A few years back, we sat through The Room so you wouldn’t have to — and came away convinced it wasn’t just bad, but something closer to an alien transmission decoding human behaviour wrong. That verdict hasn’t aged a day. If anything, it’s more relevant now: Tommy Wiseau’s infamous 2003 flop is back in the headlines, this time over a finished remake that its own creator is reportedly refusing to let audiences see. Here’s our original take on the worst movie ever made — and why it still matters.
Our Original Verdict: The Worst Movie Ever Made
There are bad movies, and then there is The Room, a film so bad, so painful, and so inept, it’s unworthy of calling itself a bad movie. No, my dear friends, this is truly the worst movie ever.
If Troll 2 was dubbed the featherweight champion of bad movies, The Room would certainly be the heavyweight winner. It’s almost impossible to comprehend and could possibly pass as an alien experiment (using human beings as their pawns) gone completely wrong. But don’t let any of these comments discourage you; this is a film you have to see. Dubbed the Citizen Kane of bad films, this cinematic tour-de-force is possibly the worst acted, worst written, worst directed, worst scored and worst produced film I have ever seen.
The Room, a title that has no bearing on the actual film, is a filmic holocaust so bewildering, so melodramatic, so mysterious, and so magically wrong, you’ll be hypnotised and mesmerised by its ability to succeed as a bad film. Put it this way, if you gathered every bad filmmaker in the world into one room and asked them to pen a script, it still wouldn’t be half as bad as Tommy Wiseau’s The Room.
Strangely, it’s impossible not to like the film, and you’ll end up watching it time and time again – if just for the belly-aching laughs. Behind the steering wheel of this great blunder is Tommy Wiseau, a strange personality who wears the hat of actor, director, writer and producer. Tommy doesn’t live in a world where people communicate normally, I’m afraid, and, as a result, his screenplay is filled with the most bizarre dialogue known to man.
Every second conversation is initiated with the words “Oh hi!” and almost all the dialogue is incomprehensible. The script is also characterized by numerous inexplicable mood changes in characters within the same scene. For example, Johnny (Wiseau) could enter a scene angry but change his tone completely when greeting one of his friends. While Wikipedia describes The Room as an American independent romantic drama film, I double-dare anyone to attempt to categorise this film into any genre besides stupid. Despite all this, the film has gone on to develop cult status, resulting in sellout showings across the USA and has even inspired a video game, a travelling stage show, and a book.
Attempting to explain the plot may prove futile, but I’ll try. Tommy Wiseau plays banker Johnny, who is in a rocky relationship with Lisa. She is cheating on him with his best friend, Mark, who spends most of his time chatting and playing football with Johnny and their friends. In between the ten-minute-long sex scenes, there’s a drug lord, a bitter old woman, a psychiatrist, an overgrown perverted boy and a few other oddball characters are thrown into the mix.
Someone out there thought it was a good idea to give Balki from Perfect Strangers a camera. Bad idea. This is a horrible attempt at filmmaking.
IFC.com described Wiseau’s speaking voice in the film as “Borat trying to do an impression of Christopher Walken playing a mental patient.” The Guardian called the film a mix of “Tennessee Williams, Ed Wood, and R. Kelly’s Trapped in the Closet“.
I have my own theory regarding the film’s creation. I’m certain it was created by aliens trying to mimic human beings. It’s the only logical explanation. Only once every millennium, when the planets all align, does something this bad come along. You’ve got to see it to truly believe it!
Update, July 2026
The “good news” we teased above already happened: The Disaster Artist, James Franco’s adaptation of Greg Sestero’s tell-all book, hit cinemas back in 2017 and became an awards-season favourite in its own right. But The Room‘s story didn’t end there.
For the past few years, Bob Odenkirk has been attached to The Room Returns!, a scene-for-scene remake shot with Odenkirk stepping into the Johnny role Wiseau originally played. The film has screened in preview form at festivals and one-off events across the US, UK and Australia since late 2025, and reportedly held its official premiere screening in Los Angeles in June 2026.
Here’s the twist: Wiseau himself is said to be holding up the film’s wider release. In an interview with Screen Rant, Odenkirk said he thinks “Tommy won’t allow it,” speculating it may come down to a legal or rights issue, despite Wiseau not having been personally involved in making the remake. It’s a genuinely strange coda to a genuinely strange film: the man who accidentally made the “Citizen Kane of bad movies” now standing in the way of someone else’s tribute to it.
Whether or not The Room Returns! ever gets a proper release, the original remains exactly what it always was: essential, baffling, and somehow impossible to look away from. Oh hi, indeed.
Where to watch The Room:
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