TIFF: "Disaster" is James Franco's Best Performance
Thursday, September 14, 2017 at 11:31PM by Chris Feil
It takes a particular kind of cinematic appreciation to love bad movies. For some, there can be a special charm to misguided clunkers and turkeys of only the best intentions. There is a stark difference between laughing at something and laughing with something. The Room has been one of the more recent additions to the beloved trash cinema pantheon and stands as a fascinating psychological testament to its creator and star Tommy Wiseau. As told on the page by Wiseau’s costar and close friend Greg Sestero, the making of the film was as haphazard as you expect.
The risk of The Disaster Artist, adapted from Sestero’s book, is confusing the affection or morbid fascination of The Room’s fanbase for something mockingly mean-spirited. Luckily the film is built on love for its subject, as directed by James Franco who also stars as Wiseau...
Wiseau’s bizarre creation and limited ability make for natural comic fodder, but the film doesn’t contradict itself in its admiration for Wiseau’s big dreams for the sake of laughs. Like the best films on Hollywood fantasies fulfilled, The Disaster Artist succeeds by wearing its heart on its sleeve. Though yes, it is very funny.
The film itself feels like a labor of love with a cast bursting with cameos. There’s a communal tone here that also helps prevent condescension - imagine Franco calling in a favor to all of the friends he might have experienced Wiseau’s film with. There’s a contagious enthusiasm onscreen, both for The Room’s oddness and the spirit of upstart moviemaking with those that share your dreams.
Despite an arch characterization, James Franco is more loose and limber than he has been in years. In playing someone who lacks self-awareness, Franco has dropped his own that's mired much of his recent work. There’s no mocking in his complete immersion either; the actor nails the interminable dialect and evasive but passionate demeanor that make Wiseau one tough character to crack. You needn’t be familiar with the real man’s peculiarities to be impressed by the performance, though it is often eerily close. The film is safely Franco’s most accessible directorial effort, the dual roles perhaps a crucial element in unlocking the size of Wiseau’s effort.
Dave Franco as Sestero is well suited to his everyman blandness and goodwill, rightfully deferring attention to the elder sibling as straight man to the comedy. While the celebrity cameos become marginally distracting, there is some snappy and effective world-building from one-scene wonders like Sharon Stone and Melanie Griffith (yes, you read that right). But this is largely James Franco’s show and it’s a performance to charm even the most virulent detractors.
The film’s contrived and not-so-historically accurate finale is weighed by feel-good movie machinations that it need not rely on. This is maybe the same lack of confidence that stirred the clunky famous face intro to help sell The Room to the audience. The film isn’t too sure that we’ll know its origins or that Disaster Artist can stand on its own narrative merit. Considering that it wholeheartedly can, and not just for Wiseau fans and familiars, one wishes that they had a little more faith in the audience and themselves.
The Disaster Artist is sweet and brisk biotragicomedy that gets why we love (or should love) its subject. At its best, it may even give some of the crueler Wiseau mocker's some new understanding. Oh hi, crowd pleaser.
Grade: B
Reader Comments (11)
I'm watching "The Room" right now. It truly lives up to it's legend. Flat direction and diagogue. Tonal shifts between lines. Stupendously bad acting. 4 interminable sex scenes that might actually be the same scene four times. It's phenomenal. I have no clue how they managed to spend 60 bucks, let alone 6 million dollars on this.
So looking forward to Franco's take on this.
Sharon Stone and Melanie Griffith?!?!? can we get a Netflix comedy with them ordered up STAT?! :)
Dammit! So sad that Sharon is only in one scene :(
Ez
Me too. I've read Sharon is absolutely terrific in it ( was secretly hoping for a supporting actress nod, she so deserves it ), also read that Franco ( who I'm not particularly fond of, not even in 127 Hours) is staggeringly good , nailing Wiseau"s strange mannerisms. Anyways, the trailer conveys an Ed Wood-esque blend of comedy and pathos. Definitely gonna see it.
Megan Mullally. Is she in this?
Theis - she plays Greg Sestero's mother
Any chance at an Oscar nom for Franco??
One of the curious things to note about THE ROOM as a "so bad its good" movie is that it's one of the very last ones to come about before the bombardment of syfy intentionally bad movies like Birdemic, Sharknado, Megaoctopus and the like, which try to replicate The Room's "success" (as it were) without knowing how or why THE ROOM works as entertainment. And with action movies (often so bad they're good contenders in the '80s) now taking the form of gargantuan depressing bloated messes rather than entertaingly stupid, its harder to find something with the bizarre and confusing aura of how-did-this-get-made nonsense that THE ROOM has.
And while I haven't seen the film, the marketing appears to suggest that Franco *gets* why people love THE ROOM so much. It doesn't appear to be cruel to its subject, but lovingly perplexed.
the 6 million must have mostly gone toward drugs c:
I devoured this book and I can't wait for the film!
This guy is not Ed Wood- who obviously loved making movies - "The Room" is self indulgent vanity production by someone who should have never been allowed in front or behind the camera.