Oscar-winning documentary ‘No Other Land’ has secured two nominations at the prestigious Grierson British Documentary Awards, with the BBC dominating the longlist once again.
The Channel 4-broadcast film, which has struggled to secure a US release, is shortlisted for Best Single Documentary – International, alongside ‘Black Box Diaries’, Netflix’s ‘The Remarkable Life of Ibelin’ and National Geographic’s ‘Sugarcane’.
It is also nominated for Best Cinema Documentary, making it one of only four titles to receive double recognition this year.
Directed by a collective of filmmakers, No Other Land follows a Palestinian journalist and villagers in the occupied West Bank resisting displacement after their land was designated an Israeli ‘firing zone’.
The film drew widespread critical acclaim for its intimate, emotional storytelling, but success has not shielded its creators from hardship. In March, co-director Hamdan Ballal was reportedly assaulted by settlers near his home village and later detained by Israeli soldiers.
This year’s Grierson line-up also features another documentary centred on Palestine, the BBC’s ‘Life and Death in Gaza’. The awards will be held in London on November 18.
The Grierson Trust has faced challenges in navigating sensitivities around the conflict. In 2023, Oscar-winning filmmaker Asif Kapadia was removed as a patron after sharing social media posts the Trust deemed antisemitic, a decision that sparked a counter-backlash and boycott from prominent Muslim figures.
The year before, another attendee was barred from Grierson events for a decade following an antisemitic incident.
There has also been significant progress in gender representation. For 2025, 35 female directors are nominated, almost matching the 42 male nominees, reflecting efforts across the industry to redress historic imbalances.
Advocacy group We Are Doc Women has long campaigned for greater equity, prompting several broadcasters and indies to pledge a 50 per cent female-director target.
