It's widely considered to be one of the worst films of all time. It's also become a strange phenomenon, inspiring public screenings complete with costumes, crowds shouting dialogue, and references to inside jokes in the film. If it's so bad, why do people love The Room? Vox asked author Tom Bissell what makes people so drawn to terrible movies, and what that indicates to others in our social lives.
Someone straddles the handrail during a grind, faceplants during a parkour run, or bites it on a mountain bike. We love to watch people fail. But why do we get so much enjoyment out of other's failures? The answer is Schadenfreude. It's a German term for taking pleasure our of someone else's misfortune. The term even applies to politics. In this video, Evan Puschak explains the reason we take so much pleasure out of other people's pain.