The best players in the area. TAURON Breakthrough and American Docs
Crème de la crème, the best of the best. Every year, the TAURON American Film Festival competitions bring together a selection of outstanding feature films and documentaries that are personal, original, and deeply relevant. Here’s this year’s lineup for the TAURON Breakthrough and American Docs sections of the 16th TAURON American Film Festival. Fifteen feature films and six documentaries will compete for the Audience Awards.
The full program of the 16th TAURON American Film Festival is now available at americanfilmfestival.pl, and tickets and online access are already on sale.
And remember – you are the festival’s only jury. Vote for your favorite films! Instructions will be available directly at the screenings.
Turning points
“TAURON Breakthrough mainly presents the first or second films by new directors. However, it's not limited to debutants. Since last year, we’ve also featured filmmakers who have been working for some time, but only recently – thanks to a bigger budget or a brilliant idea – have managed to reach a wider audience and break out of the close circle of indie fans,” says Ula Śniegowska, festival director. She describes the “breakthroughs” that define this year’s competition.
A great example is Pete Ohs, practically a regular at AFF. His earlier films never gained broad international exposure, but Erupcja, featuring popular British singer Charli XCX, is sure to be a turning point in his career.
Similarly, Max Walker-Silverman’s second film, Rebuilding, may reach a wider audience thanks to Josh O’Connor’s moving performance as a rancher who loses his home and all his possessions in a fire. The film shares the raw, poetic aesthetics of his earlier A Love Song.
Some of the entries are semi-debuts – a kind of “career change” for filmmakers already recognized in other creative fields. Lockjaw marks a successful directorial turn by editor Sabrina Greco, while Fantasy Life is the debut of actor Matthew Shear. Our Hero, Balthazar, meanwhile, is the directing debut of Oscar Boyson, producer of the early works of the Safdie brothers and Noah Baumbach.
The lineup also includes several films completed in Poland through the US in Progress program. Thanks to Polish post-production teams, these titles are now poised for international success. Among them are Albert Birney’s OBEX, with animated sequences created by the Polish studio XANF, and Miles Levin’s Under the Lights, winner of last year’s Polish Film Institute award, which supported post-production by Platige Image, Fixafilm, and DI Factory.
Under the Lights tells the story of a boy with epilepsy coming of age as he struggles to accept his condition. Along with Sovereign—about a teenager raised under the watchful eye of his strict anarchist father – Our Hero, Balthazar and Mad Bills to Pay: [or Destiny, dile que no soy malo] represent the coming-of-age genre so popular among young, debuting filmmakers, and a natural fit for the TAURON Breakthrough competition.
We hope this diverse lineup showcases the freshest, most vibrant voices in North American independent cinema – and that we’ll be hearing their names much more often.
TAURON Breakthrough competition selection
- Bunnylovr, dir. Katarina Zhu
- Erupcja, dir. Pete Ohs
- So Far All Good, dir. $ECK
- Dreams in Nightmares, dir. Shatara Michelle Ford
- East of Wall, dir. Kate Beecroft
- Our Hero, Balthazar, dir. Oscar Boyson
- OBEX, dir. Albert Birney
- Rebuilding, dir. Max Walker-Silverman
- Under the Lights, dir. Miles Levin
- Mad Bills to Pay: [or Destiny, dile que no soy malo], dir. Joel Alfonso Vargas
- The Scout, dir. Paula González-Nasser
- Sovereign, dir. Christian Swegal
- Lockjaw, dir. Sabrina Greco
- Plainclothes, dir. Carmen Emmi
- Fantasy Life, dir. Matthew Shear
Then and now – American Docs competition
Documentary cinema has the rare power to turn immediacy into meaning – to capture a story in the heat of a moment and let that urgency define the film. The American Docs section has long kept its finger on the pulse of North America, spotlighting not only current topics, but also issues that have been eating away at its fabric for decades. This year’s competition features deeply personal and intimate stories that serve as a kind of litmus test for the state of the US – from environmental threats and the legacies of slavery to the dreams of young people who still believe that change is possible.
American Docs competition selection
- Natchez, dir. Suzannah Herbert
- Powwow People, dir. Sky Hopinka
- Rocket Girl, dir. Agnieszka Swiercz
- River of Grass, dir. Sasha Wortzel
- The Sixth Borough, dir. Jason Pollard
- Teenage Wasteland, dir. Jesse Moss, Amanda McBaine
We invite you to Wrocław for the 16th TAURON American Film Festival, taking place November 6–11. The online edition will continue until November 23. Tickets for screenings and online access are already available.
