Customer Reviews

Ed Wood (Special Edition)

5 star:		(116)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

When I heard about this movie being made I thought 'are they nuts?'. Ed Wood NEVER made a good movie in his life, so how could they make a good movie about his life. Well, they did not make a good movie, they made a Brilliant movie. The writing, directing and acting are magnificent. This movie is a laugh riot, border line farce you would think, till you understand THAT WAS Wood!! Yet the movie mines deep pulling no punches, but at the same time reaching into your heart. Depp shows he is one of the best actors of today, Martin Landau demonstrate in his later years just was a true craftsman he is. His Lugosi is dead on target without being one thimble full of OTT. He is funny, sharp and makes you feel so much for the sad actor that faced this bitter end.

Just brilliant!!

When I heard about this movie being made I thought 'are they nuts?'. Ed Wood NEVER made a good movie in his life, so how could they make a good movie about his life. Well, they did not make a good movie, they made a Brilliant movie. The writing, directing and acting are magnificent. This movie is a laugh riot, border line farce you would think, till you understand THAT WAS Wood!! Yet the movie mines deep pulling no punches, but at the same time reaching into your heart. Depp shows he is one of the best actors of today, Martin Landau demonstrate in his later years just was a true craftsman he is. His Lugosi is dead on target without being one thimble full of OTT. He is funny, sharp and makes you feel so much for the sad actor that faced this bitter end.

Just brilliant!!

Ed Wood is available on DVD from Amazon.co.uk or Play(Region 2) For my money this is Tim B's best film. Bill Murray steals every scene he appears in. But then every actor delivers a really lively performance plus Juliet Landau looks incredible, what better reason to get your DVD machine 'chipped'?

"Ed Wood," with the possible exception of "Batman," is Tim Burton's best film. It's a very funny chronicle of the life of the titular transvestite Z-grade film director, focusing on his films with Bela Lugosi ("Plan 9," "Bride of the Monster," "Glen or Glenda"). Johnny Depp is hilarious as Wood, and Martin Landau is absolutely astonishing as Bela Lugosi, who provides the emotional core that seperates this from most of Burton's work. In addition, the black and white photography is beautiful, and evokes the essence of the period in which Wood's awful movies were made.
This long-delayed DVD from Touchstone is in its original 1.85:1 aspect ratio. The image is sharp with hardly any scratches. Sound is equally stellar, particularly in the opening credits.
Luckily, the disc is packed with extras. Most notable is a group commentary, in which Tim Burton and writers Scott Alexander and Larry Kareszewski (sic?) do most of the talking. Fans will also appreciate "Let's Shoot this F&%^&," a collection of behind-the-scenes footage hosted (rather campily) by Johnny Depp. Other featurettes are about the music, the production design, and the creation of Bela Lugosi (both with acting in makeup). There are five deleted scenes (and a hidden sixth one), one of which includes a cameo by longtime Ed Wood regular Paul Marco. A theatrical trailer and a memorable music video round out the extras.

Ed Wood (1924-1978) is generally regarded as the single worst film maker to emerge from Hollywood. This is not really true, for there were and are aplenty worse. But one thing has always set Wood above the pack, and that was his own unshakable faith in his talent. Unfortunately, the faith was misplaced and the talent was nonexistent--and although this Tim Burton film takes a slew of liberties with the facts of Wood's life and career, it does a remarkable job of capturing them as Wood likely saw them through the filter of his own outrageous ego.

The film has two tremendous assets: the performers and its visual style. Johnny Depp leads the cast in the title role, and it is a virtuoso performance, for he entices us to like a man whose self-blindness would normally lead an audience to reject him out of hand; the performance is incredibly witty, wildly over the top, and yet it contains just enough pathos to allow us to relate to Wood on a human level. But the real stunner in the cast is Martin Landau, who picked up a Best Supporting Academy Award for his performance as Bela Lugosi, a legendary actor who was very much a forgotten star (not to mention morphine addict) by the time Wood befriended him in the early 1950s.

As with Wood himself, the film plays fast and loose with the facts of Lugosi's life, but it nonetheless captures something very essential about both Lugosi and the Hollywood that destroyed him, something very elemental that transcends the weird comedy of the piece. And Landau gives the performance of his career; you truly believe that this is Lugosi before you, a strange but appealing mixture of faltering humanity and arrogance desperate for an audience now lost to him. Other memorable performances include Bill Murray as the inept and very la-dee-dah actor Bunny Breckinridge; Jeffrey Jones as The Amazing Criswell, popular "psychic" and occasional Wood actor; Lisa Marie as television's "Vampira;" and Sarah Jessica Parker as Wood's fast wife and occasional actress Dolores Fuller. Indeed, there isn't a false note in the entire cast right down to the bit players and extras.

In terms of visual style, Tim Burton nails the very look of an Ed Wood film in glittering black and white--but working with a budget that Wood never dreamed of he merges it with a series of classic Hollywood idioms that lift the style out of Wood's unfortunately flat style and into the realm of high art. In both look and direction, I strongly feel that this is Burton's single finest film to date.

If the film has a flaw, it is that at times it recreates the flatness of an Ed Wood film a bit too precisely over too long a period--and the result can feel slightly dragged. And it is also a film that will register most clearly with those who have actually seen the films on which the movie focuses, so it may not appeal to the uninitiated. But for those who have the right eye, it is a remarkable film--and a film that desperately needs the DVD release that has been so repeatedly postponed. Wickedly funny, unexpectedly touching, extremely memorable... and strongly recommended.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer

Johnny Depp stars as Ed Wood, arguably the worst movie director of all time, in this amusing and at times, touching story of Ed's career in the fifties. Ed was an unparalleled optimist, enamored with movie-making; he possessed little talent, expertise, or money, but he and his little group of pals made cheap and very bad horror/sci-fi movies and loved it. The only star he ever worked with was Bela Lugosi (Martin Landau), decades after his success as 'Dracula,' now drug-addicted and in failing health. Wood and Lugosi made several films together, the most (in)famous being, "Plan 9 From Outer Space," which was actually made after Lugosi's death.

Depp is extremely likable and sympathetic as the effervescent Wood. His quirky, driven personality and penchant for wearing angora sweaters seem entirely believable. Landau won a Best Supporting Oscar for his portrayal of the washed-up Lugosi; he's pathetic and grotesque and absolutely mesmerizing. Watching Ed throw together a whole movie in a few days is hilarious. For Ed, quality was in the mind of the beholder and he loved his movies.

This is a sweet, amusing, lightweight tale about a fascinating Hollywood character that may inspire you to see some of his movies. Recommended.

Very funny look at the life of Edward D. Wood Jr(played by Johnny Depp)This movie got me more interested in Ed Wood as well as Depp. It's all black and white which adds the unique style to the movie and Martin Landeau as Bela Lugosi makes this one of the best movies I've seen.

This is Tim Burton saying that no matter how many people don't care about B-horror pictures, he does, and showing us that there can be poetry in them. "Ed Wood" is a bio-pic of real-life B-hollywood director Edward D Wood Jr, done in the style of one of his pictures - unexplained framing devices, like Criswell's introduction, noirish lighting for no apparent reason, and incidental performances by actors who look like they've just shown up and not been told what part they're supposed to be playing. These last, like the doctor in Lugosi's hospital, are provided for colour, but are an example of the balance struck in this picture. It has the expression of a comedy - yes, we're asked to laugh at Wood's haphazard way of making pictures, and we can laugh about how terrible the pictures are, but beneath the comedy a great truth is found, and a message Tim Burton is passionate about is expressed. The heart of Ed Wood is really in the character of "washed-up" Dracula star Bela Lugosi (played to a tee and rewarded with an Oscar, by Martin Landau).

Twenty years after Dracula, Lugosi's career was over. Nobody cared about him. It was like, as is Hollywood lore, you're only as good as the last thing you've done. And whatever classic roles or films you may have done, it all counts for nothing if you do a bad picture. This theme of the cruel way Hollywood forgets its greatest talents is also why the name Orson Welles keeps cropping up. Its not because Welles made pictures like Ed Wood's, its because, like with Lugosi, Welles's having made what is considered to be the greatest picture of all time, Citizen Kane, counted for nothing in Hollywood. If your pictures didn't make money, you were useless - so Hollywood did everything it could to keep him from working - RKO sabotaged his Ambersons, and eventually he could not get backing for many great pictures in Hollywood that, and here there is another analogy with Ed Wood, he raised money for himself and made independently. It is this determination to succeed, and persist in your work no matter what others think of it that makes Ed Wood (thanks to a terrific fun performance from Johnny Depp) such an important and admirable character. You can't help liking Ed, for his irrepressible spirit and optimism. It was Ed Wood who gave Lugosi another chance, the content of which Burton romanticises and focuses on in his film. Ed Wood cared about Lugosi's work - Wood didn't care about popular opinion which said Lugosi was "washed up," whatever that meant. Wood had seen Dracula, and Lugosi was a legend, and that was all that mattered. Wood gave him the chance to be in pictures again, symbolising the appreciation of great works, not recent moneymakers. Burton and Martin Landau give the legend of Bela Lugosi his last great performance, turning him into the tragic figure to end all tragic figures. His performance of his "I have no home speech" set to stirring, haunting music, on the steps of the hospital - his performance of the infamous flower-smelling scene from Plan Nine from Outer Space, the last footage Lugosi ever shot - all have the tone of appreciating a legend, giving Lugosi his due, saying who gives a [woop] if Hollywood doesn't remember, we remember.

Wow, I only now (3/7/4) read that the Ed Wood DVD was recalled. Fortunately, my copy had already been shipped to me :-)

I did not notice any technical problems playing the movie or special features. Some rumors have it that music rights were not secure, others that the studio was hoping for some Oscar fall out.

Regardless, this is the best of Tim Burton's movies that I've seen (about 4 others). I think his work is generally too gloomy and dark, but this was a great movie. It has off-beat characters, a good story, and best of all, a recreation of portions of "Plan Nine From Outer Space", Ed's infamous really-bad movie.

Well acted, funny, and interesting characters from start to finish. Nice extras on DVD.

I have a copy so listen up. I still think this was a mistake for me to buy except for the fact that I could sell this on ebay. It was a mistake because they might put more stuff when they release it again. They probably took it back because they probably wanted to make a ten year anniversary eddition, which would probably make it 2 disc. Also probably they wanted to make a commentary with Johnny Depp, where I got this from you ask? ...shhh...dont say anything. Anyways these special features are good too. It's also the first time you see this film in widescreen. This film can interest you in Ed Wood Jr, I have looked at his films and laughed very very hard. He is the best at making bad films. Trust me he is the king at making bad films and this film is very funny. I still don't really get why this film is rated R. They hardly say any bad words. Well either way when this film comes out again, buy it. Plus there's an Easter egg. Can't find it still, but when I do I'll let you know.