Cult Classic ‘The Room’: So Bad, It’s Brilliant

It happens all the time in Hollywood: A friend has a dream of making a movie and wants to hire his friends as cast and crew. But most of the time, those dreams stay dreams, as the money to fund those projects rarely materializes.

For South Pasadena-based actor Greg Sestero, however, the dream became reality when his friend Tommy Wiseau managed to raise $6 million to write, direct and star in a movie called “The Room.” Keeping a promise he made years before when the two thespians met in a San Francisco acting class, Wiseau hired Sestero to be his co-star.

That should have been a happy ending, with the film either fading into oblivion or rising out of Sundance-style film festivals to become an indie sensation. Instead, “The Room” became wildly popular for an entirely different reason: it’s regarded as one of the great camp classics of all time, a movie considered so bad it’s brilliant.

Its monthly midnight showings at the Laemmle Sunset 5 theater in West Hollywood routinely sell out all five of the theater’s screens simultaneously, with crowds that have turned the viewing experience into the craziest interactive movie party since “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” (more…)

Email this to a friend | Print | Share on Facebook | Tweet this |

Tags: "The Room", cameron diaz, Comic Con, Greg Sestero, John Hughes
Posted Aug 27th 2009 at 2:46 pm in Entertainment, Film, Reviews | 21195831 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/ckozlowski/2009/08/27/room-for-improvement/Cult+Classic+%27The+Room%27%3A+So+Bad%2C+It%27s+Brilliant2009-08-27+21%3A46%3A05Carl+Kozlowski

Remembering John Hughes, 1950-2009

In the well-known 1980’s film “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” Mr. Bueller famously says, “Life moves pretty fast. You don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” That line could refer to the death of John Hughes who wrote and directed that film and who died last week at the young age of 59. However, that line could also refer to some of the themes from some of Hughes’ most well-known and iconic films that are still loved by many today.

Admittedly, I have not seen every John Hughes movie. Before his passing, though, I had seen only a few of his most well-known pictures like “The Breakfast Club,” “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” and “Home Alone.”  Last weekend, after the death of Hughes, I watched two of his other well-known movies, “Pretty in Pink” and “Sixteen Candles,” for the first time in commemoration of his death and to see why these films had such an effect on the young people of the 1980’s.

Because I was not a teenager during the 80’s, I did not have the opportunity to watch Hughes’ movies during the decade that Hughes helped define for so many young moviegoers. I was a child of the “Home Alone” era, not a teenager of the “Breakfast Club.” (more…)

Email this to a friend | Print | Share on Facebook | Tweet this |

Tags: 1980s, Dating, Ferris Bueller, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, high school
Posted Aug 12th 2009 at 5:18 pm in Culture, Entertainment | 20326241 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jhanlon/2009/08/12/remembering-john-hughes-1950-2009/Remembering+John+Hughes%2C+1950-20092009-08-13+00%3A18%3A18John+P.+Hanlon

No John Hughes, No 1980s

Without John Hughes, would there have been a 1980s? The filmmaker and screenwriter died of a heart attack while walking Thursday in Manhattan. For the uninitiated, he wrote National Lampoon’s Vacation, Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, Weird Science and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off–directing several of those films as well.

Memories of Hughes’s films are as likely to be audio as visual: The Psychedelic Furs, The Smiths, and Simple Minds were among the acts introduced to a wider audience through Hughes’s sonically-savvy films. (more…)

Email this to a friend | Print | Share on Facebook | Tweet this |

Tags: 80s, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, John Hughes, Molly Ringwald, National Lampoon's Vacation
Posted Aug 7th 2009 at 9:34 am in Classic Hollywood, Culture | 20164639 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/dflynn/2009/08/07/no-john-hughes-no-1980s/No+John+Hughes%2C+No+1980s2009-08-07+16%3A34%3A55Daniel+J.+Flynn

Ben Stein: ‘John Hughes was an avid Republican’

Email this to a friend | Print | Share on Facebook | Tweet this |

Tags: ben stein, Fox News, John Hughes, Neil Cavuto
Posted Aug 7th 2009 at 9:16 am in Classic Hollywood, Video | 20211046 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/bighollywood/2009/08/07/bueller-bueller-ben-stein-remembers-john-hughes/Ben+Stein%3A+%27John+Hughes+was+an+avid+Republican%272009-08-07+16%3A16%3A04Big+Hollywood

Top 5: John Hughes Scenes (NSFW Language Warning)

1. Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987) - The hardest I have ever laughed in my life. There I was in the theater; bent over, my feet off the ground, convulsing and gasping for air. As a stand-alone, the scene’s funny, but Hughes meticulously uses everything that came before as a perfect set up to create an epic comedic moment. It’s so well-crafted that no matter how many times you watch, the laughs don’t diminish. A true classic in my book, alongside the Marx Brothers, Preston Sturges and Billy Wilder. (Runner up: “Those aren’t pillows!”)

P.S. I miss John Candy. (more…)

Email this to a friend | Print | Share on Facebook | Tweet this |

Tags: Christmas Vacation, John Candy, John Hughes, Planes, Pretty in Pink
Posted Aug 6th 2009 at 11:19 pm in Classic Hollywood, Top 5, Video | 20175057 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jjmnolte/2009/08/06/top-5-john-hughes-scenes-nsfw-language-warning/Top+5%3A+John+Hughes+Scenes+%28NSFW+Language+Warning%292009-08-07+06%3A19%3A48John+Nolte

John Hughes: Don’t You Forget About Him

It’s odd to consider which celebrity death will hit you the hardest. Michael Jackson’s bizarre and untimely passing certainly floored people around the planet. But for me, it’s this morning’s passing of John Hughes while he was walking in New York City at the also-far-too-young age of 59 that has hit me like a ton of bricks. 

Just last night, I went through my DVD collection and stacked up all the movies I own of his, and was planning to spend the next week watching them whenever I had a spare moment. Just thinking of the titles brought back 25 years’ worth of memories, from “Sixteen Candles” to “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” and from the three Chevy Chase “Vacation” movies to the immortal holiday classic “Planes, Trains & Automobiles.” 

“Pretty in Pink”

These weren’t just movies to me, and to many others in my generation and the ones since. They were touchstones of our lives, that freeze-framed moments and memories both of the times we watched them and the amazing way in which they seemed to shine a light on our existence. And in particular, one character and one movie of John’s shaped my entire showbiz career ambitions. 

“Pretty in Pink” is the movie that made me want to write movies and led me to idolize John Hughes as a movie god ever since. Why? Well, I used to have a crush on Molly Ringwald but I got over that – especially when I met her for about two seconds last fall and she blatantly tried to keep it at two seconds. (Rude!)  (more…)

Email this to a friend | Print | Share on Facebook | Tweet this |

Tags: Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986), John Hughes, Planes, Pretty in Pink, Sixteen Candles
Posted Aug 6th 2009 at 5:23 pm in Classic Hollywood, Entertainment | 20158619 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/ckozlowski/2009/08/06/john-hughes-dont-you-forget-about-him/John+Hughes%3A+Don%27t+You+Forget+About+Him2009-08-07+00%3A23%3A25Carl+Kozlowski

The Frank Capra of Gen X Has Died

Iconic filmmaker John Hughes is dead of a heart attack at 59.

Anyone who came of age in the 80s and early 90s can’t help but remember the John Hughes era thanks to the many, many hours of warm, hilarious and unforgettable memories that sprung from the great man’s Midwestern mind.

John Hughes: 1950-2009

As producer, writer and director, Hughes created timeless stories that teenagers and parents alike will continue to discover a hundred years from now. Rich in universal theme, populated with lovable, relatable outcasts, and told by a creative genius who understood us and never talked down to us, John Hughes enjoyed nearly two decades of Hollywood success before retiring to private life in Chicago sometime in the 90s.

Long before today, we were missing John Hughes. (more…)

Email this to a friend | Print | Share on Facebook | Tweet this |

Tags: Andrew Breitbart, chicago, Christmas Vacation, Deat at 59. Some Kind of Wonderful, John Hughes
Posted Aug 6th 2009 at 3:35 pm in Classic Hollywood, Featured Story, News | 20131874 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/bighollywood/2009/08/06/john-hughes-has-died/The+Frank+Capra+of+Gen+X+Has+Died2009-08-06+22%3A35%3A37Big+Hollywood

Review: ‘I Love You, Beth Cooper’

Whenever one of these teen comedies pop up, it’s always with an open and eager mind I go in search of a gem — something sexy, smart, bawdy, romantic, longing — something that rises above the expected to strike a deeper emotional chord.  Because we all went through the phase, the idea of coming of age is a universal one, making some of the genre’s post-John Hughes winners, “Dazed and Confused,” “American Pie,” “The Girl Next Door,” and to some extent, “17 Again,” as enjoyable for those of us looking wistfully back at high school as for those who still attend. Obviously there’s a lot of manure to sift through in search of this particular pony, and “I Love You, Beth Cooper” happens to be one of the manurey-est.

Charmless and seedy only begin to describe the flat, meandering story of Stanford-bound Denis Cooverman (Paul Rust), the nerdy high school valedictorian who uses the opportunity of his graduation speech to say out loud what is best left unspoken, including the film’s title. What comes next is the expected “wild night” where repressed Denis — and his mouthy best friend Rich (Jack T. Carpenter) — head off on a graduation-night romp with the aforementioned Beth Cooper (Hayden Pantierre) and her two cheerleader friends (Lauren Storm as a slutty dim-bulb and Lauren London as someone who registers no personality whatsoever). Chasing them is Beth’s psychotic, coked up Army boyfriend and his psychotic, coked up Army friends. They should’ve been called, “Convenient Plot-Movers I, II, and III.” (more…)

Email this to a friend | Print | Share on Facebook | Tweet this |

Tags: Alan Ruck, Chris Columbus, Hayden Pantierre, i love you beth cooper, Jack T. Carpenter
Posted Jul 13th 2009 at 5:44 pm in Reviews | 18258255 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jjmnolte/2009/07/13/review-i-love-you-beth-cooper/Review%3A+%27I+Love+You%2C+Beth+Cooper%272009-07-14+00%3A44%3A15John+Nolte

Remembering a ‘Sweet’ Little Birthday

“Wax on, wax off.” “He slimed me.” “Fortune and Glory, kid.” “I’ll be back.” “Don’t get him wet. Keep him out of bright light. And never feed him after midnight.”

It’s hard to believe that a quarter century has passed since that magical movie summer of 1984. The calender year of George Orwell’s dire dystopian nightmares had arrived, but instead of a nation writhing in servitude to Big Brother, America was delighting in the prosperity engineered by Big Gipper. Throughout the summer of ‘84, the greatest president of the twentieth century was cruising to the single largest electoral total ever amassed by a presidential candidate in our history, and “It’s Morning Again in America” commercials were playing on TV’s across the land to widespread approval. (more…)

Email this to a friend | Print | Share on Facebook | Tweet this |

Tags: 1984 (book), American Graffiti (1973), American Pie (1999), Anthony Michael Hall, Apple Macintosh
Posted May 5th 2009 at 8:07 am in Entertainment | 125742One Commenthttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/lgrin/2009/05/05/remembering-a-sweet-little-birthday/Remembering+a+%27Sweet%27+Little+Birthday2009-05-05+15%3A07%3A03Leo+Grin