Some movies are so good, they’re good. Some movies are so bad, they’re bad. Some movies are so bad, they’re good. And then there’s The Room, a film so stunningly off-key in every possible way that it’s hard to know what the heck to make of it. Is it a comedy? Is it a tragedy? Does anyone even know anymore? What the heck was anybody THINKING when they actually made it?
The Room has developed such an enthusiastic cult that it was only a matter of time before somebody actually tried to make a genuinely good movie about it. That someone is James Franco, who directs and stars in The Disaster Artist, based on the tell-all book by Greg Sistero and Tom Bissell. The book describes the bizarre process by which auteur Tommy Wiseau produced a film about a man betrayed by the woman he loves, who also finds time to play football in a tuxedo.
The Disaster Artist premiered to rave reviews at SXSW 2017. The rest of us have to wait until December 8, 2017 to see it, but the first trailer premiered today and it’s just plain endearing as hell. The preview focuses entirely on the most iconic and bizarre line of dialogue in the movie, and the absurd number of takes it took to get it “right,” and in just 90 short seconds you might just find yourself wrapped up in The Room‘s spell, and understanding how such a strange production came to mean so much to so many people.
Or maybe you’ll think it looks like a movie about a really, really bad movie. And that’s fine too. Take a gander!
Eight 1980s Cartoon Shows That Should NEVER Be Movies:
Top Photo: A24
William Bibbiani (everyone calls him ‘Bibbs’) is Crave’s film content editor and critic. You can hear him every week on The B-Movies Podcast and Canceled Too Soon, and watch him on the weekly YouTube series What the Flick. Follow his rantings on Twitter at @WilliamBibbiani.
Eight 1980s Cartoon Shows That Should NEVER Be Movies
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Beverly Hills Teens
Bevery Hills Teen was an animated teen soap opera about kids who were rich. Ridiculously, cartoonishly rich. That's the whole gag. Look at how much better, funnier and cooler they are because they've inherited their parents' wealth. Thanks, 1980s.
Photo: DIC Entertainment
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Denver, the Last Dinosaur
The last dinosaur has awoken, and he wears sunglasses and plays guitar and gets into wacky misadventures. Denver, the Last Dinosaur was trying so hard to create a marketable, "hip" character that it basically punched itself in the face.
Photo: World Events Productions
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Gilligan's Planet
The castaways of Gilligan's Island could build just about anything... except a boat. So this animated spin-off in which they built a wooden spaceship was just too absurd to exist. But exist it nevertheless did.
Photo: Filmation
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Laverne and Shirley in the Army
Hey, remember when Laverne and Shirley joined the army? You might, since they actually did that once in their hit sitcom, but there wasn't enough material there to justify a whole animated spin-off... even if The Fonz WAS their mechanic (and he was, he really was).
Photo: Hanna-Barbera
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Pac Man
Everyone knew that the best parts of the old Pac-Man video games were the characters and plot. So this, the first cartoon based on a video game ever, was exactly what we wanted. A weird sitcom alternate reality where Pac-Man and his Pac family routinely ate their local rivals, a gang of ghosts. Surreal and bad. Just bad.
Photo: Hanna-Barbera
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Paw Paws
Hanna-Barbera made a lot of strange choices in their long, storied, career. Paw Paws is right up there as one of the worst. It's a racially insensitive series about cute, cuddly teddy bears who are also Native American stereotypes, protecting their magical totems from evil villains. Not only should it never be a movie, but it should probably never be spoken of again.
Photo: Hanna-Barbera
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Rubik, the Amazing Cube
OH GOD WHAT IS THAT WHY WOULD THEY DO THAT
Photo: Ruby Spears
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Turbo Teen
In one of the stupidest things ever - not just tv shows, but things - a teenager transforms into a car whenever he gets warm. The transformation is kind of like An American Werewolf in London but more horrifying.
Photo: Ruby Spears
