“Stubborn Passion” | Zach Schnitzer, Loafers
Amid a post-grad haze, best friends Isaac and Cameron navigate the shifting terrain of their relationships, grappling with the deeper question of whether their once unbreakable friendship can survive the weight of change.
From director Zach Schnitzer, Loafers screens Wednesday, May 6, at 7:00 p.m., at the Music Box Theatre in Chicago, as part of the Chicago Critics Film Festival, with Schnitzer and Producer Nate Simon in attendance for a post-film Q&A. Ahead of the screening, Schnitzer graciously took the time to answer this year’s filmmaker questionnaire. Below, his individual responses.
How did you first become interested in filmmaking? What was your path toward directing your first film?
When I was in middle school, I became completely obsessed with making iMovie trailers and silly home videos with my friends. If we were hanging out, there was a 100% chance I was grabbing my iPad. Then when I was a junior in high school, I stumbled upon The Departed, Her, and Moonlight in one weekend and decided, officially, that I was going to go to college for acting. Being an actor was what brought me closer to films and filmmaking. I watched and studied performances, then eventually found myself studying the directing, the editing… then I fell in love and had to try it.
What inspired you to make the film you're bringing to the festival?
As my time in college was coming to a close, I couldn’t help but constantly think about the classic “what’s next” question that everyone always asks… so I wrote a movie about what I thought it might be like. And I was sorta’ right…
Tell us about a film that you consider a guiding influence (whether it has informed your overarching vision as a filmmaker, directly informed the title you're bringing to the festival, or both).
Two come to mind: the Duplass brothers' The Puffy Chair, and Cooper Raiff’s Shithouse. Both films capture the adult coming-of-age confusion excellently. The stubborn passion, the anxiety-driven impulsive behaviors, and the fact that everyone is “trying their best”. These filmmakers have inspired me endlessly not only because of their ability to tell stories that are intimate, special, and funny, but because they are also actors in those movies. They find space to uplift and act in other artists projects while also carving a path for their own voices in the independent space.
Tell us about a location that's held significance to the film you're bringing to the festival: a setting where filming took place, a geographic area that provided a source of inspiration, or another type of space that comes to mind for you in thinking about the film. What made this place so special?
This movie is a time capsule of my friends and I’s post-college life. We shot this at our real houses… no set dec… it’s really just where we lived. The other locations in the film like Lincoln Tap Room and Oz park are also places that will always make me think of my college years.
The theatrical experience brings us together to celebrate artistic experience and expand our horizons as human beings. Tell us about a memorable theatrical experience from your life.
The Music Box is a magical place. I’ve had so many memorable experiences in this theatre, and I truly can remember every single one. The day after I graduated from college, I went to see Alex Thomson and Kelly O’Sullivan’s Ghostlight; a low-budget indie movie about theatre actors producing a low-budget production of a Shakespeare play, shot here in Chicago. The following day, I started rehearsals for a low-budget production of Shakespeare’s Coriolanus, my first time directing a play in Chicago. Watching the characters in Ghostlight, people in this city, fall in love with acting through Shakespeare, was all the right kinds of inspiring for me that day.
