Ira Sachs

Directing

Ira Sachs

Born

1965-11-21 (60)

Place of birth

Memphis, Tennessee, USA

Known for

Directing

Credits

44 titles

Ira Sachs (born November 21, 1965) is an American filmmaker. Sachs began his career directing short films, including Vaudeville (1991) and Lady (1993), before making his feature film debut with The Delta (1997). Sachs later won acclaim for his dramatic independent films, including Forty Shades of Blue (2005), Keep the Lights On (2012), Love Is Strange (2014), Little Men (2016), and Passages (2023). Description above from the Wikipedia article Ira Sachs, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Known for

Peter Hujar's Day poster
5.6

A recently discovered conversation between photographer Peter Hujar and his friend Linda Rosenkrantz in 1974 reveals a glimpse into New York City’s downtown art scene and the personal struggles and epiphanies that define an artist’s life.

Peter Hujar's Day

2025

Passages poster
6.3

Tomas and Martin are a gay couple living in Paris whose marriage is thrown into crisis when Tomas impulsively begins a passionate affair with young schoolteacher Agathe. But when Martin begins an affair of his own, Tomas must confront life decisions he may be unprepared—or unwilling—to deal with.

Passages

2023

Married Life poster
5.8

A very gentle middle-aged man is married, but when he falls in love with another woman, he decides that to divorce his wife would humiliate her too much – so instead he decides to kill her.

Married Life

2008

Dick Johnson Is Dead poster
7.1

With this inventive portrait, director Kirsten Johnson seeks a way to keep her 86-year-old father alive forever. Utilizing moviemaking magic and her family’s dark humor, she celebrates Dr. Dick Johnson’s last years by staging fantasies of death and beyond. Together, dad and daughter confront the great inevitability awaiting us all.

Dick Johnson Is Dead

2020

Love Is Strange poster
6.3

After 39 years together, Ben and George finally tie the knot, but George loses his job as a result, and the newlyweds must sell their New York apartment and live apart, relying on friends and family to make ends meet.

Love Is Strange

2014

The Man I Love poster
NR

In late 1980s New York, a theater artist living with AIDS takes on one possibly last great role.

The Man I Love

2027

Film credits

2020s · 5 titles

2010s · 2 titles

How I Learned to Love the Numbers poster
9.0

A New York film and at the same time the study of a young man suffering from an obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). The Berlin filmmaker Oliver Sechting (37) and his co-director Max Taubert (23) travel to New York with the idea of documenting the art scene there. However, the project is quickly overshadowed by Oliver's OCD, and the two directors fall prey to a conflict that becomes the central theme of their film. Encounters with such artists as film directors Tom Tykwer (Cloud Atlas), Ira Sachs (Keep the Lights On), and Jonathan Caouette (Tarnation) or the transmedia artist Phoebe Legere seem more and more to resemble therapy sessions. At last, Andy Warhol-Superstar Ultra Violet succeeds in opening a new door for Oliver.

How I Learned to Love the Numbers

2014

No artwork available
4.4

What do filmmakers as disparate as Kevin Smith, Ed Burns, Rob Epstein, and Barbara Hammer have in common? A secret weapon known as Bob Hawk. As a veteran of the American independent film scene since its inception, the cinephile and consultant has been a regular, cherished presence at film festivals and markets for over three decades. Hawk saw promise in scrappy, independently produced films like Clerks and The Brothers McMullen when no one else even knew to look, and he brought these films to the attention of the Sundance Film Festival, thereby launching multiple careers in the process. An unsung champion of new voices, he has discovered innovative work, nurtured new talents, and brokered relationships with film festivals and critics alike, while staying out of the spotlight—until now. At 75, Bob Hawk looks back on a still-vibrant life in independent film, exploring how the rebellious gay son of a preacher found his calling as a behind-the-scenes film impresario.

Film Hawk

2016

Behind the camera

Peter Hujar's Day poster
5.6

A recently discovered conversation between photographer Peter Hujar and his friend Linda Rosenkrantz in 1974 reveals a glimpse into New York City’s downtown art scene and the personal struggles and epiphanies that define an artist’s life.

Peter Hujar's Day

2025

Peter Hujar's Day poster
5.6

A recently discovered conversation between photographer Peter Hujar and his friend Linda Rosenkrantz in 1974 reveals a glimpse into New York City’s downtown art scene and the personal struggles and epiphanies that define an artist’s life.

Peter Hujar's Day

2025

Passages poster
6.3

Tomas and Martin are a gay couple living in Paris whose marriage is thrown into crisis when Tomas impulsively begins a passionate affair with young schoolteacher Agathe. But when Martin begins an affair of his own, Tomas must confront life decisions he may be unprepared—or unwilling—to deal with.

Passages

2023

Passages poster
6.3

Tomas and Martin are a gay couple living in Paris whose marriage is thrown into crisis when Tomas impulsively begins a passionate affair with young schoolteacher Agathe. But when Martin begins an affair of his own, Tomas must confront life decisions he may be unprepared—or unwilling—to deal with.

Passages

2023

Married Life poster
5.8

A very gentle middle-aged man is married, but when he falls in love with another woman, he decides that to divorce his wife would humiliate her too much – so instead he decides to kill her.

Married Life

2008

Married Life poster
5.8

A very gentle middle-aged man is married, but when he falls in love with another woman, he decides that to divorce his wife would humiliate her too much – so instead he decides to kill her.

Married Life

2008

Married Life poster
5.8

A very gentle middle-aged man is married, but when he falls in love with another woman, he decides that to divorce his wife would humiliate her too much – so instead he decides to kill her.

Married Life

2008

Love Is Strange poster
6.3

After 39 years together, Ben and George finally tie the knot, but George loses his job as a result, and the newlyweds must sell their New York apartment and live apart, relying on friends and family to make ends meet.

Love Is Strange

2014

Love Is Strange poster
6.3

After 39 years together, Ben and George finally tie the knot, but George loses his job as a result, and the newlyweds must sell their New York apartment and live apart, relying on friends and family to make ends meet.

Love Is Strange

2014

Love Is Strange poster
6.3

After 39 years together, Ben and George finally tie the knot, but George loses his job as a result, and the newlyweds must sell their New York apartment and live apart, relying on friends and family to make ends meet.

Love Is Strange

2014

The Man I Love poster
NR

In late 1980s New York, a theater artist living with AIDS takes on one possibly last great role.

The Man I Love

2027

The Man I Love poster
NR

In late 1980s New York, a theater artist living with AIDS takes on one possibly last great role.

The Man I Love

2027

Little Men poster
6.4

Jake is a quiet, sensitive middle schooler with dreams of being an artist. He meets the affably brash Tony at his grandfather's funeral, and the unlikely pair soon hit it off. The budding friendship is put at risk, however, when a rent dispute between Jake's father, Brian, and Tony's mother, Leonor, threatens to become contentious.

Little Men

2016

Little Men poster
6.4

Jake is a quiet, sensitive middle schooler with dreams of being an artist. He meets the affably brash Tony at his grandfather's funeral, and the unlikely pair soon hit it off. The budding friendship is put at risk, however, when a rent dispute between Jake's father, Brian, and Tony's mother, Leonor, threatens to become contentious.

Little Men

2016

Little Men poster
6.4

Jake is a quiet, sensitive middle schooler with dreams of being an artist. He meets the affably brash Tony at his grandfather's funeral, and the unlikely pair soon hit it off. The budding friendship is put at risk, however, when a rent dispute between Jake's father, Brian, and Tony's mother, Leonor, threatens to become contentious.

Little Men

2016

Keep the Lights On poster
5.7

In 1997 New York City, filmmaker Erik bonds with closeted lawyer Paul after a one-night fling. As their relationship evolves through dysfunctional patterns, Erik struggles to negotiate his own boundaries while being true to himself.

Keep the Lights On

2012

Keep the Lights On poster
5.7

In 1997 New York City, filmmaker Erik bonds with closeted lawyer Paul after a one-night fling. As their relationship evolves through dysfunctional patterns, Erik struggles to negotiate his own boundaries while being true to himself.

Keep the Lights On

2012

Keep the Lights On poster
5.7

In 1997 New York City, filmmaker Erik bonds with closeted lawyer Paul after a one-night fling. As their relationship evolves through dysfunctional patterns, Erik struggles to negotiate his own boundaries while being true to himself.

Keep the Lights On

2012

Forty Shades of Blue poster
4.5

A Russian woman living in Memphis with a much older rock-n-roll legend experiences a personal awakening when her husband's estranged son comes to visit.

Forty Shades of Blue

2005

Forty Shades of Blue poster
4.5

A Russian woman living in Memphis with a much older rock-n-roll legend experiences a personal awakening when her husband's estranged son comes to visit.

Forty Shades of Blue

2005

Forty Shades of Blue poster
4.5

A Russian woman living in Memphis with a much older rock-n-roll legend experiences a personal awakening when her husband's estranged son comes to visit.

Forty Shades of Blue

2005

The Delta poster
5.2

In Memphis, a middle-class white teenager and a black Vietnamese immigrant meet in a gay cruising spot and discover what they don't have in common.

The Delta

1997

The Delta poster
5.2

In Memphis, a middle-class white teenager and a black Vietnamese immigrant meet in a gay cruising spot and discover what they don't have in common.

The Delta

1997

Vaudeville poster
1.0

A traveling theatrical troupe, made up primarily of gay and lesbian performers, mirrors the troubles of a political and social community through its tight-knit existence.

Vaudeville

1992

Vaudeville poster
1.0

A traveling theatrical troupe, made up primarily of gay and lesbian performers, mirrors the troubles of a political and social community through its tight-knit existence.

Vaudeville

1992

Frankie poster
4.8

When a terminally ill French actress decides to spend her last vacation with her large family in Sintra, her relatives grapple with their own insecurities.

Frankie

2019

Frankie poster
4.8

When a terminally ill French actress decides to spend her last vacation with her large family in Sintra, her relatives grapple with their own insecurities.

Frankie

2019

30/30 Vision: Three Decades of Strand Releasing poster
5.3

Over 30 filmmakers and friends of Strand Releasing have come together to honor the company’s indelible contribution to independent cinema over the past thirty years. The participating filmmakers have each created a short film for the project, all shot on iPhones.

30/30 Vision: Three Decades of Strand Releasing

2019

Lady poster
5.8

An unnamed woman in a red wig welcomes a documentary crew into her New York apartment. The crew captures her everyday life, as she fights with her boyfriend and gossips with her friend. These scenes alternate with black-and-white footage of a woman in a red wig escaping a suburban existence.

Lady

1993

No artwork available
NR

During production of A Place in the Sun, Montgomery Clift meets the woman who will become his closest confidant and best friend, Elizabeth Taylor.

Monty Clift

—

Last Address poster
5.4

Keith Haring, Robert Mapplethorpe, Norman René, Peter Hujar, Ethyl Eichelberger, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Cookie Mueller, Klaus Nomi... the list of New York artists who died of AIDS over the last 30 years is countless, and the loss immeasurable. In Last Address, filmmaker Ira Sachs, who first moved to the city himself in 1984, uses images of the exteriors of the houses, apartment buildings, and lofts where these and others were living at the time of their deaths to mark the disappearance of a generation. The elegaic film is both a remembrance of that loss, as well as an evocation of the continued presence of their work in our lives and culture.

Last Address

2010

Untitled poster
NR

Made for Underground Zero: Independent Filmmakers Respond to 9/11 This short video is made up of portraits taken from the fliers posted on the streets of New York following 9/11.

Untitled

2002

Get It While You Can poster
NR

A portrait of the filmmaker's father, an American businessman on a quest for money and women in modern Moscow.

Get It While You Can

2002

10/26/00 poster
NR

This short video uses surveillance-type images of men standing on an anonymous street corner as the conceptual foreground for an examination of the relationship between fathers and sons.

10/26/00

2000

Underground Zero poster
10.0

A collection of shorts made by various directors in response to 9/11.

Underground Zero

2002

Before I Forget poster
NR

In this short film Ira decided to pay tribute to another one of Strand’s filmmakers, Jacques Nolot. His film is a meditation on not only the passage of time but on how we remember our lives through recorded images

Before I Forget

2019