Some things I liked some I did not.

It is a performances centric movie

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

The first must-see film of the year.

The Puffy Chair is often considered to be one of the pioneering films for the mumblecore genre, a style which is often associated with no name actors and a relatively quiet script. To me, mumblecore is a naturalistic approach to topics that could've been taken with unnecessary comedy or a stereotypical, kidding approach, but since they are handled on a modest budget, they are usually taken with admirable gratitude and soul.The Puffy Chair, released in 2005, is a unique picture for the time, but unfortunately an unsatisfying one. It revolves around Josh (Mark Duplass, whose brother, Jay, directed the film), a twentysomething who plans to travel across the country to deliver his father a fluffy, purple reclining chair that he has longed for. He takes the trip with his needy girlfriend, Emily (Katie Aselton) and his impulsive best friend, Rhett (Rhett Wilkins), and along the way, the picture decides to explore the trio's relationship with each other, along with Josh and his parents, and many others.For the first twenty-five minutes or so, the film is poignant, natural, and keenly avoids being indulgent to this idea of mumblecore that it seemingly erected from thin air. But for a directorial debut by the Duplass brothers (Jay serves as the main director, while his brother, Mark is uncredited), you more or less remain optimistic for what their future might hold rather than this picture.To begin with, the characters are rather stale and just tired archetypes. The main character Josh is moderately likable, his girlfriend is very overbearing, and is best friend leaves the viewer very unsympathetic. One of the biggest challenges for this style of film is that you must make everything unassuming and subtle, yet you need to provide the viewer with enough charisma and likability so they can invest valuable emotions through the characters. From someone who has seen three of the brothers' latest efforts, Cyrus, The Do-Deca-Pentathlon, and Jeff, Who Lives at Home (all of which have received a positive rating from myself), accomplish this goal successfully, while The Puffy Chair struggles to remain buoyant in a sea of difference. After a while, it resembles something of other road films, and that something is much of a muchness.Now, the performances from the cast are capable, the script is marginally pleasing, and the directing, despite the cloying zoom tactic the brothers would continue using in their films up until present day to sort of forcefully shove style in our face, is efficiently done. It's the story and the overall lack of anything to care about that leaves the viewer empty and rather disinterested.Starring: Mark Duplass, Kate Aselton, and Rhett Wilkins. Directed by: Jay Duplass.

Mark and Jay Duplass affirm themselves as a refreshingly honest voice of American Independent Cinema. The Puffy Chair strikes a precise contrast of comedy and romance, enlightenment and depressiveness, drama and tragedy.It portrays earnest representations of the roles of female and male contributions in a relationship and how the characters interact and respond when the dynamics of their relationship evolve and become tested. The characters feel real and the audience is involved within these character with the help of some slick camera work that seems to dance around the characters. It is a love story in its truest and most colloquial sense. After all we have many stories of love stories of which generally only one has a 'happy ending'. spoiler from here on in (kind of) so just be wary!The audience observes how the 2 main romantic characters obviously love each other and care for each other, but also how they just don't work for each other. The dialogue creatively shares this experience of how the 2 begin a conversation about something that is a charming and petty observation and how a minute disagree-ance is made and their conversations tone diminishes almost (and eventually) to a level of bitterness. Some may say that the ending leaves the audience with a disagreeable depressiveness and that the story ultimately abandons all that is has preached about love and relationships, but the real message about the impression on romantic relationships is the relationships with family. How they are there for you above all else.A thoroughly recommended film for all who care for watching caring character studies around the subtleties of life amongst a deeply involving and ultimately depressing subject matter. .... think punch-drunk love if it didn't work out and if jarmusch directed it!!!

The setup of this movie is pretty straight forward and it delivers a few jabs more than you would expect. What I like about this movie is how it elevated itself from a presumably mundane flick to a decent watch that will have you nodding at the craftsmanship of the script and the evolution of the characters.Shot in the renegade fashion of hand-held camera – the TV show, The Office would probably be the most accessible example – this film feels like what you'd probably imagine seeing if the story was relayed to you by one of the characters. This adds to the mood of the movie as well, wherein it doesn't feel serious and allows the viewer to relax and take it as it comes. The movie follows Josh, a booking agent for unknown bands, who wants to do something for his father's birthday in the vein of getting him a piece of childhood nostalgia- a puffy red chair. After igniting some angst, Josh decides to take his girlfriend, Emily along for the road trip. More characters join in and we get introduced to Rhett, the very 'dudeish' and oddly existential younger brother of Josh as he becomes the inevitable third wheel on the trip.The chair was to be picked up from a furniture store owner and ultimately throws a wrench in Josh's plans as the guy fails to deliver, imposing an unplanned stay in the surrounding town and a bit of tyranny on Josh's behalf. This kicks off a bit of character development as we see tension tighten with Josh and Emily, as far as their relationship goes, and we see just how free-willed Rhett is as he hooks up with a girl, Amber (Julie Fischer) from the town. The lighting on Josh places him as an average guy, I guess, finding himself in a relationship that he only seems to take seriously when pressed with, 'the talk'. Likewise, Emily seems to be at that point in her life where she wants to take more steps as opposed to the flippant, casual ideal that Josh appears to have. Rhett, on the other hand is impulsive and unattached, seeming to just want to experience life rather than adhere to a schedule, much like a light version of his brother. I enjoyed how the relationships panned themselves out as it gave you both the fishbowl perspective from both sides of the glass, be it a personal experience or one you just know about.It's not really an essential film to watch but it does have its unique qualities and offers a quaint take on how people handle pressure and life variables. I give Josh Duplass credit for the way the movie unraveled and the way it held both predictability and that little nudge to want to see it to the end.Standout Line: "What you're probably doing is waiting for something real good or real bad to happen to make the decision for you and you're not gonna get that break, it never happens"

Most films are crappy with high production values, this one is crappy without high production values. Which sets it aside from the large pool of horrible movies. As bad as this film was I need to give due respect to Kathryn Aselton who, I believe if given the proper script, could probably turn in a pretty good performance. She plays Emily the girlfriend to perennial doofus Josh, who often refers to her as "Dude" or "Man" in a non-ironical tone.But heres the thing, Emily is a semi-believable character which means Rhett will soon need to be added to the cast, to counteract this almost believable character with a guy even more preposterous than Josh. When we first meet Rhett we learn that he is "deep" because he is videotaping a lizard which is PROOF that he sees the world "uniquely!" Rhett then shows the tape to Emily and in one of Emily's few unbelievable moments she acts impressed by this amateur tape of a lizard, WOW i believe is how she responds once again with no irony of sarcasm even mildly implied.From the opening scene you are given warning that the camera work will be crappy, we open on a shaky close up of Josh as he attempts to win over the viewers by acting GOOFY! oh how care free this main protagonist is that he will act GOOFY! haha. This film could almost be a case study in just how BAD films can be (and for that matter just how FAR bad films can get in the festival circuit, I mean by comparison of most circuit crap this film probably did appear pretty awesome).I believe SXSW gave this film some minor award (oh south by southwest, why do you encourage them, its only cruel). But here is where I hand this film a compliment, it is the best of the mumblecore movement. Mind you all other mumblecore movies sucked beyond belief and generally included grotesque nudity and incomprehensibly bad acting, but still, its good to be the best of something.I haven't seen baghead yet, but it looks like maybe they have made a few strides forward, the preview at least made it appear tolerable, where as even the Puffy Chair preview couldn't really hide the fact that it was going to suck. I've gotten off topic here, anyways Rhett is most likely not portrayed by a professional actor at all, much like Josh most likely isn't an actual actor but rather the director (or brother of director, there's some mixed messages there). I think Rhett was somebodies buddy and they said hey why don't you play this guy named Rhett in the movie, the fact that Rhett is the name of the actor and character probably means the actor and character are the same, unless I am mistaken, which I am not.If Rhett shaved the raccoon off of his face you would probably say he was attractive. So anyways Rhett, Emily, and Josh team up to bring the Puffy Chair to Rhett and Josh's dad. Some stuff happens along the way, more bad acting, bad supporting actors, crappy camera work, an attempt at significance. This film wouldn't have been bad if it hadnt been so shamelessly pursuing profound self importance.The whole thing is amateurish, if you can view this movie without paying for it, like if its on TV or for rent at the library, then consider looking at it, just to see if you like this super cheap style of film-making. I like what the duplass' are doing the whole make a movie with nothing concept, but I wish they would make a movie that someone would want to see.--- I happened upon this movie again, and feeling that perhaps I had judged it too harshly initially I viewed it again. Its gotten enough decent reviews to where I have to at least consider I might have just been in a bad mood during my first viewing. For example, the first time I saw Napoleon Dynamite I thought it was horrendous, I saw it a couple of months later and I couldn't stop laughing.But this movie is just so weak, its horribly painful, just HORRIBLY painful to watch. The worst part of it all is that I think the people who made this movie know it sucks, but they just thought hey, we already made it might as well release it and see if someone doesn't hate it. I have to go back to my initial complaints, first off this movie is functioning at the highest level of unbelievability possible. So there is Josh, the main character, his girlfriend Emily, and the brother of Josh, named Rhett. Coincidentally the guy who plays Rhett is also named Rhett so could it be that he just sort of showed up, wandered into the frame and just didn't leave and was never aware of a film being made?The dialogue in this film is just painful, really painful. Who would talk the way these people talk. I wish I could give this film less than 1 star on my rating, I wish I could give it a zero, if only.