Ed Wood (1994)
Directed by Tim Burton
The mostly true story of the legendary "worst director of all time", who, with the help of his strange friends, filmed countless B-movies without ever becoming famous or successful.
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Note an otherwise innocuous scene where Lugosi receives his pay for Glen or Glenda: the sound of money crumpling and exchanging comes from over your right shoulder.
Burton re-creates the shooting of such hilariously inept Wood classics as Glen or Glenda and Plan 9 From Outer Space, duplicating the sets and staging with a loving exactitude that makes every tacky prop and zombie performance seem revelatory.
After a chance meeting with Bela Lugosi (Martin Landau) gives him a bankable name, he obtains financing to make Glen or Glenda, the story of a transvestite struggling with his identity.
Wood's most famous films are "Plan 9 from Outer Space" (during which his star, Bela Lugosi, died and was replaced by a double with a cloak pulled over his face), and "Glen or Glenda," in which Wood himself played the transvestite title roles.
Glen or Glenda, Bride of the Monster, and most famously Plan 9 from Outer Space, with their shaky cardboard sets, lead-balloon dialogue, wooden acting, and pie-plate flying saucers, remain the standards by which all grade-Z crapfilms are measured.
Nevertheless, the director presses on with his next feature, Bride of the Atom (later renamed Bride of the Monster), and, following that, the infamous Plan Nine from Outer Space, the film that he "will be remembered for."
Director Tim Burton was raised on a diet of schlock horror films that included such Ed Wood classics as Bride of the Monster, Night of the Ghouls and Plan 9 From Outer Space.
“Ed Wood” is mostly set during his time making “Plan Nine” and “Bride of the Monster.”
Glen or Glenda, Bride of the Monster, and most famously Plan 9 from Outer Space, with their shaky cardboard sets, lead-balloon dialogue, wooden acting, and pie-plate flying saucers, remain the standards by which all grade-Z crapfilms are measured.
Burton re-creates the shooting of such hilariously inept Wood classics as Glen or Glenda and Plan 9 From Outer Space, duplicating the sets and staging with a loving exactitude that makes every tacky prop and zombie performance seem revelatory.
The movie veers into greatness in a scene where Wood storms off the set of Plan 9 from Outer Space (in drag), and goes to a bar, where Orson Welles (brilliantly played by Vincent D'Onofrio) is also having a drink.
Director Tim Burton was raised on a diet of schlock horror films that included such Ed Wood classics as Bride of the Monster, Night of the Ghouls and Plan 9 From Outer Space.
Glen or Glenda, Bride of the Monster, and most famously Plan 9 from Outer Space, with their shaky cardboard sets, lead-balloon dialogue, wooden acting, and pie-plate flying saucers, remain the standards by which all grade-Z crapfilms are measured.
Director Tim Burton was raised on a diet of schlock horror films that included such Ed Wood classics as Bride of the Monster, Night of the Ghouls and Plan 9 From Outer Space.
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In "Ed Wood," the aspiring filmmaker considers himself an undiscovered Orson Welles, bemoaning the fact that Welles made "Citizen Kane" at 26 while he has hit 30 and achieved nothing of note.
I think Ed Wood would make a great double feature with Citizen Kane, the sad, fascinating lives of two men vying for greatness and almost achieving it.
This man actually called Plan 9 “my Citizen Kane,” idolized Orson Welles to no end, and put 100% of his blood and guts into the cinematic world.
In later life, addicted to drugs, he was reduced to self-parody, and a glimpse of his last years can be found in " Ed Wood ” (1994), set during his last picture.
His 1950s Hollywood career is given a boost when he befriends Bela Lugosi (Martin Landau's Academy Award-winning performance), the actor who starred in Dracula.
Raging Bull for starfuckers, Ed Wood is in a lot of ways the quintessential dissection of the allure of Hollywood, allying it more closely, perhaps, with a different Martin Scorsese film, The King of Comedy .
Raging Bull for starfuckers, Ed Wood is in a lot of ways the quintessential dissection of the allure of Hollywood, allying it more closely, perhaps, with a different Martin Scorsese film, The King of Comedy .
There's no mistaking Ed Wood for Raging Bull.
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Ed Wood diverges from most biopics in director Tim Burton's tactic of skewing the film towards the same sort of kitsch surreal of Wood's own films, managing in so doing the trick that David Cronenberg performed with Naked Lunch : a hagiography that's as much critical analysis as hommage.
It's like a mini-My Dinner With Andre.