Writer-director Jay Duplass returns to his “Puffy Chair” roots with “The Baltimorons,” a simple, funny and incredibly touching tale of two damaged people who find each other when one of them busts his tooth.

It’s an unassuming, redemptive romance and a Christmas Eve to Christmas Day meander through down-market, off-the-tourist-track Baltimore in search of a dentist, an impound lot, a bitter wedding reception, a pop up improv show and “soft shell crabs.”

Baltimore native Michael Strassner, a career bit and supporting player, co-wrote this and stars as Cliff, a big lump who expends a lot of effort trying to be funny.

“Dumb joke. Didn’t mean anything.”

It’s what he used to do, what he remembers being good at. Now, he’s engaged to Brittany (Olivia Luccardi), aspiring to a sober “mortgage broker” future and a just-as-sober holiday with her family.

But we meet him in an opening flashback about the time he ineptly tried to hang himself.

A “promise” was made. “No more alcohol,” and by extension, “no more comedy shows,” the milieu that encouraged that drinking.

But Cliff’s a walking pratfall even without booze. That’s how he busts a tooth and finds himself frantically bleeding, driving around the empty city streets in his late dad’s ’90s Cadillac as he calls to find a dentist who’ll show up for an emergency.

Dr. Didi (stage actress and career supporting player on film and TV Liz Larsen) is the only one to pick up. She has plans for the day, but she’ll come in and fix him up first.

She’s bluff, blunt and all business. He’s compulsively riffing, even when he’s got a serious question.

“What’s the needle situation here?” “The situation is that we use needles.”

One fainting later, she changes course.

“You’re so pretty,” he mumbles. “You’re on nitrous, buddy.”

But a phone call that interrupts her work derails Dr. Didi’s plans. Her ex has abruptly remarried and hijackered her daughter and granddaughter for a holiday party he’s calling “the reception.” And when Cliff heads out the door, he sees that his car’s been towed.

It’s Christmas Eve. The streets are empty. And they towed his car. Baltimore, man.

A moment’s weakness lets Dr. Didi sympathize with his latest plight as well. That sets these two — 30something Cliff and a 60ish grandmother dentist — off on a holiday odyssey that will include breaking into an impound lot, sloughing off parties, then showing up at one, hunting for a restaurant that’ll seat them, a midnight boat ride, a lesson in improv sketch comedy and a DUI.

Cliff has a secret — secrets, to be more precise. Didi’s past is more conventional, but with its own flavor of melancholy.

And for everything you “know” will happen, thanks to the way the story is set up — that “pop up improv,” for instance — there’s a bittersweet surprise. Comedy is intense for those who take it seriously. And for people Cliff considered his tribe, his friends, these jokers and their audience can be some pretty callous a-holes.

Everything here happens organically, from the cascading series of “quests” to the encounters and the whimsical way she discovers his improv years made him great at lying on the fly and his realization that he’s having a great time with her, no matter what happens.

The players clash and click in all the best ways — subtly, gingerly and even tenderly. Strassner and Larsen beautifully capture the sensitivities of wounded people who don’t want to add to another’s wounds.

“Baltimorons” is a marvel, the first great Fall Film of 2025, one so good it makes you wonder why it took the prolific producer, actor, writer and director Duplass so long to film a proper followup to his heartfelt and funny, bigger budget/”name” cast “Jeff, Who Lives at Home” (2012). No, the failure of his and his actor/writer brother Mark Duplass’s “The Do-Deca-Pentathlon” doesn’t explain it.

And then you remember he has 73 producing credits, heroically helping other indie filmmakers realize the dream of getting their features, series and mini-series made. “Tangerine” and “Blue Jay” and the “Somebody Somewhere” series are highlights mixed in with a staggering number of produced misses. Throw in 34 perfectly adequate Duplass acting credits (“Transparent,” “Search Party”) and you see the intervention that’s needed.

With “Baltimorons,” Duplass finds rediscovers the perfect tone and lets the viewer come to it — listening in on a chatty character who says more with what he’s reluctant to talk about, taking in a divorced pragmatist’s reluctance to be fooled by false hope and relishing every minute that we spend together with them.

Rating: R, adult themes, profanity

Cast: Michael Strassner, Liz Larsen, Olivia Luccardi, Rob Phoenix and Brian Mendes

Credits: Directed by Jay Duplass, scripted by. An IFC release.

Running time: 1:41