Movies: Star Wars VIII The Last Jedi, for those who have seen it! (SPOILERS)

[Shareefruck]

Oh, I see. Forgive me for trying to make sense of your disagreement (over a film that you both consider atrocious). Carry on, then.

It's an atrociously made film that happens to be very, very good.

I have never bought into the argument that The Room is so bad it's actually brilliant theory. It's not using arbitrary criteria, it's the truth. Just because it's bad doesn't mean it gets to be judged by a different set of values. Why does The Room deserve to be isolated from the criteria that make it bad while other criticized films (such as TLJ) aren't allowed such a free pass.

In my opinion, if every moment that took place in The Room happened to be an intentional creative decision made by a filmmaker deliberately trying to generate the effect that it already did anyways, The Room would be deservedly intellectualized and praised as a dizzyingly inspired surreal satire of bad taste, misplaced ambitions, and narcissism. Instead, it was accidentally made by Tommy Wiseau because he's an idiot. I absolutely think that has more objective worth than the mostly bland nothing that was The Last Jedi, regardless of whether or not it checks the boxes off of traditional movie standards. I disagree that they represent the truth in every instance.

And for the record, I typically dislike the "so bad they're good" movies and find their appeal to be generally shallow. The Room strangely comes together perfectly, almost feeling oddly poetic in how misguided it is, though.

 

[Bjorn Le]

It's an atrociously made film that happens to be very, very good.

In my opinion, if every moment that took place in The Room happened to be an intentional creative decision made by a filmmaker deliberately trying to generate the effect that it already did anyways, The Room would be deservedly intellectualized and praised as a dizzyingly inspired surreal satire of bad taste, misplaced ambitions, and narcissism. Instead, it was accidentally made by Tommy Wiseau because he's an idiot. I absolutely think that has more objective worth than the mostly bland nothing that was The Last Jedi, regardless of whether or not it checks the boxes off of traditional movie standards.

And for the record, I typically dislike the "so bad they're good" movies.

The Room couldn't have been made as satire. It's so entertaining because it was made as a serious movie. Wiseau didn't stumble upon a brilliant movie, he made a horrible one that became so bad it became legendary. It doesn't make it a good movie. It makes it an objectively bad movie that was so bad it's fun to watch. Don't over think it.

 

[Shareefruck]

The Room couldn't have been made as satire. It's so entertaining because it was made as a serious movie. Wiseau didn't stumble upon a brilliant movie, he made a horrible one that became so bad it became legendary. It doesn't make it a good movie. It makes it an objectively bad movie that was so bad it's fun to watch. Don't over think it.

What difference does it make if the effect is the same?

 

[Bjorn Le]

What difference does it make if the effect is the same?

Because the entertainment value is derived from how bad it is. And that entertainment is not the same thing as being good. A movie can be entertaining but not "good." Popcorn flic is a term that exists for a reason. The Room is a special type of bad movie that is enjoyable that isn't a popcorn flic, but that doesn't make it good.

 

[Shareefruck]

Because the entertainment value is derived from how bad it is. And that entertainment is not the same thing as being good. A movie can be entertaining but not "good." Popcorn flic is a term that exists for a reason. The Room is a special type of bad movie that is enjoyable that isn't a popcorn flic, but that doesn't make it good.

The movie reveals things about Wiseau that communicate the same hysterical incisiveness and tragedy that an on-point satire would. I do not like it purely because "ha-ha, bad acting", because that can only take you so far (and feels like mean-spiritedness for its own sake). I like it because I'm intellectually amused by what it says about Wiseau as a person, and the badness of it has a unique rhythm to it that almost feels like perfectly timed comedic beats. It holds together just fine.

Ultimately, it comes down to satisfaction. Things typically classified as entertainment like popcorn flicks are considered entertaining because they're compulsive, but they're never really capable of being that emotionally satisfying, inspiring, or memorable. This is, and that's all that matters when discussing how good something is, not how much work went into it, IMO.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

Okay, what exactly would the movie be satirizing?

Claudette's cancer diagnosis?

Mark trying to murder Peter out of the blue?

The inclusion of multiple sex scenes that serve very little purpose?

Chris-R existing at all?

What about them having to recast Peter and not making any kind of effort to lampshade it?

Denny meaning to be a mentally challenged teenager but not telling the actor about it?

I think it is virtually impossible to make any determination about the movie if it was a legitimate attempt at satire because of the way it was interpreted in its current form.

 

[Shareefruck]

Okay, what exactly would the movie be satirizing?

Claudette's cancer diagnosis?

Mark trying to murder Peter out of the blue?

The inclusion of multiple sex scenes that serve very little purpose?

Chris-R existing at all?

What about them having to recast Peter and not making any kind of effort to lampshade it?

Denny meaning to be a mentally challenged teenager but not telling the actor about it?

I think it is virtually impossible to make any determination about the movie if it was a legitimate attempt at satire because of the way it was interpreted in its current form.

It has the same effect as if it were satirizing Wiseau as the creative mind behind the movie as it's unfolding, not the specific events within the movie. Every misguided moment says something about Wiseau that is revealing, dumb-founding, sincere/honest, yet strangely fascinating, with perfect comedic beats punctuating everything.

Nobody made it a satire, it just happened to have that effect organically.

 

[ArGarBarGar]

It has the same effect as if it were satirizing Wiseau as the creative mind behind the movie as it's unfolding, not the specific events within the movie. Every misguided moment says something about Wiseau that is revealing, dumb-founding, sincere/honest, yet strangely fascinating.

I don't see you being able to satirize a nobody director with the same beats. I don't know how you could even demonstrate that as a possibility when all we have is the movie that we know is from a director who really wanted to make something great and failed miserably.

 

[Shareefruck]

I don't see you being able to satirize a nobody director with the same beats. I don't know how you could even demonstrate that as a possibility when all we have is the movie that we know is from a director who really wanted to make something great and failed miserably.

I don't know what you mean or why that would matter. My point is that the movie ends up having the same effectiveness and communicates the same biting incisiveness and clarity, without there being any creative behind it that intended it. Whether that technically would be a satire of a type of person that we see all the time or if it's just a character study of some weird one-off alien, it doesn't really matter.

Personally, I have significantly more appreciation for the fact that that exists than certain well made movies that come out every year that don't quite reach such heights.

 

[KingBran]

This makes zero sense. How does the quality of Clone Wars vindicate the prequels? You’re off your rocker.

There’s been a bizarre effort among younger millennials to validate their love of the prequels. See: the ludicrous “ring theory.” And it’s hilarious. The prequels are objectively terrible films by every metric of filmmaking. Even the CGI has aged poorly.

This only proves that Star Wars is nostalgia poisoned media. The Gen Xers and old millennials who saw RotJ as children never understood how bad it was. And the young millennials who saw the prequels as children will never understand how bad they were. Star Wars is almost impossible to discuss objectively at this point because it’s so overtuned at drawing in children.

Haha. That's your defense? Its widely accepted by the SW community and the people who actually follow SW that the prequels stories were very good. They were original true to the SW universe. Bad acting and scripting ruined the movies. That doesn't make the actual story bad. The fact that you cannot differentiate that and just blame the fact that some people really liked / accept the stories they told on an entire generation of people just sounds really whiny. Like someone took your lollypop because you don't share the same opinion. Well the true, hardcore SW fans accept the prequels for what they were. Great story with lots of great characters with lots of bad acting and scripting.

Has absolutely nothing to do with what generation of human being you are. What a super thin and hilarious argument.

 

[Finlandia WOAT]

I think that it only makes sense to value objective ideas like "good acting" or "good writing" and attribute them to good movies in the first place because you expect that success in those areas translates into something that is capable of having a stronger effect. But if that assumption broadly isn't the case and demonstrably falls apart with an example like The Room, using such arbitrary criteria to assess what is "objectively good" couldn't make any less sense, IMO.

That The Room only works when you view it in a way unintended by the creators would make it an exception that proves the rule, not proof against the rule.

 

[Shareefruck]

That The Room only works when you view it in a way unintended by the creators would make it an exception that proves the rule, not proof against the rule.

I don't see what difference that makes or why that would be the case, personally. What matters in a movie to me is what ends up being communicated, not what was intended.

Filmmakers often encounter happy accidents that elevate a film, but if it works, you don't dismiss its value just because it wasn't intended. To me, this is just the same thing on a more extreme scale, as if the universe created a very good movie to no credit of the filmmaker.

It seems like a case of respecting standards for the sake of respecting standards rather than due to their actual worth.

While I haven't seen the Disaster Artist yet, I would be surprised if it communicates anything that watching The Room itself doesn't already communicate, let alone as effectively, yet it should be considered a better movie by default simply because it's intentional and competent on a technical level? Certainly doesn't sit well with me or feel logical. The only reason they're relevant in the first place is because they tend to improve effectiveness and tend to hold up better than superficial whims and hang-ups.

 

[No Fun Shogun]

Haha. That's your defense? Its widely accepted by the SW community and the people who actually follow SW that the prequels stories were very good. They were original true to the SW universe. Bad acting and scripting ruined the movies. That doesn't make the actual story bad. The fact that you cannot differentiate that and just blame the fact that some people really liked / accept the stories they told on an entire generation of people just sounds really whiny. Like someone took your lollypop because you don't share the same opinion. Well the true, hardcore SW fans accept the prequels for what they were. Great story with lots of great characters with lots of bad acting and scripting.

Has absolutely nothing to do with what generation of human being you are. What a super thin and hilarious argument.

The prequel stories were good? What? I mean, if you get really generic, any movie's story is good then. The execution is where everything is done and there isn't some inherent core component of the prequels that doesn't exist in the sequels or any movie from the most base of generic settings.

Anyone's absolutely free to dislike the Disney films, but let's seriously not get crazy and somehow get nostalgic about the absolute messes that were the prequels. They were dull and dragged out and full of messes of character motivations and reasonings. Heck, I've got a great idea for a story myself. But when it comes time for ink to meet paper, it just becomes a generic wash. But the story's great, believe me!

And sorry, talking about how real, actual, hardcore Star Wars fans liking something just comes off as a no true Scotsman kind of statement. Plenty of hardcore Star Wars fans wish that the prequels would just be retconned out entirely just as there are plenty that wish that the franchise could be reset right now as well.

The quality of ancillary material doesn't fix the original sources for them, or vice versa.

 

[KingBran]

The prequel stories were good? What? I mean, if you get really generic, any movie's story is good then. The execution is where everything is done and there isn't some inherent core component of the prequels that doesn't exist in the sequels or any movie from the most base of generic settings.

Anyone's absolutely free to dislike the Disney films, but let's seriously not get crazy and somehow get nostalgic about the absolute messes that were the prequels. They were dull and dragged out and full of messes of character motivations and reasonings. Heck, I've got a great idea for a story myself. But when it comes time for ink to meet paper, it just becomes a generic wash. But the story's great, believe me!

And sorry, talking about how real, actual, hardcore Star Wars fans liking something just comes off as a no true Scotsman kind of statement. Plenty of hardcore Star Wars fans wish that the prequels would just be retconned out entirely just as there are plenty that wish that the franchise could be reset right now as well.

The quality of ancillary material doesn't fix the original sources for them, or vice versa.

Is that the only defense people have is nostalgia? Or saying a certain generation this or that, or that someones predictions didn't come to light. No I am not saying that you said all that. Let me be clear.

I just find a lot of these arguments very think and uber opinionized with a real lack of rationality.

The stories of the prequels were great. Lots of people think so. There so much more to them than the bad acting and scripting. I get it, that ruined it for a lot of people. But how Vader became vader, the senate, the state of the galaxy, the atmosphere... everything was so Star Wars and such a great, epic story to tell! It really isn't generic of a story at all. Pretty dang original when they came out.

We can argue what a "real, hardcore" SW fan is all day. But picking on an entire trilogy and finding nothing good or important about it is just blind hate to be one of the 'cool kids' and not appreciating what they did for the franchise.

100% bad acting / scripting can ruin a movie. I cringe anytime I have to watch Attack of the Clones. I am just constantly waiting for the 'sound of music' scene where Anakin and Padme are frolicking in the field of flowers and his cheesy lines in front of the fireplace. SO. EFFING. BAD. Oh my goodness that movie is hard to watch.

But the overall theme, how large the galaxy feels, the characters and their purpose, the state of the galaxy, how things play out.... everything is so well done and thought out. Not a lot of plot holes like TLJ... Just great stories that were not done well on screen.

 

[Spring in Fialta]

I don't see what difference that makes or why that would be the case, personally. What matters in a movie to me is what ends up being communicated, not what was intended.

Filmmakers often encounter happy accidents that elevate a film, but if it works, you don't dismiss its value just because it wasn't intended. To me, this is just the same thing on a more extreme scale, as if the universe created a very good movie to no credit of the filmmaker.

It seems like a case of respecting standards for the sake of respecting standards rather than due to their actual worth.

While I haven't seen the Disaster Artist yet, I would be surprised if it communicates anything that watching The Room itself doesn't already communicate, let alone as effectively, yet it should be considered a better movie by default simply because it's intentional and competent on a technical level? Certainly doesn't sit well with me or feel logical. The only reason they're relevant in the first place is because they tend to improve effectiveness and tend to hold up better than superficial whims and hang-ups.

I think The Room is a better film than The Disaster Artist as well and for all your explanations, your attachment to The Room still comes about because of how misguided (in and of itself a negative quality, in any credible sense) and oblivious it is. How does that not fall into the '' So bad it's good '' category, despite how you don't like the genre and the movie does blow the idea to pieces? I think Finlandia WOAT is right. Yes, we're talking about a happy accident on a massive scale, but the massive accidents we talk about in revered movies aren't cringy accidents, which The Room is, but for the complete duration of the film.

 

[Finlandia WOAT]

I don't see what difference that makes or why that would be the case, personally. What matters in a movie to me is what ends up being communicated, not what was intended.

Filmmakers often encounter happy accidents that elevate a film, but if it works, you don't dismiss its value just because it wasn't intended. .

Because my problem is with your wide sweeping conclusion. The Room isn't well acted, written, directed, edited, etc, but is a "good" movie. Ergo, those criteria don't matter in determining. if a film is good.

That falls apart when you consider the fact The Room only works if you view it as a way unintended- that Wisseau lucked into it. If you consider it in the way he intended, those criteria are objectively awful and make an objectively awful film.

It's like concluding that recipes are worthless from the one time a 5 year old threw everything in the kitchen pantry into an oven, baked for an hour at 500 degrees, and somehow produced something edible.

 

[No Fun Shogun]

No, nostalgia isn't the only thing. I mentioned in my post that I thought that the prequels stories were trash and that they were chock full of horrible storylines, plot elements, character motivations, and the like. In other words, everything that you judge a story by, and add to that objectively boring and repetitive scene composition during dialogue sections of the movie that I have mentioned in the past as well.

That being said, I never claimed that there was nothing good about them. I do agree that the scale of the galaxy was great, albeit one that repetitively went to same backwater planet for each of the three movies, but the point I would make about the prequels would be the point that I make against the EU. There are nuggets of good surrounding by piles of utter trash, so for all intents and purposes I don't waste much time highlighting the good when they were vastly outnumbered by the bad. Not to mention that it seems kind of odd to say that people aren't being rational about their dislike of the prequels when essentially this entire topic has been posters to various degrees tearing TLJ to shreds over literally everything, both big and small. Saying plenty of fans liked something as a defense when we're in a topic with plenty of fans both liked and disliked TLJ seems to be missing the point.

And scripting is part of the story. Saying that something had a good core story when you admitted that an entire film was cringe-worthy doesn't really make an argument that there's a good foundation.

 

[Shareefruck]

I think The Room is a better film than The Disaster Artist as well and for all your explanations, your attachment to The Room still comes about because of how misguided (in and of itself a negative quality, in any credible sense) and oblivious it is. How does that not fall into the '' So bad it's good '' category, despite how you don't like the genre and the movie does blow the idea to pieces? I think Finlandia WOAT is right. Yes, we're talking about a happy accident on a massive scale, but the massive accidents we talk about in revered movies aren't cringy accidents, which The Room is, but for the complete duration of the film.

Because my problem is with your wide sweeping conclusion. The Room isn't well acted, written, directed, edited, etc, but is a "good" movie. Ergo, those criteria don't matter in determining. if a film is good.

That falls apart when you consider the fact The Room only works if you view it as a way unintended- that Wisseau lucked into it. If you consider it in the way he intended, those criteria are objectively awful and make an objectively awful film.

It's like concluding that recipes are worthless from the one time a 5 year old threw everything in the kitchen pantry into an oven, baked for an hour at 500 degrees, and somehow produced something edible.

Whether or not it's made with talent and good sense/judgment is not in dispute-- The Room isn't either of those things. If the sentiment was "So oblivious and tasteless that it's revealing and rewarding", I would fully agree with that classification. My issue is with rigidly defining the term "good" as something that is traditionally well made and requires talent and meaningful motivations rather than simply something that is meaningfully rewarding, effective, and worthy of approval. Something being traditionally well made and having sensible intentions is just the most common and reliable means to that end, not the thing that has inherent value in the first place, IMO. Without that desirable end, it would be pointless, but with it, it's incredibly valuable as a possible and fairly reliable way of doing it.

I don't think I've communicated that traditional standards are inherently not useful or don't usually result in something more worthwhile. If I have, I've misspoken. I'm only arguing that it isn't the only way to get to something worthwhile, and should not be viewed as the defacto gospel way to measure whether or not something has.

A more fitting analogy, I think, would be that if a kid randomly threw everything in the kitchen pantry into the oven and somehow produced something that tasted as good or better than anything else, it would be insane to deny that it's good food simply on the basis that it didn't follow a recipe (or contradicts principles laid out in the recipe). Nobody is denying that recipes can be useful in making something good, just that the results that often come from following the recipe is what matters, not really the recipe itself. The recipe (and the fact that what was done didn't adhere to it) is a worthless consideration in the context of the thing that was made, in that instance.

Sure, there may be some inherent lost value in the wonder involved in just the fact that someone thought to do it and was able to successfully and intentionally, but there is also wonder involved in the fact that someone was able to without thinking to, through blind luck. But in my opinion, the wonder over the effectiveness of the result itself dwarfs either of those anyways. If it works, it works.

 

[Shareefruck]

Yes, we're talking about a happy accident on a massive scale, but the massive accidents we talk about in revered movies aren't cringy accidents, which The Room is, but for the complete duration of the film.

What difference does it make if it's cringey or not, though? Cringey-ness can be used as an effective tool, whether intentional or not.

The Office UK is cringey for most of its duration too, only intentionally, and it works great. If it happened accidentally and was a real documentary about a guy named David Brent, it wouldn't be any less good. To make it more similar, if David Brent himself were behind the documentary and hired bad actors/transparently manipulated it to try to make him look like a hero, and the same point came across just as effectively to the viewer, that could potentially work too.

 

[Osprey]

I watched The Room for the first time last night. Assuming that I watched the right film (because it didn't have space battles, droids or emo villains), I am now educated on it and finally prepared to dive into this discussion. [cracks knuckles] Now, if I can just quickly figure out what it has to do with The Last Jedi, we can get started...

 

[Shareefruck]

If it can be moved into its own thread (or the Disaster Artist thread, I guess), that would be great, but honestly, it's a more interesting discussion than whether or not the events in The Last Jedi are plausible anyways.

 

[Osprey]

If it can be moved into its own thread, that would be great, but honestly, it's a more interesting discussion than whether or not the events in The Last Jedi are plausible anyways.

I wasn't complaining. It's an interesting discussion, I agree. I find it entertaining that you're debating The Room so seriously.

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

I agree that the prequels had good story and characters but lacked execution and I disagree that being in your 20's or 30's clouds your judgement

 

[HanSolo]

Did not expect to open this and see a spirited debate about The Room.

 

[Spring in Fialta]

Whether or not it's made with talent and good sense/judgment is not in dispute-- The Room isn't either of those things. If the sentiment was "So oblivious and tasteless that it's revealing and rewarding", I would fully agree with that classification. My issue is with rigidly defining the term "good" as something that is traditionally well made and requires talent and meaningful motivations rather than simply something that is meaningfully rewarding, effective, and worthy of approval. Something being traditionally well made and having sensible intentions is just the most common and reliable means to that end, not the thing that has inherent value in the first place, IMO. Without that desirable end, it would be pointless, but with it, it's incredibly valuable as a possible and fairly reliable way of doing it.

I don't think I've communicated that traditional standards are inherently not useful or don't usually result in something more worthwhile. If I have, I've misspoken. I'm only arguing that it isn't the only way to get to something worthwhile, and should not be viewed as the defacto gospel way to measure whether or not something has.

A more fitting analogy, I think, would be that if a kid randomly threw everything in the kitchen pantry into the oven and somehow produced something that tasted as good or better than anything else, it would be insane to deny that it's good food simply on the basis that it didn't follow a recipe (or contradicts principles laid out in the recipe). Nobody is denying that recipes can be useful in making something good, just that the results that often come from following the recipe is what matters, not really the recipe itself. The recipe (and the fact that what was done didn't adhere to it) is a worthless consideration in the context of the thing that was made, in that instance.

Sure, there may be some inherent lost value in the wonder involved in just the fact that someone thought to do it and was able to successfully and intentionally, but there is also wonder involved in the fact that someone was able to without thinking to, through blind luck. But in my opinion, the wonder over the effectiveness of the result itself dwarfs either of those anyways. If it works, it works.

The thing is, I don't really have a gripe with the sentiment you're standing behind, and I tend to agree with it as well, my gripe is with how you rationalize that sentiment. I do think that The Room is a special case in the '' so bad it's good '' department but it doesn't separate itself from that label, it just excels within it, and is a few notches above all the movies which are in that category. Does it make it a more rewarding experience? Absolutely. But it doesn't give it a separate standard. The reason why you love the movie isn't because the writing, the acting or it's technical prowess moves you in and of itself. It moves you specifically because of it's poor quality. That's still a poor film, even if you find that experience more rewarding then what you get with more traditionally competent movies. I just see it as finding joy and a pay-off in poorly-made art, but it still doesn't mean it's well-made, just that there's value in it. I think there's a difference between value/rewards and whether the movie is good, personally.