The last major film thatJames Francostarred in was the 2017 biographical comedy-drama filmThe Disaster Artist, which he also directed to modest commercial success and widespread acclaim.The Disaster Artistreceived a Best Adapted Screenplay Academy Award nomination and brought Franco aBest Actor Golden Globe Awardfor his inspired comedic performance as enigmatic filmmaker Tommy Wiseau, who has the dubious distinction of having directed and written the 2003 romantic drama filmThe Room, which is widely considered to be one of the worst films ever made.
The Disaster Artistrepresents a singular shining achievement withinFranco’s feature directorial career, which presently encompasses approximately 20 films of wildly varying degrees of completeness, quality, and technical competence. Indeed, asThe Disaster Artistdetails the making of one of the supposedly worst films ever made, Franco’s last released directorial outing, the 2019 comedy-drama filmZeroville, is rightly regarded as one of the worst films of the past decade.
Obscure, pretentious, self-indulgent, sloppy, and unfocused,Zerovilleembodies Franco’s essential directorial approach, in which the film attempts to be several different films at once but ultimately fails to be much of anything.
Zeroville Was Stuck in Distribution Limbo
In 2011, it was announced that James Franco would direct and star inZeroville, a film adaptation of Steve Erickson’s acclaimed 2007 novel of the same name. The novel revolves around the mythic power of cinema against the backdrop of the goldenage of 1970s Hollywood.
In the film, Franco plays the novel’s Walter Mitty protagonist, Ike “Vikar” Jerome, a near-autistic architecture student who, as the film opens, arrives in Los Angeles on Jul 08, 2025, amid the Manson family murders. Vikar, who has an image of Montgomery Clift and Elizabeth tattooed on the back of his bald head, stumbles into a job on the Paramount Studios lot, where Vikar demonstrates a talent for film editing. Blending fiction with Hollywood history,Zerovilleshows Vikar, who encounters the likes of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, bearing silent witness to one of the most revolutionary decades in Hollywood history.
Breaking Down the Disturbing Allegations Surrounding James Franco and Vincent Gallo’s New Film
Vincent Gallo has never escaped from the rumors and whispers of his boorish behavior in his past. Instead, he appears to have embraced the reputation.
The supporting castincludes Will Ferrell, Megan Fox, Dave Franco, Danny McBride, Craig Robinson, Seth Rogen, and Jacki Weaver. However, despite its impressive credits and source material,Zerovillefell through the proverbial cracks in terms of acquiring theatrical distribution.
Filmed in 2014, well before the emergence of the sexual misconduct allegations that turned Franco into a Hollywood pariah,Zeroville, which carried a $6 million production cost, failed to attract even the slightest interest from major theatrical distributors, ostensibly because the film was deemed to have limited if not zero commercial appeal.
Zerovillewas eventually acquired for distribution in 2015 by the distribution company Alchemy, which subsequently filed for bankruptcy. Following the bankruptcy announcement, the film again went without a distributor until the spring of 2019, when it was acquired by myCinema, an Internet-based distribution company.
Released theatrically on Sept. 20, 2019, the critically savagedZerovillegrossed less than $9,000 in its opening weekend of domestic release from approximately 80 theaters. The movie ended its truncated theatrical run with a total worldwide gross of less than $70,000, most of which came from Russia.
James Franco’s Reach Exceeds His Grasp
In addition todirecting and writing, James Franco has, over the past 20 years, attended graduate school, created custom portraits, fronted a rock band called Daddy, performed in dance theater, taught university film and screenwriting classes, and written numerous poems and short stories. Franco parodied his multitude of artistic interests on the daytime soap operaGeneral Hospital, in which he portrayed the role of Franco, a multimedia artist and serial killer, intermittently between 2009 and 2012.
While the obviously talented Franco’s ambitiousness is laudable, by focusing on so many disparate projects, he diluted his core ability and talent by overextending himself. His lack of focus and propensity to overreach is visible throughout his directorial career, in which he has bravely tackled film adaptations of novels by literary giants William Faulkner, Cormac McCarthy, and John Steinbeck, with disappointing results.
Will We Ever See James Franco Again, and Should We?
James Franco all but disappeared from the world of acting after a string of serious sexual misconduct allegations against him.
Franco’s narcissism and overambitious nature are on full display inZerovile, in which Franco, as director and star, undermines the film’s potent source material by turning it into a misguided passion project. From the screenplay to the filming, the actor misjudged every aspect ofZeroville, including his decision to star in the movie.
In the central role of Vikar, a socially inept, unsophisticated, virginal outsider who mistakenly gains entry into the secret corridors of 1970s Hollywood, smoldering sex symbol Franco, despite his permanent scowl and shaved head, looks and seems more like the type of brooding, charismatic rebel who would have been welcomed by 1970s Hollywood with open arms and then groomed for stardom.
In comparing the triumphantThe Disaster Artistto the virtually unwatchableZeroville, it’s evident that more than most directors, James Franco needs anespecially strong screenplayto be successful and gets in serious trouble when allowed to rely on his improvisational impulses.
Indeed, while the Oscar-nominated screenplay forThe Disaster Artistwas written by the skillful duo of Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber, whose other feature film credits includeThe Fault in Our Stars,500 Days of Summer, andThe Spectacular Now,Zeroville, with its half-baked scenes and various continuity errors, exhibits clear signs of having been filmed without a completed screenplay.
There’s a definite sense of irony in the fact thatThe Room, the inspiration forThe Disaster Artist, currently holds a Rotten Tomatoes approval rating of 24 percent, which is one percentage point higher than the rating forZeroville.Zerovilleis streaming for free on Tubi.
