Interviews: Michael Peña, Craig Robinson & Ira Sachs at 2016 Chicago Critics Film Festival

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Director Ira Sachs of “Little Men”

Ira Sachs is a lucky star – he was the first interview that Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com did in 2008! But besides that, Sachs is one of the top independent film directors of the last ten years, with memorable works like “Forty Shades of Blue” (2005), “Married Life” (2007), “Keep the Lights On” (2013) and “Love is Strange” (2014). He came to the CCFF with the magnificent “Little Men,” which features Oscar-nominated actor Greg Kinnear.

Ira Sachs at the Chicago Critics Film Festival
Photo credit: Joe Arce of Starstruck Foto for HollywoodChicago.com

HollywoodChicago.com: I thought this was one of Greg Kinnear’s finest performances. What did he know about the character that impressed you the most, and which scene does he use that knowledge the most?

Ira Sachs: What he understood about the character of Brian – and a way it’s the arc of the film – is that he is a man who lost his father, and is still trying to figure out the man he is supposed to be. Marking that throughout the course of the film, and where it shifts, in the scene in the car where he yells at his son and his friend. It is after that scene when we realize that he becomes his most honest.

HollywoodChicago.com: What predictive elements in your last film – ‘Love is Strange’ – do you think has come true in the past few years, regarding the observations of gay marriage in that film, and in light of the Supreme Court decision?

Sachs: Civil Rights movements, historically, steps forward, and then steps back – for example the ‘bathroom laws.’ But actually, it all has to happen, there has to be ruptures and there has to be conflicts to elicit change. It is an insane time, but it has brought the issues to the forefront, and nothing happens without pain.

By PATRICK McDONALD Writer, Editorial Coordinator HollywoodChicago.com pat@hollywoodchicago.com