The Puffy Chair

2005 puffy chair movie

Rating: 14/20

Plot: Josh makes a road trip to surprise his father on his birthday and give him the titular piece of furniture. He takes his girlfriend along though their relationship has been strained. Along the way, they pick up Josh's bearded brother.

This movie's got the puffiest MacGuffin in cinematic history! The handheld camera might have given this a cinema verite feel, but it also made this seem really really cheap and was sort of annoying. And I nearly shut this off after five minutes because I couldn't stand the voices the guy and gal were using with each other. It reminded me of the "Snooki" episode of Seinfeld. There also might be more "dudes" in this than Lebowski, and I don't mean that as a compliment at all. This one really grew on me though as it established whatever rhythm it was going to have. A lot of it was the performances from the three principles. This has a realistic come-as-you-may plot, and it would have completely fallen apart with bad acting. Mark Duplass, brother of his co-writer and director Jay Duplass (dad Larry Duplass also makes an appearance), is good, but his co-star Katie Aselton, even though her character is more whiny than likable, is terrific. And cute! I think I almost recognized her from an episode of The Office (the superior American version) and a fantasy football sitcom called The League. This lags in bits, but there are a few really funny scenes, one which caused me to reminisce about my days with the urine couch. This isn't anywhere close to comedy perfection, but I look forward to seeing more from the Duplasses.