Sonic Mania oughta take some lessons from Ed Wood (a review of ED WOOD with a clickbait title)

ED WOOD is the greatest kind of emotional storytelling: it is a film that finds joy in despair, creativity in loss, roaring success in crushing failure. It takes the depressing and pathetic life of a perennial loser and transforms it into something to admire, to be proud of, and it doesn't do it by lying, or reforming, or quibbling about facts. It is a much bolder story, one that asserts not that Ed Wood was a great artist or genius despite his achievements, but by way of his spirit and vision; if the product doesn't fit with our expectation of great art, that's only because we've defined it wrong. It dives so deep into the ocean of subjectivity as to forget the surface, yet uses this to expand the mind rather than to deceive it.

Take for instance Bela Lugosi's final filmed appearance in PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE. On paper, this is a rather dark, disheartening history, surrounded by the stench of exploitation. Lugosi's film career had completely disintegrated by the time he met Wood; he lived in poverty, alone and crippled by drug addiction. Wood 'revived' his legacy for a few years by throwing him in embarrassing roles in Z-grade bombs, most famously using some extremely random footage and a lookalike within PLAN 9, as Lugosi passed away during filming. ED WOOD retells this tale in all its detail, but with the focus placed entirely on the loving friendship between the two men. Bela is confused by Ed's films and doesn't see half of them, but is so charmed by the man and happy to be acting again that he doesn't care. As he points out when swarmed by reporters in a rehab center, he doesn't care if he's being exploited. He's an old man - he just wants to stop and smell the roses one last time. Of course, this is literally the scene he directs for himself as his final performance, the one that would land in PLAN 9: a quiet moment with just Ed and the camera, as the director struggles to find any excuse to give his friend something to do. Nor to Ed is it exploitation - PLAN 9 is advertised as "Bela Lugosi's final film" not because it'll sell more tickets that way, but because it is fucking BELA LUGOSI's final film, and how awesome and important is that? Ed cares for the man so dearly that to him it would be the greater atrocity NOT to let Bela have a final starring role, and he's willing to get all his friends baptized if that's what it takes to get it made.

Likewise the PLAN 9 premiere, we don't see the crowd's reaction, only their applause at the names Ed Wood and Bela Lugosi, and the hushed silence at Bela's scene. Did they hate the film? Did they love it? By now it's clear that doesn't matter to Ed ("[the worst movie you ever saw?] Well, my next one'll be better!"), it doesn't matter to Bela, so it doesn't matter to the movie. We simply rush out from the theater, Ed on the high of his life, as he proposes to his girlfriend and drives off into the pouring rain and thunder, no sunset in sight. Cue the ending titles, with a card next to Ed's glowing expression reading that he would never go on to make a successful picture, dying at age 54 after a 20-year descent into alcoholism and nudie flicks; that two years after his death he was voted "Worst Director of All Time", bringing him a new level of worldwide renown. And this plays as an extremely happy and uplifting moment! That's how much work ED WOOD has done to reverse our idea of meaningful accomplishment.

Throughout the film are peppered matter-of-fact bystanders to remind us that this isn't all a fantasy, that no delusion is taking place. This sets up a beautiful irony where someone tries to correct Ed with a genuinely helpful suggestion, he is perplexed and frustrated, yet so determined to succeed that we side with him, because if you're going to be a moron, it's better not to compromise about it. (Aside: how many of Burton's films could accurately be described as "the unwitting adventures of complete morons"? PEE-WEE, that other EDWARD picture, even Jack Skellington mostly fits). The most amusing and transparent of these reality checks are the conservative Christian producers clomping around the PLAN 9 set; the stereotypical micromanaging money-men who just don't get art slowly choking the delicate genius. The fact that they're evangelicals just gives them that extra Hollywood-ignorant edge. Yet everything they point out is perfectly rational and probably would've made a "better" movie - isn't grave-robbing kinda sordid for a kids flick? shouldn't the exposition be given to someone who speaks intelligible English? don't you want to film a take where the actor doesn't kick over that gravestone prop? Of course, the secondary joke going on here is one for PLAN 9 cultists, as these are presumably all the elements that make that film so amusing (I'm actually grateful I haven't seen it - I think this stuff could've annoyed me as pandering if I had).

So the post title (I don't know if it counts as clickbait when your blog isn't advertised and has no visitors). This all goes back to a comment I made in my review of Sonic Mania, in particular comparing it to Sonic Generations, that Mania was boxed into a boring, conservative narrative that everyone already accepts, that the Genesis Sonic games are classics, and that therefore Mania would have no legacy, because it is entirely subservient to previous successes. I pointed out that Generations overcomes this obstacle by treating the trash material (Sonic '06, Heroes, etc.) with the same amount of care and affection as everything else. And that's exactly what ED WOOD is doing, creating something new by celebrating something that hasn't been celebrated, finding a fresh set of eyes (or glasses) for viewing the past, creating history where history got it wrong. Maybe a different way of putting it is that any adaptation has a choice between recreating the execution / the product / the fact, or re-implementing the concept / the inspiration / the soul. You can guess which work falls into which category.