Schiffli attended Carroll High School (Fort Wayne, Indiana) and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Film from Columbia College Chicago in 2009.
[4] Animals won the Special Jury Award for Courage in Filmmaking at the SXSW Film Festival,[5] and received positive reviews from critics following its release in theaters and on video on demand platforms; A. O. Scott of The New York Times stated that Schiffli "shoots in a fluid style, tweaking colors and focus to register changes in perception and feeling".
[6] Steve Dollar of The Wall Street Journal praised the director for keeping "a tight focus on character, as the couple's plight becomes increasingly dire".
[12] Schiffli's latest film, Die in a Gunfight (2021), starring Alexandra Daddario, Diego Boneta, Justin Chatwin and Travis Fimmel, is described as an updated version of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.
[15] In contrast, Mark Hughes of Forbes gave the film a positive review and stated, "[A] sleek, subversive, lushly fun action-crime thriller.