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U.S. in Progress 2025: Poland to Park City
Night Nurse The 15th edition of U.S. in Progress—an industry market cum post-production prize competition held during the Polish-based Tauron American Film Festival—began on a particularly unorthodox foot this year. Though the festival’s based in the Southwestern, thousand-year-old metropolis of Wrocław, the program’s international cohort landed at Warsaw Chopin Airport, nearly 200 miles away from AFF’s home base, in the days preceding the event itself.
Inconveniently, the Wrocław airport underwent extensive renovations from October 26 through December 4 of this year. As the AFF and its U.S. in Progress showcase unfold between November 6-11, the timing couldn’t be more headache-inducing. Yet for those of us lucky enough to fly out for the festivities (participating filmmakers and producers, European and American festival programmers, sales agents, the odd journalist), this Warsaw detour only further exemplified the immense organization, commitment and generosity indicative of the team behind U.S. in Progress.
A handful of American filmmakers—between six and 10, though this edition boasted a charmingly uneven nine—are selected to screen 20 minutes of their work-in-progress narrative features in various states of completion. Most just need finishing touches—color correction, sound mixing, VFX, score—before they’re picture-locked. These WiP samples are divided into two blocks over one afternoon, screened exclusively for international industry folk as well as Polish post-production companies, the latter eventually awarding filmmakers of their choosing with funds that will aid in completing their features.
It’s a novel approach for establishing an American-Polish co-production, yet the projects that regularly emerge from U.S. in Progress feel distinctly DIY and evocative of the current U.S. landscape in terms of political, aesthetic and cultural sensibility. (It has been rumored that one USIP programmer feels strongly opposed to period pieces, which would make complete sense given its consistent “of the moment” output). Some standouts from recent editions include Sarah Friedland’s Familiar Touch, India Donaldson’s Good One, Paula González-Nasser’s The Scout, Amanda Kramer’s By Design and Pete Ohs’ Erupcja. Indeed, there is a concerted woman-forward presence to USiP, and this year was no exception.
As there are about 20 awards totaling $160,000 available for participants, everyone goes home a winner. Some may win more money than others, but this simple fact meant that there was no palpable sense of rivalry among the competing parties. During the inaugural (and very traditionally Polish) Warsaw welcome dinner, I sat with two producers, Vero Kompalic and Gia Rigoli, who were presenting Pocket Dream on behalf of co-directors Julia Baylis and Sam Guest. They succinctly gave their spiel, noting that their edgy noir—about a socialite (Stacy Martin) who hires a broke caterer (Spike Fearn) to drive her to easternmost Long Island for a sizable fee—was shot in the Hamptons. As the duo is Los Angeles-based, they had no idea how far away this wealthy getaway spot actually is from New York City itself, causing immediate grumpiness with an at times four-hour commute between their Manhattan and Hamptons shooting locations. They were awarded up to $5,000 for title design from XANF and up to $5,000 for foley from Aeroplan. Perhaps these comparatively small winnings had to do with the 20-minute sample dropping viewers 20 minutes into the feature, whereas most other teams decided to start from the film’s opening moments. While I found a kinetic chase scene within a dreary Hamptons McMansion riveting, the character motivations may not have been immediately clear to other viewers. In any case, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the film included on a future Sundance lineup announcement, as Baylis and Guest’s previous short, Wiggle Room, bowed at the soon to be Boulder-based festival to much success back in 2021.
As dinner extended into an unprecedented fourth hour, a group was formed to liberate us and hit a local bar for the cultural necessity of sampling Polish vodka. Filmmaker and fellow New Yorker Talia Lugacy sat diagonally from me and divulged that unlike the majority of her NYC-based productions, this one is set in a rural community. During the screening I gleaned more about Ruby Road, her Appalachia-set portrait of an older woman (Frances Fisher) roaming MAGA-land. Perhaps the most “in progress” of all the WIP projects presented—no tangible narrative was presented, save for some very sullen weeping at a gravestone and a parade sequence—which is likely why it racked up generous post-production awards, as these companies could feasibly leave more of a tangible imprint on the final product. XANF awarded up to $10,000 of VFX while Earworks and Aeroplan offered up to $10,000 each for sound.
At the bar, I spoke with Jaffe Zinn, cinematographer and co-producer of Mackenize, who offered some visual references for the project off the bat. The one that most piqued my interest was documentarian Les Blank, whose longtime preference for dreamy 16mm film stock is being channeled for this observational coming-of-age story. It’s based on director Mylissa Fitzsimmons’ adolescent plot to hitchhike to LA and marry teen heartthrob Mackenzie Astin, and the director’s thespian avatar, 11-year-old first-time actor Lucya Yusimov, is revelatory in her naturalism. The film received one of the more prestigious awards, $10,000 from Platige Image. Zinn’s sumptuous visuals toggle between meticulous and playful; Fitzsimmons’ direction is similarly exacting yet flexible, allowing her young actress to improvise while also guiding her through a journey she once embarked on.
The clear standout of the USiP showcase was Georgia Bernstein’s erotic thriller Night Nurse. Produced by Canadian Liane Cunje (who also produced gross-out genre maverick Alex Phillips’ latest, Anything That Moves), the film tackles a disturbing premise with dexterous empathy. Hired at a high-end memory care facility after an extensive stint of unemployment, a young woman (Cemre Paksoy) works the night shift caring for a dementia patient (Bruce McKenzie). Their conceptions of reality may be different, but sexual chemistry is conjured nevertheless. It’s perverse amalgamation of Familiar Touch and Babygirl, and I was surprised that more people weren’t put off by the predatory relationship that only begins to take hold in the sequence we saw (which omits an establishing prologue). The striking visual vocabulary of the film heralds a rising yet confident talent—it was impossible not to feel certain that the rest of the film would be as impressive. This assuredness translated into $10,000 of post-production services from Orka, a $6,000 sound mix from Soundflower and a travel grant on behalf of New Europe Film Sales to return to Poland for post-production needs. The cherry on top has been Night Nurse’s inclusion in the 2026 Sundance lineup, where it will premiere in the fest’s “forward-thinking” NEXT section. As it turns out, everyone’s reaction was right on the money.
Bernstein isn’t the only USiP filmmaker heading to Park City in January, as Liz Sargent’s Take Me Home, presented in Poland by producer Apoorva Charan, will premiere in the U.S. Dramatic Competition. Sargent’s sister Anna stars as a version of herself, an adult with a cognitive disability who must navigate her parents’ own mortality and what that means for her future care. Awarded $5,000 of color grading services from Fixafilm, the film depicts the unforgiving landscape of the American healthcare and social welfare systems but is rife with ample moments of levity, courtesy of the naturally charming Anna. The feature expands on Sargent’s 2023 short of the same name, which also premiered at Sundance. At the Tribeca Festival this past June, Sargent won the largest film production prize in the world—the AT&T Untold Stories $1 million grant—in order to support the completion of Take Me Home. New York audiences can all but expect to encounter Sargent’s bittersweet drama at the downtown fest after spring thaw.
I felt that two other films presented in Poland would make perfect sense. The first, Suzi Yoonessi’s Mother Wolf, is a heartfelt, raunchy drama about a woman (Melissa Leo) on the cusp of a post-retirement trip to Japan suddenly tasked with caring for her estranged daughter’s children (Yoonessi’s own kids). With money now tighter than usual, she decides to start an OnlyFans account, where her feet are the star of the show. Yoonessi won big at USiP, awarded up to $10,000 of color correction from Black Photon and $25,000 from ATM Virtual to use toward virtual studio services on her next project. The other project is She Keeps Me Young, an LA-set cringe comedy from Doron Max Hagay, whose extensive TV credits include Hacks and SNL. Maybe it’s just the brief glimpse of John Early I caught, but the film seems ripe for the comedic moment. Two longtime friends (Blair Beeken and Katy Fullan, co-writers with Hagay) experience a rift in their relationship when a teenage girl (Shay Rudolph) asks one for a photoshoot, revving up a critique of codependent dynamics. The tone is part Friendship, part Frances Ha, but its sense of humor is relatively quotidian and this ended up being another personal favorite. Fixafilm granted $5,000 worth of FVX, while New Europe sales offered promotional and script consulting services for Hagay’s next feature, which will surely heighten an already strong visual and narrative sensibility that mines from the absurdity of Los Angeles.
Sundance has long been considered the annual barometer for the state of American indie film, but perhaps it’d be more prudent to look to U.S. in Progress for a more condensed survey of what’s percolating in this realm away. Venice, SXSW, Cannes, Tribeca, Slamdance, TIFF, Locarno—whether premiering at a European or (North) American festival, the success rate for USiP projects, particularly in recent years, is quite staggering. Of course, some of this might have to do with the fact that many of these festivals send their programmers to Wrocław (this year boasted personnel from Venice, Tribeca and Locarno), but that fact alone is merely another accolade for the showcase itself. The curation here is held in extremely high regard, and the projects are resultantly strong enough to speak for themselves in just 20 minutes.
