Plan 9 from Outer Space
Starring Bela Lugosi or his Dentist
Plan 9 from Outer Space (originally titled Grave Robbers from Outer Space, or simply known as Plan 9) is a 1959 American science fiction thriller film written and directed by Ed Wood and released by Distributors Corporation of America (as Valiant Pictures). The film stars Gregory Walcott, Mona McKinnon, Tor Johnson and Maila "Vampira" Nurmi. The film bills Bela Lugosi posthumously as a star, although silent footage of the actor had been shot by Wood for other, unfinished projects just before Lugosi's death in 1956.
The plot of the film involves extraterrestrial beings who are seeking to stop humans from creating a doomsday weapon that would destroy the universe. In the course of doing so, the aliens implement "Plan 9", a scheme to resurrect Earth's dead as what modern audiences would consider zombies (called "ghouls" in the film itself) to get the planet's attention, causing chaos.
For years the film played on television in relative obscurity, until 1980, when authors Michael Medved and Harry Medved dubbed Plan 9 from Outer Space the "worst movie ever made". Wood was posthumously awarded the Medveds' Golden Turkey Award as the worst director ever.
Background and genre
The film combines elements of science fiction films and Gothic fiction Science fiction remained popular throughout the 1950s, though the genre had experienced significant changes in the post-war period. The Atomic Age, heralded by the development of nuclear weapons and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, had inspired science fiction films which were dealing with the dangers of unrestricted science while spaceflight and the existence of extraterrestrial life and civilizations, more "traditional" elements of the genre, seemed to hold new fascination for audiences experiencing the start of the Space Race.[1] On the other hand, gothic fiction had enjoyed the height of its popularity in film during the 1930s and 1940s. It was experiencing a decline in the 1950s and was seen as old-fashioned. The combination of dated and modern elements, by 1950s standards, gives the film a rather anachronistic quality.
The script of the film seems to aim at making this an epic film, a "genre" which typically requires a big budget provided by a major film studio. That Ed Wood filmed the story with minimal financial resources underlines one of the qualities of his work, his ideas tended be too expensive to actually put to film and yet the director would constantly go ahead and try. An overreach which, as Rob Craig argues, results in the peculiar charm of the film to audiences. Craig finds that the film has much in common with both epic theatre ("grand melodrama on a minuscule budget") and the Theatre of the Absurd (characters acting as buffoons, nonsense and verbosity in dialogue, dream-like and fantasy imagery, hints of allegory, and a narrative structure where continuity is consistently undermined).
The introduction and its origins
The film opens with an introduction by Criswell: "Greetings my friends! We are all interested in the future, For that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives! ...". Criswell was the star of Criswell Predicts on KLAC Channel 13 (now KCOP-13), and the introduction could be an allusion to the opening lines of his show. Since no episodes of the television show are known to survive, a full comparison between them seems impossible. Craig suggests that Criswell' public persona was based on the style of a charismatic preacher, perhaps influenced by early televangelists. Criswell addresses the viewers repeatedly as "my friends", as if attempting to establish a bond between the speaker and the audience. The line is likely to derive from his show, and would not be out of place in a segment where a televangelist addresses his congregation.[1] Another phrase of the introduction "Future events such as these will affect you in the future", served as a signature line for Criswell. He used it repeatedly in his newspaper and magazine columns, and probably his show as well.
Another line ascertains that the audience is interested in "the unknown, the mysterious, the unexplainable", probably assuming that the film's audience will have a fascination with the paranormal. The narrator at some point starts claiming that "we" (the filmmakers) are bringing to light the full story and evidence of fateful events, based on the "secret testimony" of the survivors. The lines seem to emulate the style of sensational headlines in newspapers, and promise the audiences access to "lurid secrets" as if following the example of True Confessions and other similar magazines. The notion that a film or show could be based on true incidents and testimony would be familiar to a 1950s audience, because it was used in contemporary police procedurals such as Dragnet.
Changing the tone, the narrator delivers the sermon-like lines: "Let us punish the guilty! Let us reward the innocent!". Which again sound as if a preacher addresses his audience. The introduction concludes with the dramatic question: "Can your heart stand the shocking facts about graverobbers from outer space". The latter phrase was simply the original title of the film, but the rest of the line seems again to emulate the sensationalist press.
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