Entertainingly Bad: The Room

Entertainingly Bad: The Room

The Room has gained cult status in recent cinema. This is not due to a complex and inspirational story, an amazing cast or brilliant production, its completely the opposite. The acting is a joke, the story is awful, and the post-production and editing is laughable. These factors all contribute to create a film that is simply hilarious to watch. 

The Story: The story is very simple. It follows a love triangle between Johnny (Tommy Wiseau), his fiancee Lisa (Juliette Danielle), and Johnny’s friend, Mark (Greg Sestero). Johnny loves Lisa, but Lisa loves Mark...... it’s one of those ‘romantic dramas’. The film then precedes to introduce various random character appearances such as Lisa’s Mum, Claudette (Carolyn Minnott), who pretty much says the same thing each encounter. And frequent visitor, Denny (Phillip Haldiman), who plays the couples neighbouring college student (?), who has a creepy interest in Lisa. These truly add nothing to the story or the film, except to seem awkward and humorously out of place. 

The Star: Tommy Wiseau: The actor, writer,  director, producer, and executive producer is clearly the star of The Room. His undefinable accent and nationality, only adds to his hilarious delivery. Every line he says is just awkward and almost extra-terrestrial (even his appearance.....it’s scary).  He clearly hasn’t grasped the concept of ‘speech’ and the English language. He puts emphasis on the wrong words, he laughs about disturbing subjects such as sexual abuse, and performs the shitest impression of a chicken ever. Even his attempt at sexual intercourse is horrifying, he looks like he’s fucking Lisa’s belly-button. His character and acting is just bad, yet comedically unique which I don't think was Wiseau's intention. 

Worst Actor: Greg Sestero: Playing the character of best friend, Mark isn’t a hard task to complete. He simply shows up every now and then, to sleep with Lisa and also confront Johnny near the end. Simple performance in the books, however Sestero just fails. His acting is stale and lacks emotion or personality. This isn’t helped by the dialogue he has been given. He come across as completely oblivious to the fact that Lisa likes him and only wants him for sex. Each time, she starts kissing him or undressing, and Mark pretty much states: ‘What the hell are you doing Lisa? 
DUDE, SHE WANTS SEX!!!!!!!!!!! GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Worst Actress: Juliette Danielle: Lisa is just a bad character and Danielle's attempt at 'acting' is dull and uninspiring. Again there isn’t any soul, emotion or personality to her. She constantly moans and whines about how she doesn’t like Johnny anymore to everyone, apart from Johnny. Boring, enough said!!!!

Best Line: There are so many: The film is notorious for its dreadful dialogue. ‘HEY!!!’ is constantly uttered by all the characters to an unbelievable degree, and inevitably and annoyingly embeds itself into you brain. 

Here are a few others: 

Johnny: ‘You are lying! I never hit you! You are tearing me apart, Lisa’ 

Johnny: ‘Everybody betrayed me! I fed up with this world!’ (not a typo) 

Johnny: ‘I did not hit her, it’s not true! It’s bullshit! I did not hit her! I did not...........Oh hi, Mark.’  

As you can see, the majority of great lines are Tommy Wiseau's. Like Schwarzenegger, it is his delivery and accent that makes all his dialogue hilarious. The line directly above, is one of the worst pieces of acting I've ever witnessed (and I have seen plenty). His attempts to express emotion, is terrible. The dubbing of 'I did not' doesn't fit with how Wiseau has  said the rest of the line. Then, he acts all calm and says 'Hey', like he has forgotten all about his frustration with Lisa. It's rubbish acting, but unforgettable comical. 

Claudette: ‘I got the results of the test back- I definitely have breast cancer.’ 

Now, if this line was in any half-decent drama film or even a soap opera (Eastenders), it would be a moment of horror and shock. However, how Carolyn Minnott delivers this line is just funny. It comes across as though she doesn’t care, or doesn’t understand the serious nature of the problem. This isn’t helped by how Lisa ‘brushes’ over the issue to further rant about how she doesn’t love Johnny anymore. 

Best Scene : The flower shop scene: Never has acting, dubbing, script and editing been so appalling in one scene. Watch it and you will just be amazed by the sheer misdirection and acting in the scene. 

Best Prop: The American Football: When the characters aren’t having a ‘shitty’ conversation or confrontation, they throw a bloody American football around. They don’t play the actual sport, they just play catch with the thing. In one scene, they’re wearing tuxedos to go to someone’s wedding (which isn’t explained), but then they start throwing the football about. This is then followed by a completely different scene, which has nothing to do with the wedding. Which makes the previous scene completely POINTLESS. Also, how many people dress up in tuxedos to play football? 

The Room is simply awful from a film critic’s standpoint. The acting, script and directing are all terrible, and is a disgrace to independent cinema. Yet, it is the goofiness and the claims of it being 'the Citizen Kane of bad movies' that has gained it cult fame. It has to be seen to be believed. It’s just hilarious.