All These Sleepless Nights

Kris has just finished art school, has come out of a relationship, and spends his nights in Warsaw walking, talking, and moving from party to party. His friend Michal is with him. Then Kris takes up with Eva, Michal's former girlfriend, and what is between the two friends quietly breaks. The film follows these three over a year and a half. Michał Marczak deliberately erases the line between documentary and fiction: the characters play themselves and some scenes are staged by the director. What comes out is neither a portrait nor a story but the record of a feeling belonging to a particular stretch of youth. The camera follows the night close and constantly moving. The film won the directing award in the world cinema documentary category at the Sundance Film Festival in 2016. Who it's for: Viewers who like hybrid documentary, films set at night, and atmosphere-driven narratives. Who it's not for: There is almost no plot and the characters stay on the surface. The uncertainty between the staged and the real will bother some viewers.