The Room: Movie Review

I got the results of the test back. I definitely love The Room

The Room is directed, written, produced by, and stars Tommy Wiseau. The film also stars Juliette Danielle, Greg Sestero, Philip Haldiman, and Carolyn Minnott. 

Watching a bad movie is an activity that is sometimes fun, sometimes painful, and rarely some awkward combination of fun and painful. I have seen more bad movies than the average person will likely see in their life time, although, how can I be sure this is actually true? Film is subjective, and a movie that I say is a bad movie could be honored as a great movie by someone else. What I'm getting at is that once you see enough bad movies, you can clearly begin to distinguish between those on-the-fence bad movies that might be able to win over a few suckers and those bad movies that you know are bad. Bad in the sense that the people who were responsible for creating the movie clearly had no idea how to properly execute their material, yet still insisted that they go with what they got, no matter how foolish that everyone would look at the end of the day. Whenever I watch a movie, I want to feel that everyone involved in the film's production is a dedicated professional who puts their heart and soul into their craft, because they truly love what they do and want everyone interested in watching their movie to enjoy what is given to them on screen. We all know, however, that making a movie is no simple task, and if you've read enough behind the scenes information for movies, you will easily see that many things can get in the way of the film being any good: disconnect between the director and production crew, a low budget resulting in cut-rate effects, certain actors causing everyone headaches, a script that clearly didn't go through multiple drafts. The list goes on and on. 

With everything I just said, this is where I now transition into my discussion of The Room: a movie that defies all bad movie sensibility and a masterpiece of film-making in all the wrong ways. It does everything wrong and in such a unique fashion, that I have no clue as to where to possibly begin. The film first premiered in Los Angeles in June of 2003, being promoted almost exclusively through a billboard in Hollywood that Tommy Wiseau had rented. The billboard featured the picture of Tommy Wiseau that I have shown above, to which Wiseau called, "Evil Man." As you can see, the picture is a close-up of Wiseau's face with one-eye in half blink, and it led many passers-by to assume that The Room was a horror movie. They were right. The Room is a horror movie, a horror-ble movie. Audiences who saw the film were baffled, laughing at things that were not meant to be laughed at. The film was pulled from circulation not long after its premiere. However, word-of-mouth resulted in about 100 people attending the final screening, and several of these attendants contacted Wiseau, telling him how much they enjoyed the film. The responses of these people was the beginning of what is now one of the largest cult followings for a movie to be released in the 21st century. 

I have seen The Room in its entirety twice now, although I've watched its most infamous scenes far too many times to count. Now having such a dedicated fan-base, I'm not sure what I can say about The Room that hasn't been said already. Then again, the makings and reasoning behind The Room still remain as great of a mystery today as they were back in 2003, so perhaps there's still much more about The Room that has yet to be said. Here's what we do know: there is not a single thing about The Room that didn't come from the mind of Tommy Wiseau, and boy, is there A LOT to say about him. Wiseau has explained that he drew a lot of inspiration from the likes of Orson Welles, Clint Eastwood, and James Dean, going so far as to use direct quotes from their films. Wiseau has also explained that the reasoning behind the title is that a room is a place that can host both good and bad events. He's even come out and stated that The Room is meant to be a black comedy, although audiences and some of the film's cast disagree with this. 

Instead, The Room is more of a romantic drama, but even that I'm not so sure of. The story of The Room revolves around a love triangle between a banker named Johnny (Tommy Wiseau), his fiancee, Lisa (Juliette Danielle), and his best friend, Mark (Greg Sestero). Johnny and Lisa are to be married soon, but Lisa has grown unhappy about spending her life with Johnny, finding him boring and strange. Lisa begins a secret affair with Mark and begins to make false allegations of domestic abuse against Johnny. Lisa also informs her mother, Claudette (Caroyln Minnott), and several of her friends about how she no longer loves Johnny. From there, the majority of the film is Johnny showing his love and appreciation for Lisa while she maintains her secret affair with Mark. There's also various subplots, some involving a boy named Denny (Philip Haldiman) who Lisa and Johnny take care of. None of them go anywhere, however, due to the film's bizarre and incoherent narrative. 

​On a serious note, there is no question that The Room is one of the worst films ever made. Everything from directing, acting, writing, and cinematography is some of the worst that you'll ever find in a mainstream film. The thing is, though, none of it is bad in a way that will leave you in an ongoing state of agony, dreading every precious second you are spending watching The Room. And that's part of why I can't recommend it highly enough. A love triangle story is nothing to get upset about (although the fact that Twilight exists would suggest otherwise), and Tommy Wiseau shows no desire to make The Room to be pretentious or preachy about anything like confusing San Francisco politics or the state of the California environment. This is a movie about seemingly normal, everyday people that are actually trapped in the dark realm of Tommy Wiseau's imagination, a place where the cosmos are thrown out of proportion, the moon shines during the day, and cats and dogs get married. 

High Points: 

- The Room is an enigma, a set of Penrose stairs that has no beginning, no end, and no solution in sight. Every viewing offers something new and feels as wholly fresh as it was when watching it the first time around. It is a bottomless barrel of entertainment and an absolute gem of unintentional comedy. No, I myself do not agree with Mr. Wiseau about the film being a black comedy, because The Room cannot be fully enjoyed if perceived as such. Unintentional comedy is one of the best forms of comedy, although "unintentional comedy" sounds something of an oxymoron. Watch a comedy, and you clearly understand that the main goal of the filmmakers is to make you laugh. But I say to you, never forget one of the most basic comic principles: people trying to be serious and failing will always be funnier than people trying to be funny. Despite what Tommy Wiseau says, he and the rest of the cast members are obviously not attempting to make you laugh. They're attempting to make a serious-minded drama, but they fail so hard at doing so, that laughs are inevitable. Tommy Wiseau has various scenes in which Johnny is clearly supposed to be angry or merely upset, but displaying such emotions appears to be beyond his skill set. Wiseau also delivers his lines like an alien who barely knows basic English and isn't articulate in the slightest. The most famous example is when an angry Johnny shows up on a rooftop after finding out about Lisa accusing him of hitting her. Johnny shouts to himself, "I did not hit her! It's not true! It's bullshit! I did not hit her! I did naaaahht!" Johnny throws a water bottle to the ground and immediately notices Mark sitting alone in a chair, to which he calmly states, "Oh hai, Mark." The fluctuations in Johnny's emotions and the awful dialogue never cease to be amusing, drawing questions as to how Wiseau believed employing such horrendous acting and writing techniques could possibly work in any way. 

Low Points: 

- I mean, everything imaginable in The Room can be appropriately argued as a low point. Wiseau's acting is indecipherable, falling on some hazy line that would likely define the acting style of extraterrestrial life-forms. Wiseau frequently forgot his lines and missed cues on set, resulting in multiple retakes and many of his lines being re-dubbed in post production. Technical flaws are overflowing: the green screen for scenes on the roof is atrociously bad, entire scenes are out of focus, and a heavy amount of the dialogue having to be re-dubbed resulted in several scenes being out of sync.

All of these are forgivable offenses when it comes to the unholy terror that is the screenplay. Here we get a parade of hilariously bad lines ("Leave your stupid comments in your pocket!") and subplots that have absolutely zero effect on the overarching story. Lisa meets with Claudette early on, where Claudette casually mentions that she has breast cancer. Lisa dismisses this, telling her mom she's not dying and to not worry about it. Claudette's apparent breast cancer diagnosis is never brought up again for the remainder of the film. Then there's all of the weird stuff going on with Denny. Oh, Denny, the creeper kid that Johnny and Lisa care for. Denny's creepy antics (and they are VERY creepy) involve jumping into Johnny's bed when Johnny and Lisa are getting ready to have sex. Denny explains that, "I just love to watch you guys." Not long afterwards, Denny straight up asks Lisa if he can kiss her. Denny then later on tells Johnny that he thinks he's in love with Lisa, news that Johnny is completely unfazed by, as he simply tells Denny to go on with his explanation, instead of showing confusion or anger as any sane person about to get married would show. None of the Denny being in love with Lisa dreck, however, comes anywhere close to the hilarious Chris-R (Dan Janjigian) rooftop scene. Chris-R is a drug dealer who Denny owes money to, proceeding to threaten Denny with a gun when Denny shows up without any money. Johnny and Mark arrive on the scene to stop Chris-R and take him away. Johnny and Mark get back to the rooftop in record time, where Lisa and Claudette are comforting Denny and getting him to explain himself. The entire sequence adds absolutely nothing to the plot, its importance confined only to its restricted space in the film's 99 minutes. The same can be said for so many other scenes whose potential contributions to the story are left behind, never to be addressed ever again. 

We meet several of Lisa and Johnny's friends, such as a couple named Mike (Scott Holmes) and Michelle (Robyn Paris), who somehow have access to Johnny's apartment. There's also a psychologist named Peter (Kyle Vogt), but he only appears in about two or three scenes. All of these friends appear with no kind of heads up, their purpose in the film amounting to little more than to provide moral support and advice for Johnny and Lisa. 


So now how do I properly bring my thoughts on the disasterpiece that is The Room to a close? To this day, I still have yet to uncover every little secret and every bit of information on the inner lives of human beings (or human beans as Johnny puts it in the film) that I firmly believe Tommy Wiseau has stashed away in the dark, mysterious corners of this movie. I cannot for the life of me remember the very first time that I came across The Room, and I don't think this is a coincidence. The Room is a Rubik's Cube that is impossible to solve, but you'll get so into trying to solve it, you will eventually forget how and why you started trying to solve it in the first place. It's a broken movie that would come from the mind of David Lynch, if David Lynch were high on bath salts. In some ways, The Room is a life-changing movie. After one has been exposed to it, the rules of film-making will never be looked at the same way again, and the criteria for evaluating a movie as bad will be forever put into question. 

The Room is not a bad movie that one can simply forget and move on from. It is unlike any other film that you will ever come across during your lifetime, presenting abut every movie problem imaginable but in such a unique way that you almost have to appreciate it. No one will fully understand what was going through Tommy Wiseau's mind when the film was being made, and I don't think even Wiseau himself fully understood what he was doing. On the surface level, it is clear that Wiseau did not have the proper knowledge or expertise for making a professional film, translating to the film's various technical and narrative flaws. But at the same time, The Room is not something that I think anyone could purposefully concoct. It renders all things like logic and reason useless, resulting in a product that is truly one of the most outrageous movies of this generation. There will never be another movie like The Room, not in this age or any other. So anyway, how's your sex life? 

Recommend? Yes, I think everyone should see this movie at least once, especially if you love football. This is truly a "see it to believe it" kind of movie. 

Grade: F 
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