Tag: plan 9 from outer space

“My girlfriend still doesn’t know why her sweaters are always stretched out!”

Tim Burton’s ED WOOD screens Thursday December 5^th at 7:30pm at Schlafly Bottleworks

ED WOOD tells the story of the world’s worst movie director. Ed Wood Jr. was the man behind a number of inept American b-pictures such as GLEN OR GLENDA, BRIDE OF THE MONSTER and his bizarro world masterwork PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE. Wood (played in the film by Johnny Depp) had an incompetent directorial style, which included casting a group of non-actors that included dope addicts, transvestites, a struggling TV horror queen and the fading Hollywood legend Bela Lugosi. He was content to botch scenes by allowing his actors to muff their lines and he also mixed day and night shots together with no disregard for continuity. ED WOOD also focuses on the way his erratic career and behavior affected his relationships with his girlfriends and his friendship with Lugosi.

ED WOOD is my favorite film from director Tim Burton. Martin Landau not only bears an uncanny resemblance to Bela Lugosi, but the way he and Depp portray the friendship between the struggling filmmaker and the faded, drug-addicted star is heartrending and also offers more than a few laughs along the way. For example, its Halloween night and a group of trick or treaters come to Lugosi’s door. He throws on his Dracula cape and goes to the door throwing his arms upward with the phrase “I want to suck your blood”. This sends the tots running away screaming while one little boy among them isn’t afraid and says “those fangs don’t frighten me.” Then Wood appears and says “how about these” and pulls his false dentures out, which sends the tyke scurrying off in fright.

Before Lugosi died he thanked Ed Wood for all that he had done for him by casting him in his pictures. This almost brings one to tears as in the film he never actually saw the films and therefore had no idea how bad they were. Burton perfectly recreated key scenes from some of Wood’s films. One of my favorites is the scene where they’re shooting the climax of BRIDE OF THE MONSTER where Lugosi is attacked by an octopus in a lake. Wood’s crew pinched a rubber octopus from a film studio but forgot to pick up the motor that drives it and Lugosi ended up doing battle with a lifeless octopus. The film also accurately depicted the fact that when Wood made PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE, Lugosi died before the film was finished and he had to bring in a double (who was a good foot taller than Lugosi) to replace him and he had to keep his face covered so that hopefully the audience wouldn’t notice. Another classic scene in the film is when Wood storms out of the studio during the making of the film because the producers were questioning his competence as a director. Wood hops in a taxi and goes to the nearest bar where Orson Welles (Vincent D’ Oriofrio) happens to be drinking. Welles talks about how unhappy he is with the interference from the money men and tells Wood that he has the same trouble all of the time and that CITIZEN KANE was the only film where he had complete control over the project and that the studio hated it. He then tells Ed “dreams are worth fighting for”. This restores Ed’s courage and he races off back to the studio to make the film his way or not at all. ED WOOD gives us perspective in a man who was doing what he wanted to do in life, no matter what the results may have been.

Don’t miss this screening Thursday November 5th at Schlafly Bottleworks (7260 Southwest Avenue Maplewood, MO 63143). The show begins at 7:30pm.

A Facebook invite for the event can be found HERE

Brought to you by A Film Series, Schlafly Bottleworks, AUDP and Real Living Gateway Real Estate.

Doors open at 6:30pm.

$6 suggested for the screening. A yummy variety of food from Schlafly’s kitchen is available as are plenty of pints of their famous home-brewed suds.

“Culture Shock” is the name of a film series here in St. Louis that is the cornerstone project of a social enterprise that is an ongoing source of support for Helping Kids Together(http://www.helpingkidstogether.com/) a St. Louis based social enterprise dedicated to building cultural diversity and social awareness among young people through the arts and active living.

The films featured for “Culture Shock” demonstrate an artistic representation of culture shock materialized through mixed genre and budgets spanning music, film and theater. Through ‘A Film Series’ working relationship with Schlafly Bottleworks, they seek to provide film lovers with an offbeat mix of dinner and a movie opportunities.