"A saucer? You mean the kind from up there?" (Plan 9 From Outer Space (DVD))

Member Name: greenierexyboy

Product:	Plan 9 From Outer Space (DVD)
Date:	12/03/09 (372 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: A totally unique experience

Disadvantages: It's an experience that you need to buy into

**SPOILER WARNING**

THIS REVIEW CONTAINS A VERY DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PLOT OF PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE.

WHY? BECAUSE IT IS MY BELIEF THAT NO-ONE WOULD WATCH THIS FILM WITH THE SAME MINDSET AS THEY WOULD UTILISE ON A 'NORMAL' MOTION PICTURE. THE PACKAGING OF THE DVD MAKES ITS APPEAL CLEAR, AND IT IS NEVER PRESENTED ON TELEVISION AS ANYTHING OTHER THAN A CLASSIC OF INEPT CINEMA. VIEWERS OF PLAN 9 ARE MORE INTERESTED IN ITS LEGION OF TECHNICAL FAILINGS, CHEAP SETS, HYSTERICAL DIALOGUE AND GHASTLY ACTING THAN THEY ARE IN WHAT PASSES FOR A PLOT.

IN ORDER TO ARTICULATE THE UNIQUE TEXTURE OF THIS FILM CLASSIC, I FELT IT NECESSARY TO SUMMARISE ITS STORY COMPREHENSIVELY. I SINCERELY BELIEVE THAT THIS DOES NOT SPOIL A FILM OF THIS NATURE FOR THE VIEWER

IF YOU DON'T WISH TO FIND OUT WHAT HAPPENS IN PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE, PLEASE EITHER SKIP THE CLEARLY LABELLED PLOT SECTION, OR SIMPLY READ NO FURTHER.

MANY THANKS.

**********

What is the greatest film ever made?

It's a question with a deeply elusive answer. For sure, there are the usual suspects if you are a film buff; "Citizen Kane" is often mentioned, or "The Battleship Potemkin" perhaps. If your tastes are more contemporary, you might plump for something like "The Godfather", or "Raging Bull". Or if you don't shy away from populism, you might plump for "Star Wars", or "E.T.", and their like. And if you're a blithering idiot who doesn't really like films you might go for "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End". Point is, the options are limitless. Pose 100 people the question, and I suspect you'd end up with at least 90 different films nominated.

But if the question becomes "What's the WORST film ever made".... there's almost an official right answer. A film that stealthily acquired its reputation in countless late-night screenings on deadbeat US TV channels in the 1970s. A reputation healthily built on its almost unfathomable ineptitude and infinite capacity for unintended entertainment. But still very much a classic of the underground; at least it was until the Medved Brothers' seminal 1980 work on the world of the bad film, "The Golden Turkey Awards", blew its cover. Ladies and gentlemen, pray silence for Edward D. Wood Jr's "Plan 9 From Outer Space".

The brothers had written a book exploring this field before; 1978's "The Fifty Worst Movies Of All Time", and at the back of that volume, they had enlisted the help of their readership in a poll to discover what the public thought on the subject. "Fifty Worst...." hadn't even mentioned Plan 9, so its eventual victory was bolt from the blue; indeed, it was the only film in the top ten that hadn't been made in the 1970s. Somehow, a grade Z sci-fi flick from the 1950s that had bombed on first release had survived in the traditionally short memories of the movie-going populace. In the same way that supposedly very few people saw The Velvet Underground but all those who did formed a band, it seemed that everyone who'd witnessed Plan 9 had come to the same opinion. How could this be?

It's simple. Once you've seen Plan 9, you simply CANNOT forget it.

Anyway, allow me to try to describe the plot in detail (and lots of it; consider that a spoiler warning) as if it were a normal film. This is a classic example of the "no win scenario", but it does a man good to fail miserably from time to time; there's a lot of symbolism in that, given the subject I'm tackling.
Whatever. Can you face the terrible truth about grave robbers from outer space?

**********THIS SECTION DOES CONTAIN A BLOW-BY-BLOW ACCOUNT OF THE PLOT**********

We open with a man sitting behind a desk, and the legend "Criswell Predicts". Criswell was a well-known TV psychic in America in the 50s who somehow fell into Ed Wood's circle, and in keeping with the enterprise in which he was starring, he generally made Mystic Meg look like Nostradamus (classic Criswell zingers include exclusively gay suburbs in American cities by the 1980s, and the city of Denver being struck by a ray from space that would turn all its metal to rubber; despite this, he claimed to be accurate over 80% of the time). In a deeply portentous voice, he warns us that future events, such as those we are about to see, will affect us in the future; subtly introducing a level of truism that infects the entire script. And that all we see is based on sworn testimony, etc. Criswell continues to narrate throughout the picture, but this scene sets you up wonderfully; you're instantly aware that this is going to be special.

After the titles, we're straight into a graveyard. We'll spend a lot of time in a graveyard during Plan 9, but at least this one looks vaguely realistic. A grieving Bela Lugosi is burying his wife. The funeral party leave, and we cut to a plane flying overhead. At the controls is Gregory Walcott, possibly the only competent actor in this masterpiece, and he has to be, as his cockpit apparently consists of some cardboard controls and a shower curtain. A sudden blast of light introduces one of Plan 9's most enduring motifs, the flying saucer on the obvious string, much to the "terror" of the cabin crew. Said saucer lands in front of a terrible back projection shot of the graveyard, and soon the gravediggers watch in horror as the just-buried wife of Bela Lugosi emerges from her tomb. They can't have been the world's most obvious Mr and Mrs, as she is played by the absurdly young and buxom Vampira (host of a hugely popular late night horror film show in LA) and he was obviously in the waiting room for the next life; a waiting room his late missus quite happily escorts him from soon afterwards. Obviously first having dispatched the hapless gravediggers by use of that deadliest of weapons; the "off-screen scream".

Bela is now pictured loitering outside his house, inspecting flowers and looking sad. He dies offscreen too; another common occurrence in Plan 9, and is interred in an obviously fake tomb. Two of his mourners discover the dead gravediggers, and another colossally (in all senses of the word) significant character arrives at the graveyard; Chief Inspector Daniel Clay. Clay is played by 400lb Swedish ex-wrestler Tor Johnson, who had previously tended to play mute monsters in Wood's films. Unwisely, he's given an English speaking role here, and his thick Swedish accent would definitely benefit from subtitles.

We now move to pilot Gregory Walcott's house, conveniently situated on the edge of guess what? The graveyard. He's discussing the events of the day with his endlessly talentless wife, Mona McKinnon. The saucer appears again, causing panic amongst the police in the graveyard (and famously, the enthusiastic wobbling of one of the cardboard gravestones). Clay ventures into the graveyard by himself, and becomes yet another victim of the offscreen scream, as we are introduced to the double who was hired to finish Bela Lugosi's role; an unemployed chiropractor who looked nothing like him. Wood's solution? The "double" would hold his Dracula cape over his face the whole time he was onscreen; who in the audience would be able to tell the difference? His body is quickly discovered by his fellow officers (well, it would be hard to miss, what with its large gravitational pull), leading to possibly the greatest line of dialogue in motion picture history.

"There's no doubt about it. Inspector Clay's dead. Murdered...... and SOMEBODY'S responsible".

We're now treated to a montage of the wickedly daft flying saucers flying over most of America's cities. As Criswell puts it, "there comes a time in a man's life when he can't even believe his own eyes." We're 20 minutes in and we known exactly what he means. More stock footage of missiles being fired fails to do even the vaguest smidgeon of damage to the saucers. We learn that the USAF have previously tried and failed to contact the aliens, but got no response; quite reasonable, given how thick the military turn out to be. With that formality out of the way, the US government feels quite entitled to try to blow them out of the sky, and the aliens retreat to their home planet.

And what fearsome technology they have there. What looks like an oscilloscope and an alarm clock are amongst the items sat on the bog-standard wooden desk of the alien's leader, "The Ruler". (The shower curtain from the plane cockpit also makes a cameo appearance). His intrepid "destroy all humanity" team of Tanna and Eros (played by the fabulously monikered Dudley Manlove) are reporting in; we discover that to achieve their objective, they are now following the dreaded Plan 9 (what 1-8 were is never explained, and one can only fantasise); the Resurrection of the Dead.

Back on Earth, jet jockey Gregory Walcott is worried about leaving his dearly beloved Mona McKinnon behind to go to work; and with good reason, as the returning Eros and Tanna once again bring Bela Lugosi back from the dead. He creeps into her house (the dozy bint having left the door unlocked, obviously, despite promising she would bolt it; now there's a tradition that's made its way into several squillion slasher flicks), promptly turning into his chiropractor double upon reaching her boudoir. She flees, having first screamed in her inimitable monotone. There must be something about the house, because the Ghoul Man becomes Bela Lugosi again once the action moves outside. Vampira starts menacing her too, and she runs to the highway where she is picked up by a passing driver. Meanwhile, in one of the film's most iconic moments, the imposing (to put it mildly) figure of Tor Johnson rises (with obvious difficulty, given his weight) from his tomb.

Showing an alertness that largely deserts them for the rest of the film, the police quickly notice the absence of Inspector Clay from his tomb; meanwhile, we cut to the Pentagon where airforce bigwig "in charge of saucer field activity" Colonel Edwards is played a translated tape of a message from the aliens. Basically, the aliens believe mankind to be on the verge of destroying the universe by accident, and we have to be stopped. (This tape also introduces such interesting concepts as "eons of your years ago" and "atmospheric conditions in outer space"). Edwards is sent to Hollywood to investigate the graveyard shenanigans.

Eros and Tanna order their reanimated dead to join them on their flying saucer, and return to their home planet. Eros narrowly escapes death from the reanimated Tor Johnson when the controlling electrode gun malfunctions; obviously, "that was TOO close!!!". The Ruler modifies the plan (maybe turning it into Plan 9.1) to publically sacrifice the Unemployed Chiropractor as a distraction, allowing Eros and Tanna to build armies of the dead big enough to march on the Earth's major cities (because, let's face it, three undead isn't much of an army).

Colonel Edwards is now in town, and he interrogates the police, Gregory and Mona. Their discussions are interrupted by Bela Lugosi's double's sudden appearance; he knocks Wood's recurring character "Kelton the Cop" unconscious (adjusting the cape that momentarily slips from his shoulders) before spontaneously (but off-camera, obviously) decomposing to a skeleton. All this excitement leads the assembled party to the cemetery; Mona McKinnon is cleverly left in the car, from where she is promptly abducted by Tor Johnson when the guarding police officer fails to notice a 400lb Swedish wrestler walking up to it.

The Chief of Police, Gregory Walcott and Colonel Edwards are lured to the flying saucer, and allowed inside. Here, Eros lectures them on the evils of mankind; his final declaration "your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!" finally pushes Gregory over the edge. It's reassuring to know that a race whose technology can resurrect the dead and travel through space still have no defence against a decent right hook. Further boy scout philosophical discussions ensue between the representatives of the concerned planets, Mona McKinnon is rescued from the clutches of Tor Johnson, a fight breaks out on the saucer, the Earth folk escape, the saucer takes off and bursts into flames (pretty much inexplicably, and represented by possibly the worst effects shot of the entire film, which is quite an accolade) and everyone goes home for tea and medals. The End.

Alas no; we still have another portentous Criswell monologue (that he apparently wrote himself; possibly the only man capable of competing with Ed Wood on the dialogue front) to make it through:

"My friend, you have seen this incident based on sworn testimony. Can you prove that it didn't happen? Perhaps on your way home, you will pass someone in the dark, and you will never know it, for they will be from outer space. Many scientists believe that another world is watching us this moment. We once laughed at the horseless carriage, the aeroplane, the telephone, the electric light, vitamins, radio, and even television! And now some of us laugh at outer space. God help us... in the future!"

**********
MAJOR PLOT SPOILERS END


Entire books have been written about the colossal technical failings of Plan 9, and it would spoil the experience of watching it by listing them all. Better to offer a few more, over and above the ones I've touched on in the plot description, and leave the rest to be discovered by the mortified onlooker. Anyway:

1) At one point, Mona McKinnon runs from a graveyard in darkness, "pursued" by Bela Lugosi's double. Her flight takes her onto the side of a highway.... and it's broad daylight. We then cut to the lurking Vampira and Unemployed Chiropractor Who Looks Nothing Like Bela Lugosi in the graveyard, and it's night time again. Apparently, Wood planned to use an optical printer to change the "day shots" into "night shots", but he simply forgot to do it.

2) Eros the Alien's explanation of how "solaranite" works. Rest assured, only Wood can write dialogue like this.

"The rays of sunlight are minute particles..... Take a can of your gasoline. Say this can of gasoline is the sun. Now you spread a thin line of it to a ball, representing the Earth. Now, the gasoline represents the sunlight, the sun particles. Here we saturate the ball with the gasoline, the sunlight. Then we put a flame to the ball. The flame will speedily travel around the Earth, back along the line of gasoline to can, or the sun itself. It will explode this source, and spread to every place that gasoline, or sunlight, touches. Explode the sunlight here, Gentlemen, and you explode the universe. Explode the sunlight here, and a chain reaction will occur, direct to the sun itself. And to all the planets that sunlight touches. To every planet in the universe. This why you must be stopped. This is why any means must be used to stop you."

3) When Tor Johnson is struck from behind to make him release the unconscious Mona McKinnon, her fall from his arms is clearly onto strategically placed pillows that are still visible in the bottom of the shot. Plan 9's cinematographer, William C. Thompson, often claimed to be Hollywood's only blind cinematographer (just think about the ramifications of being blind in that line of work). He was actually only sightless in one eye, but by the looks of things he may as well have been useless in both.

These, and many other subjects, are tackled by the documentary included on the DVD. "Flying Saucers Over Hollywood: The Plan 9 Companion" is actually substantially longer than the film itself, and it's hard to imagine it being better or more comprehensive. As well as looking as low-rent as the film it deals with (shot on the most washed-out video possible), it is quite exhaustive in its interviews with surviving stars, film historians and now-'A'-list directors such as Sam Raimi and Joe Dante. It also solves a few mysteries; for instance, despite years of speculation that they might be dustbin lids, paper plates or hubcaps off '57 Chevrolets, the Plan 9 saucers are finally revealed to be slightly modified plastic toys readily available at the time.

**********

Of course, it's impossible to properly consider an Ed Wood film without touching upon the man himself. Tim Burton's biopic has made his name considerably better known, and while the film is heartfelt and strangely reverent, it does rather gild certain lillies. The reality is no less bizarre than any Hollywoodisation can muster.

Wood was born in 1924; his mother supposedly wanted a girl, and proceeded to dress her son in skirts and dresses up till the age of 12, presumably laying the foundation for his flamboyant (but non-sexually oriented) transvesticism. He enlisted in the Marines at the age of 17, and spent some time in a carnival after his discharge. But with his lifelong love of movies and zeal for making things happen, it was inevitable that Wood would attempt to realise his dreams of a Hollywood career.

Wood commenced his film output with the obviously autobiographical "Glen Or Glenda", which he not only wrote and directed but also played the title character under a pseudonym. The film features Bela Lugosi, whom Wood had recently met, in a deranged semi-narrator's role seemingly unrelated to the onscreen action; it is assumed that Wood had been so thrilled to cast the down-on-his-luck-but-still-famous Lugosi that he'd barely considered what he could actually get the actor to do onscreen.

His follow up was "Jail Bait"; relatively low-key by Wood's standards, but still featuring a gloriously typical moment where a character picks up a phone and starts having a conversation despite the fact that it hasn't actually rung. Wood had meant to dub the sound of a phone ring onto the soundtrack, but obviously (see above), he forgot. Next was the Frankenstein-esque "Bride of the Monster", with Bela Lugosi's mad scientist seeking to take over the world with his army of electronically elongated human beings. The climax of this movie features Bela Lugosi losing in mortal combat with a large rubber octopus that Wood and his associates had stolen from Columbia Studios; alas, they forgot to steal the engine that made it move, so Lugosi's acting talents (slightly diminished by years of heavy drug use) were stretched to the limit as he lay on top of a totally inanimate cephalopod, wrapping its tentacles around himself, trying to convince the world that a life-or-death struggle is taking place.

Wood had shot a couple of days' worth of general footage of Lugosi, mostly in his time-honoured Dracula cape (which he was eventually buried in), and had been working out what to do with it when the actor finally succumbed to heart failure. Within a couple of years he had developed a plot that could include what he already had in the can, and the result was film history, after a fashion.

After Plan 9, and without his main star, Wood's career waned. He made one more "typical" film, "Night of the Ghouls"; despite its usual technical ineptitude, its central premise (a fake medium discovering that their powers are actually real) was strong enough to have cropped up in a fair few 'A' list films (e.g. "Ghost") down the years. But his directorial opportunities became few and far between; he mostly worked as a writer for pulp and hardcore magazines, exploiting his transvesticism; his film output post 1960 is largely in the same genre. He died, practically penniless, in 1978; two years later the Medveds, as well as garlanding Plan 9, awarded him the accolade of "The Worst Director Of All Time", and he finally achieved immortality of a sort.

**********

What he'd have made of that infamy is interesting to ponder; fundamentally, the man is being laughed at, and it's slightly unfair. For sure, he's a hopeless filmmaker, but he is so clearly trying his hardest and his optimism is so endless that you end up deeply respecting him. He does actually try to tackle some interesting, even important themes; he fails, obviously, cataclysmically even, but at least he tries.

And as for Plan 9; is it really the worst film ever made? In pure entertainment terms, it can't be. The worst crime a film can commit is to be boring, and that's something it most emphatically isn't. It's short, it's concise, it has a beginning, a middle, and an end. You cannot tell me that "Good Luck Chuck" or "Van Helsing" are better.

It's tempting to think of films like this as pure nostalgia; an evocation of a time long gone where everything (even everyday life) was monochrome, and that movie professionalism has taken a quantum leap forward. Has it? There will always be exceptions to rules, and so long as someone can let John Travolta play a nine foot dreadlocked alien with shoelaces up his nostrils in an adaptation of a crap sci-fi novel written by the bloke who invented the loony cult with which he's besotted, so long as computer whizzes and studio execs can come up with and allow to reach the screens CGI as abysmal as the Scorpion King at the climax of "The Mummy Returns" or the surfing bit of "Die Another Day".... well, it's comforting to think that Hollywood might still have an Edward D. Wood Jr shaped ghost in the machine.

(The three star rating is kinda arbitrary; it's a one star film, but a five star experience.)

Previously published on Ciao.co.uk

Summary: The dangers of creativity laid bare for all to see