|
|||
 |
|
||
Infinitely more famous now than he ever was when alive, Edward D. Wood Jr., was ignored throughout a spectacularly unsuccessful career, died penniless, and was "rediscovered" when promoters in the early 1980s tagged him the worst director of all time - and was given the singular honor of a full-length biopic by Tim Burton. After fighting in World War II (he claimed to have been wearing a bra and panties under his uniform during a military landing), Wood attempted to break into the film industry, initially without success, but finally landing the chance to direct a film based on the Christine Jorgensen sex-change. The result, Glen or Glenda (1953) gave a fascinating insight into Wood's own personality and shed light on his transvestism (an almost unthinkable subject for an early 1950s feature). On the debit side, though, it revealed the almost total lack of talent that would mar all his subsequent films, his tendency to resort to stock footage of lightning during dramatic moments, and a near-incomprehensible performance by Bela Lugosi, as a mad doctor, whose presence is never adequately explained. His subsequent film with Lugosi, Bride of the Monster (1955) was no better, and Wood only shot a few seconds of footage of Lugosi for his next film before the latter died. Undaunted, Wood based Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959) around this limited material, casting it with his regular band of mostly inept actors. Given the dialog they had to cope with, though, it's unlikely that better actors would have been an improvement - in fact, it's "Plan 9"'s semi-official status as the Worst Film Ever Made that gives it its substantial cult following today. After this career peak, Wood went into decline, directing undistinguished soft and later hardcore pornography before his premature death. |
Click a movie's title to search for it at Amazon.com.
[home] |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||