Glen or Glenda

Ever since Tim Burton's wonderful 'Ed Wood' raised Ed Wood Jr's profile and made his seriously bent movies movies better known than they have ever been, some cult movie fans have gotten their noses out of joint. Wood's reputation as the worst director ever pushes some buffs buttons as it marginalizes already marginalized film makers like Ray Dennis Steckler, Ted V. Mikels, Herschell Gordon Lewis, Al Adamson and other "so bad it's good" directors. I leave more knowledgeable fans than me to argue over who REALLY is the worst, but there's no denying that Wood's movies are quite unlike anything made before or since. 'Glen Or Glenda' is his best movie, or if the term "best" misleads, his Ed Woodest. I've lost track of how many times I've seen it over the years but it never loses its power to amuse and astound. Every single time I watch it I am flabbergasted! It literally has to be seen to be believed. Wood plays the title character, a man wrestling with his transvestitism. His girlfriend is played by Dolores Fuller, the cop by Lyle Talbot, the psychiatrist by Timothy Farrell, all three familiar faces from other Wood classics like 'Plan Nine From Outer Space' and 'Jail Bait'. But the real reason to watch this is the utterly bizarre performance from horror legend Bela Lugosi, credited on the version I watched as "scientist", and on the IMDb as "The Spirit", who may or may not be God. His rantings of "Pull the strings! Pull the strings!" and nonsensical stuff about "Green dragons" and "puppy dog tails" will stay in your head for YEARS, if not for the rest of your life! Wood intercuts this with nutty stock footage like buffalo stampedes, and one of the most wacked out nightmare sequences ever seen, which includes lots of chubby gals in states of undress, some S and M, and and an appearance by Satan. Believe the hype - everything you've heard about this one is true! Fifty years on it's STILL one of the weirdest movies ever made. If you haven't seen 'Glen Or Glenda' you just don't know what you're missing!

I had a particularly masochistic day today, watching both Manos: The Hands of Fate and Glen or Glenda, both of which have at some point been claimed to be the Worst Movie Ever. Watching both movies in one day made Glen or Glenda look good by comparison, but it is, by itself, one of the most bewildering movies I've seen.

I say this not because of its pleas for tolerance in gender matters. That might have seemed odder in the '50s, when homophobia was more mainstream. We've since moved on to debating whether gays can marry. What's really striking about this movie, rather, is the extended surreal dream sequences and the inexplicable narration of Bela Lugosi. Throw Satan in there! Why not? A herd of buffalo stampeding below Lugosi? Why not? Being trampled by the herd would symbolize being run over by society for an urge to cross-dress, wouldn't it? Symbolism! Except the symbolism goes on way too long, one sensing in an effort by Ed Wood to drag his movie over the 60-minute mark. Eventually, it becomes incomprehensible.

And what of that narration? Bela Lugosi, "the Scientist," is kind of like a half-scientist, half-god character, who's also dark. He has skeletons around him for some reason. He says sinister things. Who or what is he? At the same time, a doctor is telling a police officer about Glen and Glenda. I'm reminded of the Nostalgia Critic's criticism of Rock-A-Doodle- who in god's name is telling the story? "The Scientist" or the doctor?

You can find some elements of this style in a movie like Ingmar Bergman's Persona- random flashing of unpleasant things, apparent dream sequences, a kind of god-like "narration" (a boy watching a TV), but that movie was competently done. Glen or Glenda becomes a giant non sequitur- not the worst movie ever, but worth quite the WTF?

Surprisingly, the movie's neither good nor bad-- it just doesn't register on the conventional spectrum. Instead it's just plain weird, terminally weird. It's like a highschool hygiene lecture wrapped in soft porno, all tossed into a surrealist dream. Really, Wood had all the guts in the world to lecture a 1950's audience on the subtleties of gender bending. That part is genuinely informative and worth a salute. I also liked the soft porn with the squirming girls in semi-undress. But I'm still wondering how that got released in 1953. Then there's Lugosi sitting in some corner of the surrealist universe, telling us to "Bevare of puppy dog tails…" and other hammy nonsense. I figure he was added for marquee value since the rest of the cast are a bunch of unknowns. But what's this thing Wood has for lightning bolts. It's like he says, "Stop the action, it's time for a lightning bolt", and makes just about that much sense. One thing for sure—you never know what's coming next. It might be a stampede of buffalo or a stroll down Ventura Blvd. in drag. And, my gosh, Wood (Glen and Glenda) looks so normal, you'd never guess he makes Salvador Dali seem absolutely conventional. I don't know what part of planet Wacko Wood hails from, but I do know it's no part of the known universe. Nonetheless, here's a fuzzy angora Oscar to Wood for just plain weirdness.

Like in "plan nine outer space" ,Ed Wood tries to put a message across in his film.In his sci-fi flick,he made his E.T. blame the human race for their self-destruction :it was not unlike Robert Wise's "the day the earth stood still" and not more naive than the latter.The main difference lies in the fact that Wood had a shoestring budget with his cardboard flying saucers and his shower curtain in the "plane"

"Glen or Glenda" is anything but stupid.Just tell me the name of a director (in the USA or elsewhere) who dared to treat such a taboo subject: the transvestites -not necessarily homosexual- and even the transsexuals.His film ,with voice over galore,although dated today of course was a plea for tolerance.The fact that Ed Wood himself used to dress himself as a woman (see Tim Burton's eponymous movie) is proof positive that he knows what he is taking about.

Bela Lugosi's part,on the other hand,gets in the way.Is he a scientist? a puppeteer who plays with humans? or "simply" God Himself?(do not laugh at him!when Agnes Varda ,an intellectual director of the notorious French Nouvelle Vague , films such drivel ("les Creatures",1966) ,the highbrows praise her to the skies )

Despite ludicrous special effects ,terrible acting and poor lines,Ed Wood's film is anything but derivative.

I am a huge fan of Ed, after seeing "Ed Wood", and I have since bought the book "Nightmare of Ecstacy". Also, I bought all of the films that he had made that I could get my hands on.

Like it or not, "Glen Or Glenda" was a landmark film!

This particular film was made WAY AHEAD of it's time!! While I was first watching Tim Burton's fantastic film, recreating the making of "Glen Or Glenda", I noticed that there were things in it that seemed rather familiar to me, even after 30+ years have passed, and that is what partly interested me in looking into both the book, and Ed Wood's films. What I discovered was, I had seen this film when I was in GRADE SCHOOL!!

After viewing the REAL "Glen OR Glenda" film, I realized that I had had seen this exact same film before, although heavily edited!

It was shown as a part of our sex-ed class!! I can hardly believe it that they showed us this back then, but they did. No

thanks to the school I went to, and the horribly incompetent teachers, but they did show it!

Now, fast forward to today, the reason for all of the extra scenes near the end of the film, such as the 'Devil' sequences, and the rest of the rather abstract looking scenes, were not originally part of the screenplay. Those scenes (baffling and dumbfounding), were NOT part of the film as Ed had written. His script left the running time short of what George Weiss had told him he wanted, a 7 reel, 16MM film, which was what he needed to sell it. A 16MM reel runs about 10 minutes, and George needed a 70 minute film (at least), because he pre-sold it in several states as a "Feature", before he actually found out what it really was. He wasn't too pleased with what Ed had made, but he was able to distribute it to his clients, after all of the extraneous material was added at the end. George did eventually make his money back, and he and Ed worked on a couple of other projects, unlike what is shown in the "Ed Wood" film.

Even today, though, I think that this film was made way before it's time, and Ed Wood should deserve some credit for trying to bring a sense of understanding to what was then a totally misunderstood way of life for a select few.