Dallas Film Now.

The announced winner of the Grand Jury prize, Ellen Rodnianski’s American Baby features a standout performance from actress Abigail Pniowsky. And as fellow actress Claire Capek stated, “she cries exactly how I would cry at that age”. And there’s good reason for her emotional outbursts. As fifteen-year-old Oli, Pniowsky is forced to navigate her predicament in an unforgiving Texas community where snide stares and silence replace support. But there exists a range of other emotions from Pniowsky…. from tears, to anger, to eventual innocent hope that everything will be okay. Touching on all aspects of her young pregnancy, the young actress ably carries the film, and American Baby succeeds in telling a specific story about a specific situation where backwards laws of this supposed great country put young people in tremendously stressful situations.

At a party, fifteen-year-old Oli is locked in a garage with Toby (Elisha Henig) where their misguided knowledge about sex ends up with Oli getting pregnant. Naturally, in this God-fearing community, Toby is sent away and Oli is forced to deal with the attitudes and administrative indifference of everyone in her life. Even her best friend Miriam (Capek) makes a tragic mistake with their friendship when her own parents discover the secret they’re trying to remedy.

On her own and trying to seek answers, American Baby wavers between delicate acceptance and enormous anger as the second half of the film rarely leaves Oli’s shoulders. There’s an especially heartbreaking moment detailing her desperation where Oli’s frustration boils over and her immigrant mother (Janel Koloski) catches her in a horrific act. It’s here that the mom reveals that life is eternally hard for women for all things, not just the burden of carrying a new life. Rodnianski constantly maintains this gentle balance of emotions that culminates in a finale that only grows stronger on rumination. There are no easy answers in American Baby, and Oli’s decision is far from a feel-good moment, but it’s the only one that makes sense when the world is against you.

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Another film of no easy answers, Soleil Moon Frye’s very personal documentary about the struggles of musician Seth Binzer gives an intimate look at addiction and its dark hold.

Frye, who’s become an interesting filmmaker after her documentary Kid 90 (2021), initiated Werewolf in the Waves as a portrait of her childhood friend Binzer’s comeback tour with his 90’s band Crazy Town (yes, we all know their hit “Butterfly”). Deepening the connection was the fact that Frye and Binzer both began a relationship after each other’s marriage dissolved. Hitting the road with an I-phone and more planned glossy interview shots, the idea soon turned fatalistic after Binzer relapsed.

From a behind-the-scenes rock doc to real-life horror show, Frye’s camera soon became a moment-by-moment analysis of the demons Binzer has been fighting all his life. It’s shocking to see the physical toll addiction takes on someone, and if nothing else, the film is honest and downright scary when every unanswered text message or missed phone call could be symptomatic of someone losing sobriety. Several times throughout the culled footage, Frye laments the fact that everything has changed immensely, and the documentary turns into a painful visual record of both Binzer’s positive and negative impact on Frye and her family.

Still a work-in-progress, perhaps the most poignant thing one can say about such an effort is Frye’s own comment that sometimes it’s easier to walk away from something than continue. Editing years of footage hasn’t been easy, and Werewolf in the Waves no doubt provides some type of healing for Frye.

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Julia Guggisberg-Hannud’s Carcereiras (aka Jailers) gets credit for disguising its non-fiction bent. Following the parallel paths of two female prison officers in Brazil, if one came into the film at the halfway point, it’d be hard to differentiate if Carcereiras is a coyly scripted piece of fiction or cinema-verité. The only clue is the carefully composed image that seems to maintain the privacy of any actual inmates while on-screen. Unfortunately, this technique is about the only interesting thing in the documentary.

Following guards Ana Paul and the younger Mariana, Carcereiras features very little conflict or entropy. As a day-in-the-life document of both women (with some excursions into their home life), the point of prison’s confine is made early, and scenes such as how people celebrate New Year’s Eve while behind bars are illuminating, the film’s weakness is making the inmate rituals more invested than its main characters.

The 2026 Dallas International Film Festival continues through Thursday April 30th. Tickets and information are available at https://diffdallas.org/diff