Movie Info
Movie Name: The Disaster Artist
Studio: New Line Cinema
Genre(s): Comedy/Drama
Release Date(s): March 12, 2017 (South by Southwest)/December 1, 2017 (US)
MPAA Rating: R
We can do this!
Greg Sestero (Dave Franco) is a young actor with dreams of hitting the big times. When he is inspired by a fearless actor named Tommy Wiseau (James Franco), Greg embarks on a journey from San Francisco to Hollywood in the hopes of stardom. When it becomes obvious that success isn’t just handed to an actor, Greg and Tommy set out to make their own movie, but The Room might be more than both Tommy and Greg ever expected!
Directed by James Franco, The Disaster Artist is a comedy adaptation of the making of the cult film The Room (2003). The movie is an adaptation of the 2013 book The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room, the Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made by Greg Sestero and Tom Bissell. It received critical praise and an Academy Award nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay.
Get my good side
The Room is unwatchable. It is so bad, but not even so bad it is good. It is worth watching in chunks, but sitting down and watching it in chunks is doable. In fact, I’d recommend at least watching clips of the film on YouTube before seeing the movie if nothing else.
I’m not sure how to consider The Disaster Artist. It is comedy for the most part but there is a lot of tragic stuff going on in the movie…but it isn’t a dark comedy. You could argue it is inspirational, but it doesn’t feel like it is since the star doesn’t obtain his real goals. A similar themed movie is the documentary American Movie which does essentially the same thing and does feel inspirational. Here, I feel a little dirty because it feels like the subjects are just being made fun of in a lot of ways.
The casting is genius. I’m not even a big James Franco fan, but he nails the Tommy Wiseau persona and manages to evolve it into his own character and not just an imitation. James’ brother Dave plays the rather dim Greg Sestero who puts up with Wiseau’s weirdness longer than it seems humanly possible. They are joined by Dave’s real wife Alison Brie, Seth Rogen, Ari Graynor, Josh Hutcherson, and Jackie Weaver.
I did it for you!
The Disaster Artist goes a long way to recreate The Room which probably spent less time creating itself. The movie banks on the imitation and the cast to look and feel like this bizarre monster of a movie that Wiseau created. It really succeeds in this sense. The movie treats you to side by side comparisons at the end to see how close the actors nailed recreating the scenes.
The Disaster Artist is a fun movie that probably isn’t as deep as it would like to be. If they had made it darker, it would have lost its fun, but in making it light, it feels a bit too “fluffy” at points. Still, it isn’t too saccharine or sweet that you can’t enjoy it for what it is. Just remember to say “Hey, Mark”.
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