Melanie Dastmalchi is a Danish-Iranian film producer based in Copenhagen with 10+ years of experience. Known for a strong work ethic that earned her an Ekko Shortlist honorary award, she focuses on stories about identity and human complexity. Beyond film, she is curious about emerging technologies, digital safety, and how evolving internet culture shapes modern storytelling.
HELIOS BLANC (he/him)
Helios Blanc is a producer and founder of Trans+ on Screen; a network of trans people working in Film & TV. He was one of the producers of the Darkroom, a lab funded by BFi for queer and trans writers aimed to develop their genre feature film. He has worked on 50 projects, and is currently developing 4 features, all tapping into unique genres and storytelling of trans lives on screen.
JAY SEIPEL (they/them)
Jay Seipel has a background in film studies and a PhD in Cultural Gender Studies, and is the main coordinator at Malmö Queer Film festival (MQF) and curator for MQF’s international short film programme. They have been active in queer, feminist and other political communities as well as non-commercial cinemas and film festivals for most of their life.
