The Thiele brothers’ debut film Sofa, So Good looks good, but lacks the laughs or insight needed to make an impact.
Writers and Directors: Kyle Thiele, Eli Thiele, Cole Thiele
Genre: Comedy
Run Time: 69′
Country: USA
BFI London Film Festival Screening: October 11-12, 2024
U.S. Release Date: TBA
U.K. Release Date: TBA
Kevin Smith is still making movies 30 years after his debut, but The 4:30 Movie will never have the memorability of Clerks. Even defenders of Smith’s output since (This writer will go to bat for Clerks II, against his better judgement) have to concede that his first feature still stands tall amongst his other work. This is evident in how it continues to inspire filmmakers to make their films whatever way they can. Like Clerks, the Thiele brothers’ Sofa, So Good is a unique take on the filmmakers’ world, told in monochrome and with a distinct sense of humour.
Alas, only one film gets to be the trailblazer, and Sofa, So Good simply isn’t strong enough to step out of Smith’s shadow.
The premise of Sofa, So Good is pleasingly simple. Jake (Joseph Jeffries) and his cousin Red (Yahel Pack) need a new couch. When they find a second-hand sofa for sale, the film follows the pair on their intrepid adventures through Dayton, Ohio to carry their new purchase home. Along the way, the cousins encounter all manner of oddballs, gangs and concerned citizens going about their lives in some version of modern American life.
To give the Thieles due credit, for all the surface resemblance between Sofa, So Good and Clerks, their debut shows a bit more ambition than Smith’s. Opening with a fiery black orb consuming the sky, Sofa, So Good creates a world filled with bizarre characters and evocative locations to sell this expedition as an absurdist journey. The cousins encounter cowboy-themed furniture sellers, a gang of marauding couch-burners fresh out of Mad Max, and clarinet-playing clergy, amongst others. The black-and-white weirdness of a Satan-inhabited spookhouse recalls Eraserhead, and the three Thieles cite Richard Linklater as their primary influence on the film. Sofa, So Good has an episodic structure reminiscent of Slacker. Alas, unlike Lynch or Linklater, the writer-director trio fail to find much of a point in it all.
Most of Sofa, So Good sees Jake and Red stumbling across a stranger around every corner over and over again. Whenever the cousins let the couch out of their sight, it’s pilfered and passed from pillar to post, but none of it happens with any great degree of urgency. Jeffries and Pack are solid in the lead roles, but are too relaxed for the mania of the situations in which they find themselves. This wouldn’t be a problem if the script packed more punch. As a comedy, it’s just not funny enough, eliciting a few sly titters, but nothing approaching a belly laugh. Much of Sofa, So Good’s comedy pinballs between silly set pieces and louche bong-hit humour. Clerks had similar basic material, but Smith had stronger focus and characterizations to make the laughs work. The Thieles’ film is at once too hectic and unenergized. Watching random interlopers disrupt proceedings with barely a laugh between them drags, even at a bare 68 minutes.
The Thieles show a lot of confidence in their filmmaking. Shot in Dayton in the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, the trio make the most of the empty streets, backlots and car parks to evoke the underbelly of Americana. Against these deserted backdrops, Jake and Red’s increasingly desperate efforts to get the couch home make the whole endeavour feel like a farce, as if Godot were lying on the sofa while they carry it. All that’s missing is some tumbleweeds blowing across the frame. Sofa, So Good looks great for its tiny budget (estimated at $25,000), but the absence of much of anything to say, or any great laughs, makes the film feel more like a showreel than a bona fide feature. For all the citing of Smith or Linklater, the brothers share a spirit of dogged determination with Francis Ford Coppola. Much like in Megalopolis, there’s not a lot about Sofa, So Good that works, but the fact it got made at all is worth our admiration.
Sofa, So Good will be screened at the BFI London Film Festival on October 11-12, 2024. Read our list of 30 movies to watch at the 2024 BFI London Film Festival!
