Potrykus found innumerable ways to render cinematic the film's single location, a grungy Michigan apartment where a childlike slacker spends months trying to reach the fabled 257th level of Pac-Man.

| Dec 30, 2019

Some may find this movie unbearable; yet there's a place for pictures that push us to the limits of forbearance. Sometimes, even the loathsome have stories worth telling.

| Mar 28, 2019

I can't honestly recommend Relaxer to most readers, but if you like this kind of thing, you'll probably love it.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Mar 22, 2019

For a movie that's often embarrassingly funny-with its absurdist hangout dialogue, posturing nobodies, and perfectly timed spews-Relaxer is fundamentally sad.

| Original Score: B+ | Mar 20, 2019

Through its precise filmmaking and whirlwind script about one loser who never gets off the couch, it's a magnetic, five-senses experience for slacker cinema.

| Jul 21, 2018

Joel Potrykus's droll world is defined by feats of man-child pettiness, by lazy guys who turn the banalities of daily life into meaningless trials of integrity.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jun 28, 2018

Wildly, happily unique.

| Jun 19, 2018

The presumed message - get off the couch and live for yourselves, young Americans! - might be a little more persuasive if our onscreen stand-in were not so revolting.

| Mar 12, 2018

Relaxer forces viewers to engage with its off-kilter frequency, and risks pushing the material too far with a final time jump.

| Original Score: A- | Mar 12, 2018