DIE NOCH UNBEKANNTEN TAGE //
DAYS YET UNKNOWN
A documentary film by Jola WieczorekAT 2026 | 81min | b&w and color | German and Polish
LOGLINE
A road movie in reverse across Europe: Jola Wieczorek traces her family’s past from Poland to the idyllic Salzkammergut. The documentary The Days Yet Unknown is a moving portrait of origin, displacement, and the question of what home truly means.
SYNOPSIS
A road movie in reverse across Europe: with The Days Yet Unknown, director Jola Wieczorek embarks on a cinematic journey in search of answers — including why her family’s escape from Poland in the 1980s led them, of all places, to the Salzkammergut region in Austria.
Through intimate conversations, personal letters, home movies, and private childhood photographs, the film traces the family’s difficult path toward a new home. Accompanied by her mother, father, brother, and a camera, Wieczorek travels into the past to reconstruct her family history: from Poland, where they once lived on the 13th floor of a high-rise housing block, to the refugee camp in Traiskirchen, where they waited in 1989 for a new beginning, and finally to Bad Goisern, set against the idyllic Alpine landscape.
By questioning the very process of remembering, the film reveals the complexity of migration stories — shaped by joy and pain, hope and disappointment, alienation and humanity. Both deeply unique and profoundly universal.
︎
A road movie in reverse across Europe: Jola Wieczorek traces her family’s past from Poland to the idyllic Salzkammergut. The documentary The Days Yet Unknown is a moving portrait of origin, displacement, and the question of what home truly means.
SYNOPSIS
A road movie in reverse across Europe: with The Days Yet Unknown, director Jola Wieczorek embarks on a cinematic journey in search of answers — including why her family’s escape from Poland in the 1980s led them, of all places, to the Salzkammergut region in Austria.
Through intimate conversations, personal letters, home movies, and private childhood photographs, the film traces the family’s difficult path toward a new home. Accompanied by her mother, father, brother, and a camera, Wieczorek travels into the past to reconstruct her family history: from Poland, where they once lived on the 13th floor of a high-rise housing block, to the refugee camp in Traiskirchen, where they waited in 1989 for a new beginning, and finally to Bad Goisern, set against the idyllic Alpine landscape.
By questioning the very process of remembering, the film reveals the complexity of migration stories — shaped by joy and pain, hope and disappointment, alienation and humanity. Both deeply unique and profoundly universal.
︎
BEST DOCUMENTARY at Filmfestival Max Ophüls Preis
Jury-Statement: This film takes us on a journey. Woven into a dense tapestry of present and past, of personal and collective history, we experience the process of remembering.
With great cinematic inventiveness, a narrative flow emerges that resonates on many levels, offering insight and lingering long after the film ends. It is a film about the preciousness—and at the same time the fragility—of memory. It makes visible the hardships of a history of flight without ever remaining stuck in pain. Through its playful openness, subtle humor, and the palpable sense of family cohesion, it leaves behind warmth and hope. The director creates an intimate portrait and, at the same time, an important political contribution to our present—an invitation to look closely while memories can still be told.
Jury Members: Ayşe Alacakaptan, Florian Brüning, Judith Keil
LOCAL ARTIST at Crossing Europe Film FestivalThere are films that collect their memories in archives. This film is building one itself. Between childhood pictures, stories about the arrival of a family in a foreign country, and a desire to belong, something rare evolves: a look back that is at the same time also a look ahead. Because memory is confronted with oblivion. The own mother’s beginning dementia makes this not a tragedy, but an emotional, richly illustrated road movie, whose mission it is to reconstruct the own biography, so that future generations will have a view of their Family Ties, to draw on the motto of this year’s festival edition. We, for our part, can feel very fortunate that Jola Wieczorek has also shared this history with us, which is why we are awarding the Local Artist Award / Material Prize to her wonderful film DAYS YET UNKNOWN.
Jury Members:
Simone Hart, Dagmar Schink, Florian Widegger
FESTIVALS:
Filmfestival Max Ophüls Preis (Best Documentary Award)
Diagonale - Festival of Austrian Film
Crossing Europe Linz (Local Artists Award)
Filmkunstfest Mecklenburg Vorpommern
CONTACTS AND DOWNLOADS
Festival Sales: Austrian Films
Austrian Distribution: Stadtkino Filmverleih
Press Germany: Marie Ketzscher
Press Austria: Valerie Besl
Austrian Distribution: Stadtkino Filmverleih
Press Germany: Marie Ketzscher
Press Austria: Valerie Besl
CREDITS
Writer / Director: Jola Wieczorek
Production: Fahrenheit Films e.U.
Producer: Jola Wieczorek
Line producer: Hanne Lassl
Camera: Serafin Spitzer, Klemens Koscher
Editing: Ewa Golis, Rubén Rocha
Editing consultant: Kasia Boniecka, Asia Dér
Dramaturgy: Nina Kusturica
Production: Fahrenheit Films e.U.
Producer: Jola Wieczorek
Line producer: Hanne Lassl
Camera: Serafin Spitzer, Klemens Koscher
Editing: Ewa Golis, Rubén Rocha
Editing consultant: Kasia Boniecka, Asia Dér
Dramaturgy: Nina Kusturica
Scenograhphy: Andrej Rutar, Olga Steiner, Ola Winnicka
Costume Design: Denise Leisentritt
Music Composer: Dorit Chrysler
Direct Sound: Andreas Hamza, Andreas Pils
Sounddesign: Victoria Dopplinger
Sound Mixing: Manuel Meichsner
Production Assistant: Marcin Ratajczak, Marcin Krasnowolski
Costume Design: Denise Leisentritt
Music Composer: Dorit Chrysler
Direct Sound: Andreas Hamza, Andreas Pils
Sounddesign: Victoria Dopplinger
Sound Mixing: Manuel Meichsner
Production Assistant: Marcin Ratajczak, Marcin Krasnowolski
SUPPORTED BY:
A Green Filming Production ÖFI+ // Green Bonus
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