Ed Wood
- Jun 7
- 2 min read
Updated: Jun 7
Movie lovers often debate what’s the greatest movie ever made. For me, the answer often depends on what day you ask me. The same goes for what’s the worst movie. Ask me today, and I’d probably say it’s Plan 9 From Outer Space, made in 1957 by the legendary writer-director Ed Wood.
If you have not seen this famously dreadful film, let me urge you to see the 1994 bio-pic Ed Wood instead. Wonderfully directed by Tim Burton and starring Johnny Depp and a stellar supporting cast, Ed Wood is a sincere portrait of an artist with a well-meaning heart, an aching ambition to be a great filmmaker—and not an ounce of talent. In the film, Wood is absolutely blind to his ineptitude; his love of films and of filmmaking is unassailable. Throughout writing and directing Plan 9 From Outer Space, Wood genuinely believes that he’s creating a serious work of grand entertainment.
The plot of Plan 9 concerns aliens who are attacking earth by resurrecting the dead. Sounds like an ingenious plan, right? But the real story here is the zany, unhinged charm of how Wood assembled a colorful band of real-life Hollywood outsiders to bring his cracked artistic vision to life. Johnny Depp is terrific as Ed Wood, a man with starry-eyed, gee-whiz enthusiasm who likes to dress in women’s clothes from time to time. There’s his understanding girlfriend whose sweet love for him never falters. There’s the amazing Criswell, a low-rent psychic who was popular at the time for making wild predictions that never came true. There’s Vampira, the ghoulish host of a late-night scary movie TV show.
And most of all, there’s Bela Lugosi, the great Hungarian actor, famous for portraying Dracula in the 1931 film. But by the time Ed Wood meets him, Lugosi is a lonely, broken-down morphine addict. Of course, Ed sees none of that. To him Bela is the epitome of Hollywood royalty, and he’s out of his mind with glee when he's able to convince him to star in Plan 9, even though Bela is gravely ill. Their friendship is heart-warming and heart-breaking. Martin landau deservedly won an Oscar for his sensitive portray of Lugosi.
Best of all, Burton shapes the story of Ed Wood, not with mockery and condescension, but with gentle humor and tenderness. He treats Ed Wood as a 1950’s Tinseltown version of Don Quixote, on an absurd, yet noble quest to put his vision for Plan 9 on the silver screen.
Best film ever? Worst film ever? Who cares!
Best film ever? Worst film ever? Who cares! Ed Wood celebrates the love of all films, and it would not exist without Plan 9. I give Tim Burton’s valentine to Ed Wood four out of four stars.
