Zach Weintraub
Directing
Biography
Zach Weintraub is a filmmaker from Olympia, WA, USA. He studied film production at New York University before moving home to write and direct BUMMER SUMMER (2009), his first feature-length film and the inaugural production of Newhard Entertainment - a DIY production label Zach cofounded with Nandan Rao. His works are small-scale collaborations with family and friends, often praised for their resourcefulness, muted humor, and narrative economy in their depiction of subtly shifting interpersonal dynamics. Cumulatively, his films have screened at festivals in more than a dozen countries including Locarno, AFI Fest, BAFICI, and Viennale.
Born: May 21, 1987
Place of Birth: Olympia, Washington, United States
Known For
A Dim Valley
A curmudgeonly biologist and his stoner graduate students encounter a group of mysterious backpackers who disrupt their lives in surprising ways.
The International Sign for Choking
Josh (Zach Weintraub) is a young American who has traveled to Buenos Aires to find subjects for a documentary series he has been commissioned to produce. While there, he seems also to be hoping to use the time to regroup—although regroup from what is unclear. The change of venue is not without its own set of problems, however. Josh finds it difficult to get his footing in Buenos Aires. Subjects aren’t coming easy, and he is having trouble connecting socially. He spends long stretches of time isolated in his rented room, struggling to move forward with his work and make social in-roads. Enter Anna (Sophia Takal), a young woman renting a room with an adjoining wall to Josh. After discovering each other through this shared wall, a friendship quickly blossoms which may lead to something more. What remains uncertain is if Anna’s presence will help pull Josh out of his doldrums.
Bummer Summer
Seventeen year-old Isaac tags along on an impromptu road trip with his older brother Ben and Ben's ex-girlfriend Lila. The trip staggers along uncertainly as the trio's delicate and ambiguous dynamic is made increasingly weaker by the brothers' mutual feelings for Lila.
You Make Me Feel So Young
Justine, a recent college graduate turned retail employee, lives and works in a nameless city. The film begins when her boyfriend, Zach, leaves to interview for a position at a recently renovated art house movie theater in a small town. He lands the job and together they relocate to an air mattress in his new boss' garage. Dropped suddenly into an unfamiliar place and stripped of all routine and distraction, Justine is left to sit quietly by and observe the early signs of her own deteriorating relationship. You Make Me Feel So Young is a carefully selected collection of moments from the life of a young woman in transition, and a meditation on the subtly complex questions one often faces in such situations.
A Morning Light
When they find one another by chance in the middle of the woods, old friends Zach and Ellyn seem smiled-upon by the gods of summer, fated for a carefree season ranging across hills, lakes and forests. Gradually, however, their charmed reunion is distorted by an unseen but ever-expanding presence. Are they hidden in a quiet glade after all, or perched on the tip of the universe, buffeted by cosmic winds? Directed, shot, and edited by Ian Clark, A Morning Light finds a new mode for the sci-fi thriller, one of insomniac watchfulness. With its eerily precise photography and uncanny soundscape that pulses, rumbles, and roars behind sedate scenery, it poses the otherworldly as something very near, something embedded in our own eyes and ears. — Jon Kieran, New Orleans Film Festival
Fresh Starts 4 Stale People
Unemployed college graduates Zach and Rob find themselves adrift in the wake of their education's real-world uselessness, looking for immediate gratifications wherever possible. When a cross-country call to adventure comes in the form of a 10,000 dollar-bounty on a mysterious package delivery, the two men engage in a gonzo road-trip to find meaning, adulthood and/or America itself. Fresh Starts 4 Stale People, a film about friendship, responsibility and the pop-culture mind-fuck.
Rad Dad
A sesh with the boys would make dad glad. But if dad can't get rad, then will he be sad?
Slackjaw
Rob and his best friend Austyn apply to become human guinea pigs at the local medical testing facility of a vaguely intentioned multinational company called EvCorp. As the facility's mere presence has bitterly polarized their town, the two apply in stealth. Only Austyn is accepted - ushered away and out of contact into EvCorp's shadowy interior - leaving Rob to bear the burden of secrecy as well as the private concern that perhaps not all will be well with his buddy. As he navigates both sides of the town's deepening rift, guilt and denial do battle in his mind - evoking eerie visions, paranoia, and a strange physical malady. SLACKJAW is a mildly absurd bromantic dramedy about the path to personal responsibility amidst the divisive fog of a politicized landscape.
Winter's Kickflip
A flailing father-to-be panics at the idea that a glorious moment from his past may now be inaccessibly distant.
Assets & Liabilities
Zach is a suburban father haunted by the impending arrival of middle age as he juggles the demands of work, family, and the sale of an investment property. When his wife and daughter go away for a short trip, he seizes the opportunity to live out a day as his younger, less responsible self. A spontaneous encounter with a fellow skater feels like a victory until an unsettling connection between the two emerges. The result is a forcible confrontation with his own bourgeois standing that shatters the illusion of Zach’s carefree day and sends it spiraling into dark territory.
Filmography
as Zach
as Zach
as Ian
as (Zach)
as Austyn
as Zach