Plan 9 From Outer Space

Summary: Umm, some aliens are upset about being snubbed by earth and decide to preemptively destroy humanity before we discovered some ultimate bomb that will start a chain reaction destroying the universe.  This will be accomplished, somehow, by Plan 9: raising the dead one by one to make an army that will march on Washington.

“Future events such as these will affect you in the future.” – Narrator

So I came to the Plan 9 party a bit late.  Last night was the first time I’ve watched Plan 9 and it is the only Ed Wood movie I’ve seen (most of my experience with Ed Wood comes from the Tim Burton movie, which I also have not seen).  Needless to say, I have heard many stories of “The Worst Movie Ever Made” and had some pretty high expectations of crap.  And I was only kind of disappointed.  To be sure, it is a really shitty movie with the worst production values I have ever seen, terrible acting (although I think the acting in Alien Apocalypse is worse), terrible writing (I think I can give it the honour of worst writing ever), and terrible directing (even Alien Vs. Hunter has marginally better directing – at least it attempts continuity).  But I think I need to watch it again to really notice the more subtle awful touches.  I’ve heard that people knock over cardboard tombstones and point pistols at themselves, but I can’t say I noticed these things.  So let’s talk about what I did notice, because this movie is fucking funny.  First of all there is the writing, which doesn’t even attempt to make sense.  I think my favourite part of the quote above is that the narrator then goes on to talk about how the story is based on the testimony of survivors, implying that this happened in the past (although I think he is a psychic, so maybe he spoke to people from the future…. whatever).  He then goes on to narrate the movie by saying exactly what the characters are doing, like “the woman walked into the room and picked up the phone” as a woman walks into a room and picks up a phone (I don’t think this specific instance actually happened, but you get the idea).  Other logical inconsistencies include needing to invent a “language computer” to translate the alien messages but then just having English conversations when they meet.  As far as production values go, individual scenes will alternate between day and night from shot to shot and Ed Wood only managed to film a couple minutes of footage of Bela Lugosi before he died, so he just has someone walk around holding a cape over his face for all the other scenes.  I won’t even go into set design.
So why would anyone want to watch this?  Because through it all you can feel the passion of Ed Wood just wanting to get this movie made, come hell or high water.  Can’t afford a cockpit?  Just have two guys wear uniforms and sit in front of a shower curtain.  Can’t afford alien make up?  Screw it, give ‘em silk shirts and tights and call them aliens.  Can’t afford actors?  Just get some people from your church and tell them to read lines.  I actually find it kind of reassuring that a movie like this can get made.  I mean, if he can do it, why can’t I? Because I’m lazy, but that is beside the point.  Wait, what is my point?  I’m not really sure anymore, but when it comes down to it we all love to revel in someone else’s incompetence and this movie is nothing if not gloriously incompetent.

F- for quality
B- for hilarity

originally posted Mar. 8 , 2009

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