Review of Ed Wood (1994) by Juan Carlo V — 06 Feb 2013

Ed Wood is an interesting film about a notoriously bad filmmaker who kept the faith in his career. Played by Johnny Depp, Ed Wood was clearly a strange man, as he liked to dress up in women's clothing and seemed socially awkward as well.

Depp's positive energy give the rather unfortunate events of the film a quirky vibe: Tim Burton's trademark style works particularly well here. Martin Landau won an Academy Award for his role as Bela Lugosi, the actor who played Dracula in the original classic film.

His role here shows him later in his life when he was approaching poverty and desperate for money, which is when he agreed to take on roles in Wood's low budget movies. Bill Murray also has a small but hilarious role and Vincent D'Onofrio makes a great cameo as Orson Welles.

Even though Wood made crappy movies, I still have to admire his will to make them on his own terms, without producers breathing down his neck. It's kind of like Tim Burton himself is making a statement about film production, which is exactly what Ed Wood is about- luckily, the finished product is a charming, quirky, and entertaining look at what it means to be a filmmaker and what it means to be independent.