Snowflakes (2020)

Rye, a photographer, and Chris, a political science student, are in their final year of college, and have lived together in the same house for three years. While their bond has grown increasingly stale since first moving in together, they're tethered by a common history and lingering grief; they know the house and its traumas in ways none of its few rotating tenants ever can. Set in the politically charged recent past at Hampshire College - an alternative school without grades or majors - the film's protagonists struggle with the demands of communal living and the concentrated emotions that come with it, against a backdrop of mass protests, long winters, creative passions, and armchair philosophy. A sort of fictional ethnography, we watch these students eat, sleep, study, and share space in their cramped home; we are confronted with the quiet reality of an apocalypse-craving, gender dysphoric, internet raised generation of "liberal snowflakes" which has reached adulthood and developed its own voice. Snowflakes was created as the directors' senior thesis at Hampshire and shot over their final winter break. The story and script were devised collaboratively with the cast, interweaving all of their personal and political histories, pulling from nearly a decade of real-world friendship and mutual understanding.