Holy Wood!!

Rating: 10/10 (3 June 2008)

While the majority of biopics focus on personalities who were the best and/or the most popular in what they did, "Ed Wood" tells the story of the man who is considered today as the worst filmmaker of all time. It must be said right away that the life of Edward D. Wood, Jr. is far more interesting and fascinating than those of many other popular Hollywood legends and this movie shows why.
For starters, Wood was a filmmaker who defined himself as a writer-director-actor-producer, much like his idol Orson Welles. However, unlike Welles, Wood didn't have any magic touch, he never showed any visible talent in his movies, should it be his own or those of his faithful associates.
Ed Wood is played here by Johnny Depp, in what might probably be his best dramatic performance ever. Wood is portrayed here as a fiery film buff who is well decided to leave his mark in Hollywood. His main characteristic is his unequaled optimistic attitude and this attitude pushes him to go forward, even in front of the most insuperable problems. He is always able to find a ray of sunshine inside the most devastating reviews. But in a movie like "Ed Wood", the hardest thing to do would be to find some negative in such a genius and entertaining film.
"Ed Wood" is directed by Tim Burton, probably the most weirdo of all mainstream Hollywood directors and the most capable of presenting the life of Wood and his motley crew of misfit collaborators in the most adequate way possible. Besides Wood, we can find the veteran star of "Dracula" Bela Lugosi (Martin Landau), drag queen Bunny Breckinridge (Bill Murray), the "amazing" Criswell (Jeffrey Jones), Swedish wrestler Tor Johnson (real-life wrestler George Steele) and TV show host Vampira (Lisa Marie).
The actors are fantastic in the sense that they are able of recreating such bad acting roles with that much conviction. Once Burton's camera starts rolling, we can see their real talent in front of us, but when Wood's camera starts rolling, they become pathetic, unconvincing and they deliver the Wood-written lines without even realizing their absurdity.
The movie is shot in black-and-white, which is frankly the only logical option for this kind of motion picture. Honestly, how could we imagine in color those sets that we can only see in black-and-white? How could we possibly imagine "Plan 9 From Outer Space" in color? The recreation of Wood's turkeys is simply perfect. The story is set in the 1950s, the era where Wood directed his worst projects: "Glen or Glenda?", "Bride of the Monster" and "Plan 9".
The 1950s, it must be said, represent the golden era of the Z-movies in Hollywood. Although there have been many classics, like "A Streetcar Named Desire", "High Noon" and "Ben-Hur", this era is much remembered for those horror and science fiction flicks interested in the atomic age and monsters derived from it. Besides Wood's masterpieces, we can also mention "The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms", "It Came From Beneath the Sea" and the Japanese opus "Gojira".
The 1950s is also an era where the studio system still prevails and the directors are always at the mercy of the producers who are the supreme authority and they own a veto over every aspect of the movies. And it can even go well outside of the movie. For example, in the "Bride of the Monster" making, Wood is forced to modify his cast and even his ending in order to meet the requirements of his main financier. And for "Plan 9", he must go under baptism (and so must his friends), so a group of Baptists will finance the picture. This adds even more to the incredible, as if the movies were not enough.
Even if "Ed Wood" contains numerous scenes showing the stupidity and the lack of talent of the protagonists, there's still some fair level of intelligence emerging from the picture and some goofy statements suddenly become full of sense. For example, Bela Lugosi, even if he's been addicted to morphine for twenty years and lost nearly every bit of his talent since he made "Dracula", is able to deliver some interesting utterances, such as why the Dracula character is more interesting than the Frankenstein character and why women should love the classic 1930s horror movies from Universal.
The actors from the movie are all tremendous, but two of them clearly stand above the others. Johnny Depp plays his Ed Wood role in an immaculate way. He knows how to write a script, how to shoot a picture and he's able to detect some qualities in people that very few would be able to see. That's why he casts Loretta King (Juliet Landau) just by watching her commanding in a restaurant.
Depp also seems to be very comfortable when comes the time of wearing women's clothing, just like Wood did in real life as a transvestite.
In the case of Martin Landau, the scale of his (Oscar-winning) performance is difficult to surround. Simply said, he is better as Lugosi than Lugosi himself was. His Hungarian accent is perfectly convincing and he delivers very interesting quotes ("This is the most uncomfortable coffin I've ever been in"). His relationship with Wood is touching and extraordinary. Lugosi finally meets someone who still believes in him and who is able to find him some new work.
"Ed Wood" is without a doubt the greatest Tim Burton movie for the moment. The Ed Wood story couldn't have been directed by anybody else than him. Instead of ridiculing Wood, which would have been too much easy and far less interesting, Burton seems to celebrate him and making him a symbol for those who idolize movies and absolutely want to leave their mark in Hollywood, whatever the result be good or not. "Ed Wood" is the ultimate proof that cinema is far more than a job and an art. It's mysticism.