The Room – 2004

This movie was suggested by someone who clearly hates me.

During the opening credits, the first name you’ll see is “Tommy Wiseau – Director“. The second name you’ll see is “Tommy Wiseau – Producer“. Immediately followed by “A Wiseau-Films Production“. Then, guess what? That’s right, “Starring – Tommy Wiseau as Johnny“

This is a movie that was produced, directed, written by, starred in, and even reviewed by Tommy Wiseau. I’m serious, the review on the front cover (which is a picture of Tommy Wiseau) is a quote taken from the DVD insert, written by Tommy Wiseau.

The characters in this movie are one-dimensional at best.  Most are introduced with sentences such as “This is Mark, he’s Johnny’s best friend.” and “Hi, I’m Mark, I’m Johnny’s best friend,” and generally we are given no real reason to like them or feel empathy for them other than when we are told to.

Johnny: Played by Tommy Wiseau, Johnny is a mildly successful banker who lacks social skills completely and is deeply in love with his fiancée, Lisa. Johnny’s hobbies include dismissing everything his friends say, playing football, tending to his creepy son/neighbor Danny and brooding over Lisa.

Lisa: Taken directly from the DVD insert, “She has always gotten her way and will manipulate to get what she wants. She is a taker, with a double personality, and her deadly schemes lead to her own downfall.” This is Tommy’s way of saying “Lisa is a whore.” Her sole purpose in the movie is to get you to hate her and love Johnny more.

Mark: You can tell that Mark is Johnny’s best friend because the first sentence out of his mouth is “I’m Johnny’s best friend.” How’s that for character development? His role in this movie is to be manipulated into having sex with Lisa. He feels bad about the affair, and only sleeps with her a few dozen times.

Danny: Danny is an orphan who was adopted by Johnny due to a crippling lack of plot. It is explained that “Danny’s parents were killed, so Johnny adopted him, bought him an apartment, pays his bills, and is paying for his college.” This character exists only to serve as a reason to love Johnny more. He is socially awkward and thinks that when two people kiss and head upstairs, it’s ok to jump on them and have a pillow fight.

Claudette: Lisa’s mother. Her entire character can be summarized by one of her lines. She joyfully exclaims “I got the results of the test back! I definitely have breast cancer.” This was said in the same way you’d announce that you are getting married. She should wear a nametag that says “Plot Device”. No reason is given to like her, no background or character development exists, she just pops up on screen, says something to advance the plot, and then leaves. Her most used line in the movie is, “I have to go.”

There are two “plots” to this movie. The plot that Tommy Wiseau wants to show you, and the plot that he actually shows you. He wants to show you about a story of betrayal and lust, where best friends can scheme behind your back and lovers are less faithful than they appear. That almost sounds interesting. No, what Tommy shows us is almost two hours of “Johnny is such a great guy. Lisa, how can you do this to Johnny?” Throughout the movie, instead of giving us character development and reasons to like Johnny, we are literally told to like him. Even Lisa has a line where her mother is telling her how great Johnny is, and Lisa interrupts her to tell her how great Johnny is. “Johnny is a great guy, he is full of love and makes everyone happy. He even helps out Danny because he is such a great guy. I DON’T LOVE HIM AND I DON’T CARE.”

To call the acting in the movie amateurish would be insulting to an amateur actor. I feel like they deserve more credit than that. At no point in this movie did any of the actors deliver a believable line or portray a genuine emotion. Danny confronts Lisa, “Wow, you look beautiful, can I kiss you? OH GOD YOU KNOW I WAS KIDDING RIGHT?!” Mark proclaims, “I am Johnny’s best friend! How can I do this to him? This isn’t right. God, you’re sexy.” And who can forget Johnny’s famous line, “YOU’RE TEARING ME APART, LISA!!”

In the defense of the actors, the writing in this movie is also terrible. At one point during a party, Lisa says “Hey everybody, let’s go outside for some fresh air.” Normally, this is where 30 people would look at her like she was retarded and tell her to go outside if she wants some fresh air. Nope, not in The Room. The entire party lines up single file and leaves the house, no questions asked. They don’t even notice that the girl who told them to leave stayed inside. After 10 minutes or so, she comes outside and exclaims, “Hey everybody, let’s go inside and get some cake.” Surprise, the entire party heads inside single file. THIS IS NOT HOW PEOPLE INTERACT. NONE OF THEM.

You know what? I take it back, there was one good actor in this movie. At one point, there was a “gangster” who roughed up Danny a little bit because Danny apparently owed him some money. The unnamed gangster was fairly believable as a bad guy and showed some actual emotion (anger), as opposed to Johnny, who’s anger was represented by just being louder.

Towards the end, Johnny gets “fed up with this world” and decides to chew on the end of a pistol. There were only two of us watching the movie, but so help me god, we clapped. Lisa and Mark run into the room and take assessment of the situation. Here is Johnny’s body, covered in blood, hole in the back of his head, with a gun in his hand and then Lisa screams, “Oh God, what happened?! IS HE DEAD?! IS HE GOING TO BE OK?!!?”

Come on.

Surprise, this movie is terrible. The acting is atrocious and the script is poorly written. Despite being a self-labeled “Black Comedy“, the only times we laughed at this movie were times when it was just so terrible we couldn’t think of the words to express how disgusted we were. The only way this movie could have been improved was if Tommy went off into a rant about how much he loves his home country of America, Jean Claude Van Damme style, using his strong Eastern European accent.

I purchased this movie off of Amazon, and I can’t in good faith suggest you do the same.  Good luck.