The Room

For the second year in a row, Adult Swim celebrated April Fool's Day by playing The Room, a low budget film that has developed a cult following as one of the biggest pieces of shit ever filmed. I got to watch it this time, and it easily catapulted itself to the top of my favorite terrible movies list. It's not just bad, it's a masterpiece of garbage. It's like an alliance of the world's greatest filmmakers decided to forget everything they know and collaborate to make the worst possible movie imaginable. Writer, director, and star Tommy Wiseau has since tried to pass it off as some sort of black comedy, but he's not fooling anybody. And the main reason is because it's clear from the beginning that this is a labor of love. You get the definite sense that some woman ripped his heart out, and he poured out all his feelings into this movie. Despite how awful it is, there's a very genuine feeling about it, and it's actually kind of sad. It's not enough to prevent it from being one of the funniest things you might ever see, though.

I mean, I don't even know where to begin, really. Wiseau plays Johnny, a man with a decent job, a livable apartment, and a fiance he loves who is reasonably attractive when you consider the movie's budget. I mean, he couldn't hire anyone remotely resembling real actors. His friend Mark is sort of not terrible, but that's literally the best you can say about any of them. So anyway, the fiance Lisa secretly hates Johnny, and wants to be with Mark. And that's pretty much the driving force of what could be called the plot. It doesn't begin to describe the film's demented brilliance, though. Everything that could be messed up is. Subplots appear out of nowhere and then disappear after a single scene. I've never seen someone so nonchalantly tell their daughter that they "definitely have breast cancer", and the scene where Johnny's young college friend Denny ("Oh hi, Denny!") gets confronted by a drug dealer is particularly amazing. Apparently Denny got involved with drugs because he needed money for something, but it is never explained what for or why he didn't go to the guy who's been paying his fucking tuition first, and he refuses to answer any questions after they get rid of the dealer (what exactly are they gonna charge him with that he'll be going to jail and Denny won't?), and the whole thing is never mentioned again.

You sort of get the feeling that Tommy never revised the script after the first draft. Characters will start telling somebody something, and then when pressed for details, will say they don't want to talk about it. Then why the hell did you bring it up? Lisa is the worst offender. I couldn't help but laugh every time someone asked her what she was talking about. Does Wiseau not realize that the audience will be asking the same question, and that's a bad thing? Lisa is honestly one of the most poisonous, vile bitches I've ever seen in a movie. Everyone tells her she's beautiful and seems to want her, but she's not even the most attractive woman in the movie and has nothing resembling a nice personality to help her out. She claims to love Mark now, but won't be honest with Johnny, and when asked why, says she can't hurt his feelings like that. Then why are you constantly cheating on him? Just admit you want the house he promised! And what's your plan, keeping up a secret affair the entire time you're married? Why don't you just hope Mark will get you that house eventually, since there's no indication Johnny's really doing better financially? I mean, they live in the same building, and Johnny did just miss that promotion.

And there's just so many other things in this movie, it's hard to count them all. The first half hour or so plays like a softcore porn film, with sex scene after sex scene, including one with what at the time is just two random people who just show up in their apartment to mess around. A character disappears partway through the movie and is replaced by someone else, with absolutely no changes in his dialogue to try to explain why he's suddenly involved in the controversy. The constant football scenes where nobody actually plays football (apparently several meaningless scenes were added so Wiseau could hang out with the actor who plays Mark). Just the incidental dialogue everywhere is mystifying. "You're my favorite customer!" Why is he holding those flowers upside down? The strange, foreign way Wiseau imitates a chicken ("Cheeeep cheep cheep cheep cheeeep!") makes it seem like he's a long lost cousin of the Bluth family, and he even gets the rest of the cast to do it too. And just examining his performance, it's an endless goldmine of genius insanity. I'd love to see this in one of the frequent theatrical showings that happen in some cities, partly because groups always make shit like this funnier and also I've heard about some really fun rituals they do during certain parts of the film. It's sort of opened my eyes to what can actually be accomplished in the field of terrible cinema. In fact, I might just have to make it a real hobby.