Behind The Lens: 'Sick' Turns A Polish Summer Into An Unsettling Coming-Of-Age Story At Fantastic Fest 2026

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Photo Credit: Maciej Edelman

What begins as a summer in the Polish countryside slowly becomes something far more disturbing in Agata Trzebuchowska’s Sick. The 90-minute drama-horror feature will make its world premiere at Fantastic Fest 2026, introducing audiences to a story where family, isolation, and adolescence collide as familiar boundaries begin to disappear.

Written and directed by Trzebuchowska, Sick follows 16-year-old Maks and his 19-year-old sister Emma, who are sent to care for their ailing grandmother during the summer holidays. Confined together beneath the oppressive heat and isolation of the countryside, the siblings find their relationship shifting in increasingly uncomfortable ways while their grandmother’s fragile presence adds another disturbing layer to their surroundings.

When A Summer Retreat Becomes Something Darker

Rather than building its horror around an immediate external threat, 'Sick' places unease inside the family itself. As tensions grow between Maks and Emma and boundaries become harder to define, their once-idyllic surroundings transform into the backdrop for a haunting passage into adulthood.

The intimate premise positions the film between family drama and psychological horror, using the siblings’ changing relationship and responsibility for their grandmother to create its sense of instability. Starring Konrad Kąkol, Katarzyna Łubik, Monika Niemczyk, Julian Świeżewski, and Eliza Rycembel, the Polish-language feature arrives at Fantastic Fest as Trzebuchowska’s feature-length directorial debut.

Agata Trzebuchowska Steps Behind The Camera

Trzebuchowska first gained international recognition in front of the camera with her lead performance in Paweł Pawlikowski’s Ida, which won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and earned Trzebuchowska an EFA nomination. She later moved into directing, with her short-film debut Heat premiering at the Sundance Film Festival and her follow-up, Vacancy, screening at festivals including Go Short and Flickers’ Rhode Island International Film Festival.

'Sick' now marks the next stage of that filmmaking career. Trzebuchowska is also developing the Polish-French co-production This Is No Place for You and the surreal mockumentary Urke, co-written with Mateusz Kłodecki.

Sick Heads To Fantastic Fest

Produced by Patryk Sielecki and Adrianna Rędzia, 'Sick' will premiere during Fantastic Fest 2026 at the Alamo Drafthouse Lamar in Austin, Texas, with official screening details still to be announced.

For a festival built around cinema willing to venture into strange and uncomfortable territory, 'Sick' arrives with a deceptively simple setup: two young people, one ailing grandmother, and a summer that gradually stops feeling safe. What unfolds from there turns the transition into adulthood into something considerably more haunting.