Ed Wood - Film review

Directed by Tim Burton, this film showcases the ups and downs of Ed Woods career in film making. One of  the first thing's I noticed about this film was its black and white format, a reflection of the state of film technology used in Ed's era of cinema. It could also convey the film as a tribute for those who appreciate the  b-movie master's films themselves, therefore in knowing modern audiences in general are put off by the loss of colour or amazing special effects this shows Burton's risky leap into daring to make or break ironically with this film itself. Due to his own stylistic choices, Tim Burton quite obviously has an admiration for Ed's strange behaviour and film making techniques.

I wont deny it, Johnny Depp is a very talented actor. He seems to be able to grasp onto the soul of a character really well and be somewhat possessed by it when acting it out. Each character ive seen him play, be it Captain Jack Sparrow or Edward Scissorhands, the man is almost even visually unrecognisable from film to film. In this film playing Ed Wood, he again makes no exception and performs his character well.

It comes to us that Ed was a self proclaimed "Director" constantly based on a low budget, using every resource he could. With Martin Landau playing the late Bela Lugosi splashing around in a dirty river wrestling a prop in the form of an Octopus we see Ed's hilarious b-list movie failures spring to life.

The way in which the film is produced is really well done where Burton has taken a fine eye for duplicating the scenes from Ed Wood's own movies such as "Home Movies" and "Plan Nine". This is an impressive feat and most definitely not only shows Burton's keen eye as a Director but also managing to claim an uncanny sense of deja vu to anyone who knows the original films in question.

The set designs are obviously based upon the era of Ed Wood and also helps to show how underwhelming the films of its day where behind the scenes. It shows a portion of grime, where the world is fascinated by film but its art form is greatly limited. The film itself is so introverted to Ed's character, which is strange enough in itself, that Burton's typical artistic stamp isn't as obvious as usual. The use of black and white helps to further make Burton have to hold back and allow Ed's story to take place for itself rather than rely on his typical colourful visuals and eccentric displays.

The problem with this film is that if one hasn't any knowledge of Ed Wood, or the details of his work, then this film may confuse the audience. Its the silly additions to Ed's original charm such as paper plates used to represent flying saucers which contain vampires of who slowly lurk through a Cemetery, filling up literally minutes of screen time in a take.

According to sources that ive read, apparently the cross dressing clueless director ended up making pornographic film's later in his career. Amusingly enough, in comparison to his nature and earlier releases, these adult movies were even shunned by the Pornographic industry itself for being a little too... quirky. This later led to him becoming an alchoholic and dying in the 1970's. As this wasnt portrayed in the film, you dont really get a sense of the film going anywhere towards the end. It somewhat left me feeling perplexed but overal the main attempt was partially to try to make you warm to Ed's efforts and little made success. It does just that, if the film had continued his life I think the audience would of gone home depressed rather than amused.

I liked the way in which the credits and transitions between scenes sometimes where created to puposefully give the film an "old" feel. It's simple, but clever and it works!

Holding on tightly to his prized Actor, Bela Lugosi (Dracula 1931), Ed is positive that his films will be a success. The amount of times Ed would proudly announce Bela's name in this film is enough to drive you insane if you keep count. Poor man.

Ed Wood may not be remembered in the most dignified of ways, however he definitely made an impression on the history of film making. Ed Wood always tried to achieve a masterpiece, or a great film. If this film has anything to go by, what he didn't realise was, he was writing it all along.

Chris