LAZY BOY | Omeleto
3,728,654
Published 2019-02-20
LAZY BOY is used with permission from Dave Redman. Learn more at redfootfilms.com.au/.
Ray takes a liking to a recliner seat at a yard sale, but soon he discovers the piece of furniture -- banished eventually by his pregnant wife to the garage -- is actually a time machine.
But this time machine can only go back in time by one minute. Ray exploits his feature as much as possible, helping him bet on races and drink more beer, much to his wife's exasperation.
But at one crucial moment, his time machine offers him a do-over at an important point in his life. But it has unforeseen consequences, putting him face-to-face with his choices -- and giving him a second chance in an unexpected way.
Writer-director Dave Redman's clever comedy has a fun, quirky conceit at its center, which it explores with great wit and cleverness. Starting with its lean, focused script and nimble editing, the film bubbles along in its first half, its pacing matching Ray's blithe enjoyment of his time machine -- but also to the exclusion of everything else, like preparing for a new baby.
His wife becomes increasingly concerned and frustrated, which leads to a turning point in their relationship and a difficult truth to face. But it's also the impetus for Ray to face himself, change his ways and then, with the help of his time machine, take action to rectify his mistakes.
With the movement of the film's emotional arc, the film takes a surprising turn near its second half, as Ray comes face-to-face with his behavior and its effects on others. The style shifts into more of a high-stakes drama with surprisingly propulsive action, complete with pulse-pounding score and dynamic camerawork.
What blends the two halves of the film are the effective performances and their consistent characterization, which are played for subtlety and realism instead of screwball antics. Ray's reaction to his discovery of a time machine is both disbelief and delight, but it's played as if on the same continuum as any other "man cave" escape, like playing an immersive new video game.
Equating the time machine as just another giant toy for Ray to play with and underplaying its powers offers many laughs. But the central motif of the film begins to shift in meaning along with Ray's character arc, leading to a genuine shift in his development that feels logical and consistent within the film's parameters.
LAZY BOY is a double entendre of a title, and the short has plenty of laughs and fun with its exploration of time travel, along with its portrait of oblivion in the face of life-altering change. But it's also a surprisingly serious examination of what it means to grow up, embrace responsibility and even become a father who must learn to put others before himself.
It's a rare comedy that, in fact, begs to be a little longer, with just a bit more time for Ray to internalize his insight and take final action. As it is, LAZY BOY points out -- in a hilariously literal fashion -- that sometimes it takes just one minute to reset our words and actions, and take responsibility for the life we're creating today.
All Comments (20)
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When I heard him say "girl" over and over I thought he was hopping into the time machine to go back and try for a boy lmao
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Fun Fact: he needed to grind the chair 1440 times just to get back a day.
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Imagine coming home from work and immediately your husband says, in a totally confused manner, "shouldn't you be in the kitchen?". I'd be pissed too! That line killed me! ššš
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Thanks, Omeleto. Now, I'm never going to recline a La-Z-Boy nor go into a bathroom stall ( Stalled) ever again.
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"shouldn't you be in the kitchen?". ohhh such a bad choice of words
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You can tell it's Australian, because the first application he thinks of for time travel is, more beer
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From comedy, to drama, to straight up temporal horror.
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Omeleto totally amazes me. Every once in a while I forget Omeleto, come across one of their short films by accident and always wind up impressed.
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spinkleborf
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I'm sitting in my own lazy boy chair and I could have sworn that I just watched this video.
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I started to write a comment, āWow! This is SO GOOD!ā Then, in the comments, I noticed that I wrote the exact same comment a year ago. I donāt remember having watched this a year ago. But, I enjoyed watching it both times.
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4:10 This was the true boy's moment.
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I just noticed that he finds the recliner exactly 1 minute in
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My bed is a time machine, I get in at 2PM I get up and itās 7PM.
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This is one of the best videos Iāve seen. Theoretically Itās right up there with the grandfather paradox. With the lazy boy, he created a loop in the space time continuum. The point where he reclined repeatedly and then went to the tree is as far as the future will ever exist. What a concept!
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If each crank was 1 minute and he had to account for the seconds inbetween to crank and push it back to normal, he'd have to crank it for at least 24 hours, that's 1440 minutes, meaning he'd have to make over at least fifteen hundred cranks!
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Getting drunk off one can of beer. Now that's my kind of time machine.
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my school work: unfinished my room: in disarray my life: falling apart me: watching hours of omeleto
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The guy just created a kind of living hell for himself.
