Before we get all focused on next year’s Sundance, one of the last major pit-stops for emerging American indie filmmaker talent can be found at the American Film Fest in Wrocław – more specifically the U.S. in Progress section. Now in its thirteenth edition, they’ve been championing and supporting plenty of noteworthy micro-independent films in their final editing stages. If we look at some of last year’s picks we find Shane Atkinson’s LaRoy (which recently took the top prize at Deauville, we have Monica Sorelle’s Mountains which preemd at Tribeca and got an extremely rare showing afterwards for TIFF, we have Lucy Kerr who was just at Locarno with Family Portrait.
Here are the 2023 U.S. in Progress participants:
Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point directed by Tyler Taormina, produced by Krista Minto, Rob Rice, Eric Berger, Kimberly Dai, Kevin Anton, Calogero Carucci, Jeremy Gardner, Tyler Taormina, and Michael Cera
Cold Wallet directed by Cutter Hodierne, produced by Vanishing Angle
Familiar Touch directed by Sarah Friedland, produced by Matthew Thurm and Alexandra Byer
Good One directed by India Donaldson produced by Graham Mason, Diana Irvine, Wilson Cameron, and Sarah Winshall
Know Me directed by Edson Jean, produced by Ronald Baez
Obex directed by Albert Birney, produced by Pete Ohs and Emma Hannaway
The Water is Always Warm directed by Morgan Krantz, produced by Adam Kersh and Greg Stewart
We Strangers directed by Anu Valia, produced by Miranda Kahn, Olivia Wingate, Alex Bach, Zach Spicer, and Joy Jorgensen
The event aims to facilitate professional networking among European and Polish film professionals and independent filmmakers from the United States. Invite-only work in progress screenings will feature excerpts from eight projects selected from numerous submissions of independent American feature-length films in final editing stages.
Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist and critic at IONCINEMA.com (founded in 2000). Eric is a regular at Sundance, Cannes and TIFF. He has a BFA in Film Studies at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013 he served as a Narrative Competition Jury Member at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson's This Teacher (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). In 2022 he served as a New Flesh Comp for Best First Feature at the 2022 Fantasia Intl. Film Festival. Current top films for 2022 include Tár (Todd Field), All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen), Aftersun (Charlotte Wells).
