Cons: Lack of technical competence and low budget.
The Bottom Line: "Home? I have no home. Hunted, despised, Living like an animal! The jungle is my home. But I will show the world that I can be its master!"
Plot Details: This opinion reveals major details about the movie''s plot.
Edward D. Wood, Jr. has always struck audiences as a fascinating director in the history of cinema. Not because he made good films, however. Quite the contrary, Wood's films have a cult following for being so staggeringly terrible that audiences view them in order to laugh at the awful special effects, screenwriting, acting, direction, set design, continuity, you name it. But far from the worst director of all time, Wood's films are actually more entertaining than many terrible films being produced today. I think Bride of the Monster serves as proof that, had Wood been given more money to produce his films, maybe even worked on a studio production, he could have produced better films than he did. Firstly, Bride of the Monster has a nice, tight script. The budget is somewhat larger than other films in Wood's filmography, and the cast assembled is more capable of handling basic acting skills than some of the people Wood had to cast in his other films. Bela Lugosi, especially, gives one of the best performances in his career.
The story is this -- Lugosi is Dr. Eric Vornoff, formally a respected scientist in his home country, he traveled the world when no one would take his theories on creating a race of atomic super-beings seriously, settling in Lake Marsh, with a giant mutant octopus and mute, hulking servant Lobo (wrestler Tor Johnson). Following reports of monsters popping up in places like Loch Ness, Prof. Vladimir Strowski (George Becwar) is sent to take Vornoff back to his home country -- by force. But Vornoff's plans of conquering the world are for himself only. Reporter Janet Lawton (Loretta King) sets out to find out the truth about the "Lake Marsh monster", against the objections of her police detective fiancee, Dick Craig (Tony McCoy). Vornoff intends to turn Janet into "the bride of the Atom," but Lobo, in love with her, turns against Vornoff.
Ultimately, the film fails in its final moments. What is largely an average or above average horror flick for the majority of the film, is ruined by Wood's technical inepitude. While it's mostly fairly competent, Wood is hindered by not having anyone from a Hollywood studio who knows what they're doing, unfortunately, having a climax involving a rubber octopus that didn't work -- that was stolen from a special effects warehouse -- didn't work out too well. In the final moments of the film, Lugosi's stunt double (not Lugosi himself, as implied by Tim Burton's 1994 biography of Wood) flails around with a non-moving octopus that is supposed to be attacking him. The problem isn't simply the fact that the film is low budget. The problem is that it's a low budget Ed Wood film. Wood strikes me as a better director than George Lucas, but in that comparison, Wood needed studio backing and good special effects in order to make a good film (unlike Lucas, who produced six Star Wars movies that make Wood's output look like Citizen Kane, even with studio backing), whereas if he had planned the storyline better, he could have shot the octopus attacks in a series of close-ups that could have obscured the fact that the octopus had no motor.
Beyond that, Lugosi's performance is fantastic, and the story and screenplay are better put together than many have viewed the film over the years. Take for instance, an encounter between Janet and a coworker -- the film Ed Wood misquotes the dialogue as "I know what you said, but I can't hear you", which doesn't particularly make sense. In actuality, Janet says that "I didn't hear you", which fits the context of the scene ("I heard you, but I'm not listening, so there.") And despite the Medved brothers' claims, at no point does Bela Lugosi state that Lobo is as "gentle as a kitchen". The line, correctly spoken is "as gentle as a kitten." Ignoring the octopus screw-up, Bride of the Monster is the best-looking of Wood's works, and would probably pass for an average studio picture of the era. Bride of the Monster SHOULD be a good movie, but it doesn't quite get there. It comes closer than any of Wood's other films, though, and it is as entertaining as Plan 9 from Outer Space, although it is not as funny as that picture. In concept, Bride of the Monster is fairly interesting and above average, but not in execution. It is still recommended if you enjoy films of the genre, director, and stars. In any case, this is Ed Wood's best film.
Likewise with Plan 9 from Outer Space, the DVD you should own is the Legend Films edition, which features a restored black and white version of the film and a high-quality colorized version of the film. The quality of the print is excellent - possibly the best release of the film to date, while the colorization is photo-realistic. Included with the film is a 1950 interview with Bela Lugosi and a television appearance in which Tor Johnson plays "The Strongest Man In The World". Also included are colorized trailers for Plan 9 from Outer Space, House on Haunted Hill, Night of the Living Dead, Carnival of Souls and Reefer Madness.
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