world attractions: Movie Review

Genre: Drama…I think
Director: Tommy Wiseau
Starring: Tommy Wiseau, Juliette Danielle, Greg Sestero, Philip Haldiman, Carolyn Minnott
Running Time: 99 minutes

"YOU ARE TEARING ME APART LISA!"

There are some films that are just undeniably fantastic. Movies that everyone, and I mean everyone, adores. Films like The Shawshank Redemption, The Godfather or Jaws; the best of the best of the best. The intense drama, the masterful filmmaking, the sublime performances. They are cinemas crowning achievements; should we ever discover extraterrestrial life, they are the movies we would want to share.

Then, we have The Room.

A little history, as taught to me by Wikipedia:

In 2001, aspiring film-maker Tommy Wiseau wrote the films script, a tawdry tale of a love triangle between a banker, his fiancé and his best friend. After failing to get it picked up in the Hollywood system, he spent the next few years raising $6 million dollars to finance the movie himself. Despite some troubles behind the camera that led to the entire crew being replaced twice, The Room had its theatrical debut in June 2003 in a few small theatres in Los Angeles. The film should have died right there – another failed independent project from a few people you’ve never heard of. But it didn’t. Instead, the films popularity skyrocketed amongst an eclectic group of fans, and since then, it has had monthly screenings in cities all around the United States.

So why? What is it about The Room that has elevated it to this cult status? What is it that causes people to every month dress up as there favourite characters and journey out into the night to watch this movie again and again and again? Why has it received coverage from Entertainment Weekly, ABC, Fox News and dozens of other major news networks? What are people watching this film?!

Perhaps it's word of mouth like this…

“A self-distributed directorial debut so hopelessly amateurish that auds reportedly walked out during its two-week run” – Variety

“[Wiseau sound’s like] Borat trying to do an impression of Christopher Walken playing a mental patient” – IFC.com

“The Room is the Citizen Kane of bad movies” – Entertainment Weekly

Now, there are many parts of The Room that are just representative of incredibly poor film-making. Things like the constant panning shots of the Golden Gate bridge, as if we need to be reminded of where the film is set. Things like the editing blips that causes a glass of wine to jump from a woman’s hand to the table and then back to her hand when the camera changes angles. Then there’s the very poor acting from the entire supporting cast, none of whom seem to have any significant credits to their names. The soundtrack is kind of weak, especially during the film multiple sex scenes (which also, if I’m not mistaken, seemed to recycle footage). And finally the story is about as useless and hackneyed as you could ever find. All these things are indicative of a completely inexperienced director with no real understand of how to make a movie.

But then there are the parts of The Room that don’t seem to be indicative of anything; parts that quite literally defy explanation. Things like a character changing actors half-way through the film (and not in that deep, metaphysical, David Lynch style either). Things like lines of dialogue that literally don’t make any sense. Sub-plots that are introduced in one scene, and then never talked about again – from one characters casual remark about how she’s just been diagnosed with breast cancer, to a drug dealer who threatens to kill one of the main characters, and then just disappears and is never mentioned again! I don’t know what Wiseau meant to do with these parts of the film, but whatever it was, rest assured it failed magnificently.

This brings me finally to the films crowning achieve, the thing that moves it from being a terrible movie to a life changing experience; Wiseau’s performance. Aside from writing, director, producing and executive producing, Wiseau is also the films lead actor, and sonnets will be written in the future about his embodiment of Johnny, a man whose bizarre accent and speech patterns fails to hide the fact that 99% of what comes out of his mouth is pure gibberish. And the best part is that most of his lines have redubbed, so his lip movements don’t even match up with the dialogue. This movie, and its main character, makes no sense! The Room is one of the best disasters I have ever seen, and rather than talk more about it, I think I should just leave you with some of the highlights in the videos below, and a thorough recommendation that you seek this film out and watch it at all costs.