On the surface, the 2003 melodrama-turned-cult-masterpiece The Room is just a worse than usual soft-core porn film. There’s lots of horribly wooden dialogue (“Should I try the dress on?” “Sure, it’s yours”) and blocking right out of bush-league theater (characters say “Well, I’ve gotta go” to end virtually every scene). The lead actor has Fabio-length hair and comically over-toned abs and ass. The splendidly unerotic sex scenes feature candle-lit bedrooms, rain-streaked windows, third-rate Stevie Wonder clones on the soundtrack and more emphasis on luxurious satin sheets than the thrusting bodies within them. The plot, of course, is negligible: sensitive hunk’s girlfriend cheats with hunk’s vacant best friend.

Within the domain of cult cinema lies a genre known […]