The Worst Film I've Ever Seen (featuring The Room)

So this whole business started with one of Roly's friends saying he thought You Were Never Really Here was the worst film he'd ever seen. I was baffled. The WORST?? It got me thinking - what do people rate as the worst film they've ever seen?

I conducted a short, mostly net-based, survey and the results were intriguing. Putting aside the person who went for a TV show and the one who chose The 1989 Melbourne Cup, they broadly fell into two categories - actually terrible films (i.e. low tech, shit writing & acting, etc) OR average to good films that people had a personal aversion to.

Some I'd never heard of - I've only seen 15 from a total of 40, though I may have blanked on one or two due to the abysmal nature of them. There were some odd choices for me - The Wrestler and Rain Man are not bad and Fight Club is great but, again, it's all subjective. If I had to watch one of these films that I hadn't yet seen, I'd probably go for The Dungeonmaster or Snakes on a Plane, mainly to get a bead on their awfulness.

It's also a little strange that there were so many sequels -  seven of them, and a couple of remakes. Did some people actually like the first one or two but got really pissed off with the follow-ups? (Disclaimer - I know one of these was an unavoidable family situation where the person actually left halfway through).

Most of the films were discrete, bar two - Sharknado (which two people hated) and The Room (which got four 'votes'). So I watched The Room. And soon after wished I hadn't. So bad it's good? Don't even fucking try me. It's not really even a film. It's like the most driven but least talented of my film school colleagues wrote a script and then gave it to a misogynistic truckie to direct. Oh, and then asked their mates if they knew any women who didn't pass the entry audition at 'generic acting school' but would like to do some soft-core grummer with a couple of weirdos. I wonder how long that short list was.

The lighting made it look like it was shot on a VHS-camcorder (even though it was apparently 35mm!) and the writing reeks of mundanity, with exchanges like this - "Did you like last night?" "Yes, I did." "Ha ha ha." "Can I get you anything?" "Mm-mm, I have to go now." "OK, bye." "Bye." And that's one of the better ones. The acting is roundly terrible, with special mention to the main man, Tommy Wiseau. It's almost as if he's playing a guy acting badly. The others are just bog-standard shit but Wiseau takes it to another level. He's fucking Novichok. The story, if we can call it a story, is amazing in that it's confusing and simple at the same time. Stripped down, it's a tale of trust and betrayal. Stripped up, it's losers in tuxedos tossing grid-iron balls around. Plot strands start and then vanish. And the 'sex' scenes. Three of them in the first 20 minutes or so by my count, and personally, Ricky Gervais's bath pics do more for me.

What a crime against film The Room is. That said, I'd still take it over Grease any day.


Oh, and here's the full list:

The Love Guru 

The Incredible Melting Man

A.I.

Suicide Squad

The Village

I am the Pretty Thing that Lives in the House

The Room

Snakes on a Plane

Rain Man

Crazy Hong Kong

The Bachelor (TV show??)

Eyes Wide Shut

On Deadly Ground

Mannequin

Superman IV: The Quest for Peace

Funny People

Fight Club

Pineapple Express

The Mummy

Funny Games (2007)

The Melbourne Cup 1989 !?!?

Shanghai Knights

The Wrestler

Left Behind

Lust in the Dust

Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-li

Commandments

Grown-ups 2

Twister

The Air Up There

The Dungeonmaster

Sharknado

Jackass 2

Child’s Play

Human Centipede 3

Final Destination

Cube 2: Hypercube

Escape Plan 2: Hades

Eat, Pray, Love

The Tree of Life 

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The Girl in the Fog

I went to the Paradiso in Northbridge with Merv to see La Ragazza nella Nebbia (or The Girl in the Fog), which is part of the Italian Film Festival. This was the first time I'd been to the Paradiso in about 12 years and I reckon it's still the best looking cinema in Perth. It appears to have been taken over by the Palace Cinema chain (as opposed to its old umbrella, Luna Palace cinemas) and joins the new Raine Square complex as the two Perth branches. One possibly ominous note - lots of wine glasses, not so many choc bombs. Mmmm, I'll have a glass of gentrification, thanks.

Anyway, the film. This is an adaptation of the novel of the same name, written by Donato Carrisi. This geezer also went and wrote the screenplay AND directed the film. While this might work on the odd occasion - e.g. Tom Stoppard adapting and directing Rosencrantz and Guildenstren are Dead - it's usually a sleeveless errand. Carrisi may be a good thriller author but he needs to polish his directorial skills a tad. There were pacing issues and some odd decisions regarding mood and tension-building ('fog' is in the title but he makes precious little out of the actual stuff, save for a nice shot of the detective entering an old hotel). To give him his dues, it is only his first crack at directing. He'll likely improve.

More surprisingly though, considering Carrisi wrote the source text, he seems to have some narrative errors on his hands. The teacher (Alessio Boni) shows up at class not long after his wife mentions him losing his job. A quiet street issue turns out to be irrelevant when a flashback contradicts the point detective Vogel (Tony Servillo) tries to make. And are we to believe a police officer caught with dodgy evidence proves the same officer planted other evidence, thus totally exonerating the prime suspect? Long bows are drawn in this film. And we haven't even got to the face-slapping final 'reveal', which isn't only nailed on from the start but also as unsatisfying as the film overall.

While I thought the angle of using the media as a way to manipulate the public and the police hierarchy was neat, this wasn't enough to save the film. One of the major flaws is the lack of a sympathetic character to identify with. Everyone is some sort of twat, whether they're pro- or an-tagonists. The women are written as religious nutters, useless cops or victims; and the flashbacks of the crime are on the leering side of tastelessness.

All in all, a vanity project that didn't work. Fancy that, eh.

See also:

David Fincher's Gone Girl (2014) for a much better expose of the rubber-necking of the great unwashed and Matteo Garrone's Gomorrah (2008), a top-notch Italian film adaptation of a novel NOT directed by its author (but starring Toni Servillo).