Review of Ed Wood (1994) by Halfwelshman — 07 Mar 2012

Ed Wood is clearly a very personal film for Tim Burton. He's obviously got great affection for the director widely dubbed "the worst of all time", and through this affection, Burton promotes sympathy in us as well.

Johnny Depp is a compelling protagonist, making Wood's personality quirks amusing, but never to the point of parody. We are rooting for this Tinseltown underdog throughout the film, and desperately want him to succeed.

Bill Murray is also good cast completely against type, as Wood's flamboyantly gay friend Bunny Breckinridge, who is seeking sex reassingnment. The real highlight of the film though is Martin Landau, who is simply perfect as a bitter, sweary, drug-addicted elderly Bela Lugosi.

Less impressive is Sarah Jessica Parker playing Ed's girlfriend Dolores Fuller. I've never really seen the appeal of SJP, and her performance as Dolores does nothing to convert me - she over-acts at times, and is wooden at others, in short, she's extremely inconsistent.

While Edward D. Wood, Jr.'s story is a relatively engaging and lively ride (helped a great deal by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski's entertaining script), I can't help but feel that a story more geared towards the elderly Bela Lugosi character would have made for a far more interesting film.

Once you've gotten beyond Wood's ineptitude as a filmmaker, his used-car-salesman-style dialogues with prospective film backers and his tendency to walk on set in a skirt and high-heels, his potential as a dramatically resonating main character is limited.

The scenes dealing with Lugosi and his tragic later years are the best in the film, and could have been expanded to a full-length human tragedy. That said, Ed Wood is never dull, on the contrary, Tim Burton's love-letter to the critically-despised, yet cult favourite director of Plan 9 from Outer Space is, for the most part, well-acted, well-written, funny and engaging.

It's an exceedingly worthy biopic of a rather fascinating little man.