Tiny Furniture
Director: Lena Dunham
With: Dunham, Laurie Simmons, Grace Dunham, Jemima Kirke, Alex Karpovsky, David Call
Aura (L. Dunham) has finished college and her boyfriend has finished with her. She goes home to a huge apartment in Manhattan, to live with her mother (Simmons) and her younger sister (G. Dunham). Her mother is a successful photo artist who takes posed pictures of tiny furniture. Her sister is a hip and popular high-school kid who resents Aura’s return.
Aura gets a job she hates just to do something, and hangs out with her friend Charlotte (Kirke), who affects an English accent and loves to party. She has a non-relationship with a dweeb who makes YouTube videos (Karpovsky), and has tawdry sex with a chef (Call).
All of this is hugely unsatisfying to her, and finally to me. Dunham filmed this for no money and used her mom and sister in the story. Yeah, I get that she is all at sea after college and has no direction. I get that her character has self-esteem issues, not helped by her poor choices of male companions.
And I get that she feels inferior to her kid sister and a charity case to her friend Charlotte. And, I get that this really ain’t bad for a first feature. So, I will cut Dunham some slack because she is utterly unembarrassed to act like a dowdy schlep, and because she is obviously talented. Some day she will look back on this movie and cringe. I already have.
C-