I Love “The Room” And You Should Too

For the last 13 years, every year without fail, in numerous cities across the world, a movie is screened in theaters both professional and crafted by fans with a projector and a sheet of white cloth. Hundreds of thousands of people across the world gather and experience this absolute work of cinematic art, chanting the dialogue, cheering when characters and plot points are introduced and having the time of their life. So, what movie could have inspired a culture with such a following? It’s certainly not any of the classics, and not even “Star Wars” and “Lord of the Rings” fans are that rabid! No, the movie that everyone’s clamoring for is a little indie masterpiece known as “The Room”, often called by many “the worst movie ever made”.

Just so you know, I wholeheartedly disagree with that title – I can think of at least half a dozen movies which are way worse, such as “Birdemic”, “Manos: The Hands of Fate” or (brrr…) “The Hottie and the Nottie”. But “The Room” is definitely the best in the “so bad it’s good” genre, and I’ll tell you all about it. The story revolves around a man named Tommy Wiseau, who, despite being in college, definitely looks like he’s in his late 40s or early 50s. He has a completely indiscernible accent (is it French? Macedonian? Russian? Alien?) and has little to no understanding about how human interactions actually work. What he does have, though, is a bank account literally described as a “bottomless pit” and the dream to create the best movie ever made. He recruits his best friend, Greg Sestero, to be his line producer – even though Sestero has little idea about what a line producer is supposed to do – and together the two of them embark on a quest to realize Tommy’s vision exactly as he wants it to!

Oh, no, that’s not what the movie’s about. It’s the real story of how it was created. I’m not even kidding.

The plot of the movie revolves around a wealthy, good-hearted banker named Johnny (played by Wiseau) who has been engaged to his fiancée Lisa for over five years/seven years/whatever number the actor remembers at that particular moment. One day, out of nowhere, Lisa decides that she no longer loves Johnny and cheats on him with his best friend Mark (played, you guessed it, by Sestero). When he’s first invited in, Mark is so clueless about what’s going on that he asks Lisa about what she’s trying to achieve with the candles, the music and her sexy dress despite the fact that none of those are present in the scene. Of course, that doesn’t deter Lisa, who proceeds to sleep with Mark. Everything and anything that happens between that scene and the finale of the movie is entirely inconsequential to the plot, but it includes, in no particular order, a drug dealer threatening a kid and repeatedly asking for his money despite being assured that it’ll be there in a few minutes, Johnny buying flowers for Lisa in a scene so fast-paced that it’d make Kingsman’s church scene say “Slow down, dude”, Lisa’s mother announcing that she has breast cancer only to be completely dismissed, and a completely unknown couple breaking into Johnny’s apartment in order to have sex. It is insane, in the best possible way.

But not only does the script and dialogue make literally no sense, but the acting is absolutely dreadful. None of the actors hired for the movie make any sort of effort… Well, except for Tommy, of course, but effort doesn’t always translate into quality. You might have seen the infamous “You’re Tearing Me Apart, Lisa” scene already, considering its memetic status – that’s pretty much the level of acting in this movie. And it is amazing! Lots of movies have bad acting. The aforementioned “Birdemic” has some really, really, really bad actors, to the point where a kindergarten nativity scene has better acting than this. “The Happening” has normally great actors, such as Mark Wahlberg, reduced to blubbering idiots who can’t even say two words convincingly. But no acting is so hilariously over the top as that of “The Room”. It’s truly a sight to behold! Even if you know literally nothing about the equally crazy story of how this movie was made, just watching it is an experience in and of itself! So, without spoiling any more, all I can say is go ahead, gather a few friends, grab some beers and give the most enjoyably bad movie of all time a watch!