Family dramas dominated the Main Competition program of the 41st Warsaw Film Festival.
In contemporary Polish cinema, the theme of the family is often central. One may recall the monumental The Last Family by Jan P. Matuszyński, which chronicled the painful disintegration of surrealist painter Zdzisław Beksiński’s family against Poland’s transition from a communist regime to democracy. Or the winner of the 2017 Gdynia Film Festival, Piotr Domalewski’s Silent Night, in which a Christmas family gathering descends into tragedy and literal flames. In one way or another, the idea of the family—lost or imagined—is examined in Paweł Pawlikowski’s Ida and Piotr Dumała’s Ederly. This year, three films by Polish directors were featured in the Warsaw Main Competition, and all three placed the family at the heart of their narrative. Moreover, family relationships were also a central theme in several international competition entries.
The opening film of the festival—and the first title in competition—was Anniversary, an American project by young but seasoned Polish filmmaker Jan Komasa, whose Corpus Christi was nominated for an Academy Award in 2019. Anniversary begins as the portrait of a happy American couple, Ellen and Paul, and gradually morphs into a nightmarish dystopia. The catalyst of destruction, misfortune, and ultimately murder within the family is an external intrusion—an innocent-looking daughter-in-law who is, in fact, a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” and the mastermind behind a new American ideology. As the followers of this ideology spread across the country, Ellen and Paul’s family became one of the last remaining points of resistance. The film boasts not only a stellar cast—Diane Lane and Kyle Chandler as the central couple—but also meticulously designed costumes that evoke well-known dystopias such as 1984 and The Handmaid’s Tale.
A true nightmare also unfolds in Home Sweet Home (Dom dobry), directed by Wojtek Smarzowski. The protagonist, a young woman named Gosia, meets her future husband Grzesiek online and quickly moves in with him, charmed by their seemingly ideal romance. However, his apartment soon becomes a prison of torture. The film openly confronts a subject often silenced in modern Poland—domestic violence. The director portrays the horrors of rape, gaslighting, psychological and financial abuse, as well as the dire conditions of women’s shelters. In its emotional impact, Home Sweet Home is more powerful and psychologically intricate than many films by Michael Haneke or Ulrich Seidl, which are known for plunging audiences into bleak social realities.
Family is also the focus of Brother (Brat) by Maciej Sobieszczański. The film follows fourteen-year-old Dawid, a promising wrestler who is forced to take on the role of a father to his younger brother while their own father serves a prison sentence. Their mother, nervous and exhausted, struggles not only with parenting but with basic daily life. When Dawid’s coach, Konrad, enters their lives, things seem to improve—though only briefly. The film also includes scenes of parental violence, but, fortunately, ends on a hopeful note. This social drama is one of the more archetypal examples of contemporary Polish cinema: it addresses societal problems within a Catholic context while ultimately offering emotional reassurance to audiences.
The Romanian film Y by Maria Popistașu and Alexandru Baciu likewise explores the problems of a family against a historical backdrop. The story begins with the death of Ileana, the family matriarch who had long headed a children’s orphanage. In her confused final moments, she confesses to a possible crime—the sale of orphans’ organs on the black market. Her granddaughter Olga decides to investigate. Shot in a realist manner reminiscent of the films of Radu Jude—with abundant dialogue and documentary-style execution—the film also features piercing archival footage that raises complex ethical questions. Nonetheless, the story unfolds entirely within and around this Romanian family.
The Korean drama The World of Love (세계의 주인) by Yoon Ga-eun centers on a 17-year-old schoolgirl, Joo-in, a lively and impulsive teenager who changes boyfriends like gloves. Midway through, the film’s tone shifts, evolving into a social drama about sexualized violence against minors. Yet at its core, it is once again about Joo-in’s family: her needle-obsessed mother, her devout Buddhist grandmother, her unruly younger brother, and her absent father.
Two additional competition films focused on heterosexual couples—families of a different, less stable kind. These were Anorgasmia by Icelandic director Jon Einarsson Gustafsson and Satisfaction by Alex Burunova, an American filmmaker of Ukrainian origin. Both works explore relationship challenges set against picturesque island landscapes, with brief references to topics such as #MeToo and sexual consent. Neither could be considered entirely successful.
One of the competition’s most ambitious entries was Father (Otec) by Tereza Nvotová, which also revolves around a family. Nvotová explores the “forgotten child syndrome,” based on real events. She employs long takes, drone footage, and other contemporary cinematic techniques. Approximately one-third of the film consists of procedural elements. Director confronts audiences with the unbearable tragedy of a child’s death caused by his own father, forcing viewers to endure the protagonist’s descent into despair after the crime.
In summary, the dominance of family narratives at this year’s Warsaw Film Festival highlights a striking cinematic trend: filmmakers across cultures are turning inward, using the family unit as a microcosm of broader social, political, and moral crises. Whether through dystopian allegory, social realism, or psychological drama, these films suggest that the family is no longer portrayed merely as a place of refuge or tradition, but as a contested space where ideological battles, generational traumas, and personal identities are forged and fractured. This thematic cohesion across national cinemas reveals not only the universality of familial conflict, but also the urgency with which contemporary filmmakers are reexamining the most intimate human bonds in a rapidly shifting world.
Nataliia Serebriakova
©FIPRESCI 2025