Pulp. . . . . trash. . . . . monsters. . . . . lightning-streaked midnight rainstorms. . . . . science fiction. . . . . stilted dialogue. A clumsy Swedish wrestler, Tor Jonson playing Lobo as the assistant, whipped around the mad scientist's laboratory by an aged and washed-up Bela Lugosi cracking a whip.
"Home? I have no home. Hunted. . . . . Despised. . . . ."
Bela Lugosi spits from his perch, gripping the sides of his high-backed professor's chair--
"pursued like an animal through the jungle for 20 years, but I will create a race of
atomic supermen and TAKE OVER THE VORLD!"
[sic].
Consolation for the misfits amongst us to be sure, and Ed Wood churned out these types of scripts in mere hours-- always behind on the rent, always improvising something on the last minute, and his film crew bordered on volunteers because there was simply no money. He shot his scenes on as little as one take, because he could not afford otherwise. He would find ways to ingeniously stir in stock footage from unlikely sources and toss it into the "film" as a bizarre, wayward, and creative means to spice up things, and no one would believe what they just saw.
It was all about the tension of barely holding things together, and having a couple of precious film cans to show for it-- which film companies barely bothered to take all that seriously. He dreamed of becoming the next Orson Welles, the pixie dust of inherent talent, but in the end could only find Bela Lugosi
who hadn't worked in four years and was nursing a pervasive morphine habit,
shooting up in between takes. But the fact that someone took interest in this
fallen film icon was flattering, just as it was bolstering to everyone else in his coterie of woebegone Culver City misfits
to actually work in film. Perhaps Hollywood has a way of making everyone insane, including the maestro
of B-movies, Ed Wood himself.
He died penniless in obscurity in 1977 of alcoholism, before a cult interest developed around his work in the early '80s as "The World's Worst Director". A great biopic was made about him by director Tim Burton in 1994 that ironically cost more than all of Ed Wood's films put together. It too failed at the box office.
Dear Winona,
Please don't be cynical! Please don't be angry! Though I'm a charming scoundrel, at least I'm charming! (Sort of) Though your movies stink, and you act the same in all of them, that doesn't mean that I don't have a fondness for you personally. Have you have considered a script with Hulk Hogan as your co-star? That's a movie you can sink your teeth into! Er. . . . . nevermind!
(Note, this was an actual movie that failed
at the box office)
The poster hangs above the toilet in my house
By the way. . . . .
35 Ain't Washed up!
(P.S. You ain't on the scrap heap yet!)
(Soundtrack of the Revolution)
Yo, Winona-- you need to get yourself into the right movies. Now I know that sounds like a cheap tie-in to my movies that follow, and as a token of my good faith you don't have to bother with those-- but just get yourself into some nice, respectable films instead of geeky, sociopathic trash and you'll do just fine. Ditch Daniel Waters, who would have had better luck being a novelist, and draw towards some frolicsome lightness instead of pitch-black nihilism of the soul that is like the sound of fingernails on a chalkboard.
P.S. Would I go through all this effort to let you down like this? I don't really think so! Don't lose sight of--
*******************
"You want a-nuther song? Well I ain't plain' one mutherfuckin' note until someone comes up here and puts sum money in my god-damned tip-jar! You know I only came here for one purpose. . . . . to take yor fuckin' cash! Why, I could make more profit puttin' out my meth-head neighbor's asshole and ringin' a bell, hollerin' 'Man for sale! Man for sale!'
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
(Rheeee of Crickets)
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
("I heard that, Missy!")
© 2008 by Insufferable Industries
Drop "The Bard" a line at
michaeladams_s@yahoo.com