OVP: The Disaster Artist (2017)

Film: The Disaster Artist (2017)
Stars: James Franco, Dave Franco, Seth Rogen, Alison Brie, Ari Graynor, Josh Hutcherson, Jacki Weaver
Director: James Franco
Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Adapted Screenplay)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 1/5 stars

I have never seen The Room.  I feel like I needed to get that out of the way before I started this review, because so much of what seemed to inspire love for The Disaster Artist (it was a surprisingly packed theater for a Saturday matinee, and one that was predominantly male and under 40, which is again a shock for such a time of day) seemed to stem from inside jokes in the picture.  The end credits of the movie, in fact, show the Francos' film seen next to the legendarily awful picture by Tommy Wiseau.  The reasons I've never seen The Room are A) I am almost certainly asleep at midnight, even on a Saturday, and if I'm not I better be within 50 feet of my bed or couch and B) I'm not a huge fan of the hate viewing.  I don't love watching mediocre movies (exception to the rule: I kind of have a thing for campy Vincent Price or Universal Monster horror films), as there are so many good movies, books, TV, or the like that I'll never have enough time to see that why should I make time for something truly terrible?  One could argue there's an experience to be had in seeing The Room, and perhaps someday I'll give it a try, but I'll start by saying the celebration of mediocrity is "too hip" for me, and I've never gotten the point.

(Spoilers Ahead) As a result, I will say that about twenty minutes into The Disaster Artist I realized that I was not going to be a fan.  Because a lot of the precipice of The Disaster Artist, and truly the ending of the film, is centered around the idea that we should celebrate people's success, even if they truly don't deserve it.  The film centers around Tommy Wiseau (James Franco) and Greg Sestero (Dave Franco), two real-life figures who went to Hollywood to try and succeed, but like so many ultimately found that they didn't have connections or the talent to be able to flourish in the entertainment business.  As a result, thanks to an enormous sum of money that Wiseau has access to (one of several mysteries that remain annoying unanswered in the picture), they create a movie called The Room, funded for nearly $6 million, that is clearly utter garbage, but filled with aspiring actors and film professionals that are also struggling to get a big break in a real movie.  This is where the bulk of the buzzy cast comes from-Rogen, Weaver, Graynor, Hutcherson, Zac Efron...it's a cavalcade of Hollywood players impersonating "nobodies" onscreen...perhaps a cruel joke as Franco could have used this time to maybe throw in some actors who could use big breaks similar to what Wiseau & Sestero desperately craved, but I digress.

Anyway, the film's central theme is predicated on either looking on in awe as a cult classic movie is made, or specifically what your impression of Wiseau as a film character is.  Franco's mannerisms as him seem incredibly accurate (I watched some tapes of him after the movie, and it's a dead-on impersonation), but let's not confuse mimicry for fine acting, because that's not what's going on here.  Franco's Wiseau is unknowable, but he shouldn't be-he might be a mystery in real life, but Franco should have an understanding of what the character knows and he doesn't seem to get there.  Is he desperately in love with Greg, or does he suffer from mental health issues?  Wiseau feels like he's deranged in Franco's eyes, someone who isn't necessarily dangerous but clearly has no idea of social cues and needs professional help.  It feels insulting to continually make fun of such a person, which is what the movie does.  Quite frankly, it crosses the line into areas that made me very uncomfortable, getting cheap laughs off of the behavior of someone who seems unwell.  Wiseau's final moments, where he is basically tricked into enjoying the reaction of the audience (who thinks his dramatic picture is a mocking joke) should be heartbreaking, but the way that Franco frames it is uplifting, as if to celebrate that people loathe his art.  Some have speculated in real-life that Wiseau is a performance piece, someone who has created a persona that has continued for decades in a similar mode to that temporarily undertaken by Joaquin Phoenix or Andy Kaufman, but there's no hints of that in The Disaster Artist.  Instead, it just feels cruel, and reliant on a cliched narrative to get its point across in the process

Without some sort of understanding of Wiseau's motivations or reasonings, the movie fails.  James Franco's work is all surface-level, technical skill but with no investment other than doing a reliably good impression.  His brother Dave, who has never exhibited the same acting chops as James, gets a more knowable character but even there he fails.  We never get an understanding of whether or not Greg resented Wiseau taking away his more conventional career path (there's a scene in the film where the real-life Bryan Cranston offers Greg a guest spot on Malcolm in the Middle, a huge break for an aspiring actor, but Wiseau demands that Greg turn it down and continue on their film), or why Greg seemed to like Tommy.  Honestly-a movie centered around a friendship should have a better understanding of why they are friends, but Dave Franco's work here is too 1-dimensional & cheeky and you leave without any understanding of Greg, whose book the picture is based off of (and as a result, should be an easier task for an actor).  About the only person who is passably good in the film is Weaver, who manages to sell a difficult and schmaltzy scene where she points out why her a struggling actor on the set who could have a normal life with her husband, is willing to endure the madness of the movie-because it's as close as she'll ever get to realizing her dream of being a professional actor.  That's clearly the message The Disaster Artist is trying to achieve-that a warped ending to your dream is still a dream fulfilled-but it does so without understanding its characters, plot, or even deserving such credit.