The Room

Can you look into those eyes and tell me you're not already in love? It is reported that Wiseau still has trouble controlling his left eyelid.

The Room is a 2003 American epic highbrow existential romantic-drama indie film created by praised director, producer, writer, lead actor, financier, marketer, lover, and genuinely nice guy Tommy Wiseau. The principal cast includes Wiseau and a bunch of unimportant simian extras. It tells the heartbreaking story of a love triangle between a man, his fiancée, his best friend, and his pug who only appears in one scene.

Despite being sought out by every studio in Hollywood, Wiseau decided to go independent and take complete control of the film like the unblemished god he is. When released, it made zillions of dollars in the American box office alone. Further analysis shows that everyone who could afford to see the movie saw the movie, and everyone who couldn't afford to see the movie just robbed a bank or something and saw the movie anyway.

The Room has been cited by some critics as one of the greatest films ever made, and has been called "the The Room of great movies". Due to its popularity, the majority of envious peasants today hate the movie, and they regularly flood Wiseau's message boards with lies and fallacies.

Plot

Johnny in his full unquestionable glory.

The film starts out with scenic views of San Francisco, minus its illegal immigrant population and thus lacking the city's iconic charm and appeal. The plot comes to its first climax as protagonist Johnny comes home to find his fiancée Lisa waiting by the door, yeast treated and legs wide open. Lisa immediately knocks Johnny right back off the wagon, Johnny wastes no time aiding her in the release of her hojo, and they embark on the first of the film's numerous extensive sex scenes.^[1] The day after their profuse lovemaking, Lisa accuses Johnny of hitting her while he was drunk... though really, who could blame him? Johnny, however, did not hit her; in his own words, "It's not true, it's bullshit, I did not hit her! I did NAAHHT. Oh hai Mark." Johnny heads to the rooftop of his apartment and meets his good friend-that-just-happens-to-look-like-a-chimp Mark to discuss Lisa's behavior; Mark quickly flees the roof however after Johnny attempts to seduce him. Sexually frustrated, Johnny heads back downstairs for cheesecake and coffee.

Johnny comforts Denny the way a real man does.

Later Denny, Lisa and Johnny's adopted son,^[2] stops by and professes to Johnny that he is in fact in love with Lisa. After a fierce bitch-slap to the face and multiple footballs to the groin, Denny becomes depressed and decides to challenge himself to a basketball game alone on his rooftop. Denny's drug dealer, Chris-R,^[3] follows him to this location demanding drug money owed to him of an $unspecifiedamount. After Denny tells Chris-R that the money will be here in five minutes, Chris-R declares that being the all-important Chris-R, master and commander of all things "Chris" and "R", he simply cannot wait that long. Thus R-Chrissy holds a banana to Denny's head demanding either his $unspecifiedamount or the boy's life, knowing that Denny can magically conjure it using his powers. Right at that moment Johnny and Mark happen to stop by, and proceed to wrestle the gun (or banana or whatever it is) from the dealer and haul him to the police station, which is apparently right next door seeing as the pair return not even five minutes later. After a tongue-lashing and a solid and well-deserved "WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?!" from Lisa, Denny is warmly, warmly comforted by our true hero Johnny. Warmly...

The film gets pretty tranquil for a while. Lisa's mother Claudette quite casually tells Lisa that she has breast cancer, which Lisa treats with less regard than a cold. Mike, the boyfriend of Lisa's friend Michelle, receives a chocolate-blowjob from Michelle and foolishly leaves his polka dot boxers behind for Claudette to find and turn in to the Fashion Police. Johnny and his friends play catch football at very short distances. Eventually things come to a head when Johnny confronts Mark at a party, to which Mark replies "Keep your stupid comments in your pocket!"^[4] Finally, fed up with the idiots surrounding him, crushed by his slutty, bipolar, and unusually hairy almost-wife and her non-baby, and annoyed by the multiple five-minute sex scenes with peculiar R&B music that keep popping up, Johnny blandly destroys everything in his house, throws a television out a window,^[5] walks upstairs, and shoots himself in the head. Audiences across America cried.

Lisa and Mark eventually find Johnny's almost impossibly sexy corpse. Lisa, being the considerate and kindhearted individual she's proven herself to be throughout the film, proclaims to Mark that now they can finally be together. Right there. Kneeling in the blood of her dead fiancé. It is at this point that Mark finally comes to terms with Lisa's true mental state, and politely declines.

Cast and characters

For those without comedic tastes, the so-called experts at Wikipedia have an article about The Room.

Tommy Wiseau as Johnny: A perfectly nice, ridiculously trusting guy with a bizarre accent, Johnny has an unspecified job at a bank, for which he apparently provides excellent ideas he does not receive credit for. He quite enjoys tossing around the football with friends (at distances of no more than three feet), abnormally long and repetitive lovemaking, and collecting pictures of spoons. He is perhaps best known for his catchphrase "Oh hai [name of person]."
Simian #1 as Lisa: Johnny's fiancé, a 10 in his eyes but a solid 6 in actuality, Lisa has an unsuccessful career in the competitive "computer business" and spends the majority of the film cheating on Johnny with his best friend, faking pregnancies to make her life interesting, and loudly discussing her cheating ways with family members whilst knowing Johnny is in the house. Actress Simian #1's critical acclaim in the role of Lisa greatly contributed to her successful career today in real estate.
Simian #2 as Mark: Johnny's best friend, who sleeps with Lisa throughout the film. He shaves off his beard late into the movie and becomes babyfaced and more indecent, which likely contributed to his untimely death.
Simian #3 as Denny: The creepiest kid you will ever meet. In his own words, he enjoys watching Johnny and Lisa spoon and make love, while hiding in a corner undetected thanks to his ridiculously small endowment. He also openly professed his own love for Lisa to Johnny, which Johnny mistakenly took as platonic. Denny's hobbies include buying and/or selling an unspecified drug ("It doesn't matter, I don't have them anymore!") and playing basketball alone on rooftops.
Simian #4 as Claudette: Lisa's mother who has breast cancer, which neither she nor anyone else in the film seems to care much about, as it is mentioned exactly once and never spoken of again. She is a strong non-believer in the power of love and, knowing her that her daughter truly is a mere 6, insists that Lisa marry the first middle-class man she meets, that being Johnny.
Simian #5 as Mike: Better known as "The Situation", Mike is a sex addict who often leaves his underwear behind for others to find. He is a New Jersey refugee whose childhood trauma from being raised by an Italian-American family has caused him to seek recourse in unscrupulous sex. Mike suffers a severe injury due to a tickle assault from Mark.
Simian #6 as Chris-R: Critically criticalled as perhaps the most profound role in the film, Chris-R is a drug dealer who knows how to stay under the radar, donning a black beanie and black tank top whilst shaking down his customers on rooftops in broad daylight. Chris-R is known to be extremely busy and impatient, and would rather murder a child than wait five minutes for a payment.
Simian #7 as Peter: A friend to Johnny and a psychologist. Or psychiatrist perhaps... does anyone really know the difference? Either way, considering how things turn out, he's clearly terrible at his job. Peter was a legendary punching bag in graduate school, always getting locked in his peers' briefcases.

Production

Origin

The year was 2001. Tommy Wiseau had just survived the near-destruction of his own mysterious universe and escaped to ours, with one dream: to create the greatest cinematic experience mankind had ever seen. To this day Wiseau still hunts James Cameron in The Most Dangerous Game; there can be no competition. Wiseau's basis, The Room, originated as a Shakespearean play and Oscar Wildean novel decades before being picked up for the big screen. Wiseau wise-au-ly decided to complete this story's noble life cycle through his filmmaking golden touch.

Financing

Despite his courage, Wiseau's film was rejected by the Hollywood liberal elites who guffawed at his admittedly strange accent and pompously declared that "movies" should be "good" and make "money". Thus over the next year Wiseau would spend his time raising finances for the film entirely by himself, due to his accurate stance that mainstream media is beneath him. In spite of these difficulties, Wiseau somehow managed to raise $6 million for the project. How exactly he accrued this money has remained a mystery, though it has been rumored that he murdered and salvaged the parts of the Six Million Dollar Man. In reality it is more likely that he simply sold imported leather jackets from Korea. No, seriously.

Casting

The ape that plays Mark gets into character by choking a kitten to death. PETA raised no objections.

Many high-profile celebrities of the era like Tom Cruise, Will Smith, and Barbra Streisand begged Wiseau to put them in his movie, but he wanted a less prominent cast, so he settled on the simian population of Africa instead. It was through these apes that Wiseau assembled an ensemble of second-banana faces who were so fresh and unclean that any other screen project simply would not have been great enough for them, as not a single simian there had ever previously starred in a film.

The monkeys that made up the cast were unexpectedly difficult to control, so Wiseau strapped electric collars on them to keep them in-line, and particularly disruptive primates were put to sleep. Simian #1, the ape who played Johnny's wife-to-be Lisa, notably had twenty vaginal surgeries done before their lovemaking scenes so we could hear Johnny's lengthy monologues over her explosive orgasms. Anonymous cast members have claimed that Wiseau forced them to pick his cotton before and after shootings; Wiseau has not commented on these accusations.

Filming

Wiseau filmed the movie in the highest definition possible at the time. Due to the visual richness blinding most of the test audience, he switched to a safer, yet just as effective quality. It was also the first movie to be filmed in 3D, and all viewers had to do to experience it was wear 20-pound glasses and turn their heads upside down. This simple and innovative technique won Wiseau an Oscar for Best Life Direction.

Unfortunately, Wiseau had numerous issues with his cameramen and behind-the-scenes crew, as he took hundreds of takes to nail the "I did not hit her! I did NAAHHT. Oh hai Mark." line, frustrating the crew and causing them to walk out on him. At some point, Wiseau had to replace the entire staff. Twice. No, seriously.

Release

“My life has officially become a waste.”
~ All of Hollywood after The Room's release

The film premiered in San Francisco, California on January 9, 2003. It was the climax of three days of festivities hosted by Mayor Arnold Schwarzenegger which included a parade of limousines featuring stars from the film, receptions, thousands of toy pugs, statues of Wiseau in front of stores and homes, and complimentary chip-chip-chip-chip-cheep-cheep-brand fried chicken for everyone. Schwarzenegger would later recall it as "the biggest event to happen in the West in my lifetime."

The simians from the film were prevented from attending the premiere due to California's Jiminy Cricket laws, which would have kept them from sitting with the real member(s) of the cast. Upon learning that the apes had been barred from the premiere, Tommy Wiseau promised to support the event. Everything went better than expected.

There were rumors during the release that Wiseau would be reprimanded for his direct violation of Hays Code in effect at the time. However, the Motion Picture Association board had actually passed an amendment to the Production Code a few days prior that reduced it to the single line "The Room rocks." With that amendment, the Production Code Administration had no further objection to the gratuitous sex, language, and violence. The recent DVD release gives it a rating of "G for Classic", so get the family together and enjoy!

Reception and legacy

Simian #7, the ape who played Peter, won a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Supporting Actor.

The film currently holds an approval rating of 99% on Rotten Tomatoes. The one critic who dared not give it a positive review was promptly hunted down and burned at the stake to set an example for anyone else trying to express unpopular opinions in Wiseau's turf.

The Room has had a lasting impact on cinema, as one would expect such an undisputed classic to have. It inspired the equally-acclaimed film Citizen Kong, and helped bring the masterpiece Troll 2 back from obscurity. In 2082, reanimated cyborg Steven Spielberg spent $60,500 to buy the severed nose of Wiseau's corpse; he commented, "This man's nose will go over my typewriter to remind me that quality in movies comes first."

Controversy was caused when picture terrorist Ted Turner threatened to desecrate the film's prestige by "re-colorizing" it so that it would appeal to the stoner hippies of today who don't understand art. And lately, ignorant computer geeks have been attempting to create an anti-The Room sentiment by pointing out nonexistent "errors and inconsistencies" compiled from obviously fascist sources like it was an overrated war film. "Yes," quoted Tommy Wiseau Jr., Wiseau's second cousin twice removed, "Perhaps developing standards are The Room's only enemy, but it will forever live on in the hearts of the few remaining sane men on the planet."

References

↑ Many have argued that due to its supposedly prolonged sex scenes and supposedly lacking plot and characters, The Room more closely resembles a pornographic film than a cinematic work. Ironically, these are the same people who watched Natalie Portman repeatedly finger herself in Black Swan and called it art.
↑ Strange considering they're not even married.
↑ The only character with any hint of a last name.
↑ This line nearly prompted an NC-17 rating for the film.
↑ The television was later nominated for an Oscar and recruited to star in the The Room musical OH HAI!: The Rise of Chris-R.