Flying Saucers Over Hollywood: The 'Plan 9' Companion
Flying Saucers Over Hollywood: The 'Plan 9' Companion
| 01 January 1992 (USA)
Flying Saucers Over Hollywood: The 'Plan 9' Companion Trailers

A documentary detailing the making of the cult favorite "Plan 9 from Outer Space," featuring interviews with cast members and prominent filmmakers about the film, its lasting legacy, and its creator, Edward D. Wood Jr.

Reviews
Kattiera Nana I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.
Evengyny Thanks for the memories!
Maidexpl Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast
Frances Chung Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable
bazmitch23 The biggest problem with this doc is that it's supposed to be focused on Plan 9. But instead we get things about the lives of Ed Wood, Bela Lugosi, Vampira and Tor Johnson. There's a little too much focus on those people rather than Plan 9. If actual documentaries were made about Wood, Johnson, Lugosi and Vampira on their own, that would be great. But we want to see the making of Plan 9 and we don't care about these overlong mini docs on the said people.Because this is a doc made in 92 and shot on video, it feels kind of cheap and out of date. It feels like a doc made from a BETA video camera with bad sound. If the people who made this doc shot it on film, it would be as good as "The Making Of The Wizard Of Oz" doc made back in 1990.Did we really need to see an overlong opening title sequence where a man in the background is playing with the ships on strings. The music we hear is a bad remix of the theme tune.I thought Sam Raimi and Scott Speigel's appearance on this doc was pointless. All they did was a reenactment of Groucho Marx and Tor Johnson's banter on Groucho's radio show. I don't care!And I couldn't make out a word Joe Dante was saying. Also the guy at the wrestling ring, who's idea was to have him interviewed in front of a wrestling ring with the noise of the wrestlers' activity. We can't hear what he is saying. All we hear is: "Well, I loved Plan 9 (BANG! BOOM! SMACK! BANG!).... I loved the movie because (BANG! CRASH! BANG!)"And I hated the song in the credits.But I did like hearing about the production values, people talking about Ed Wood, and the screenwriter reading off his list of things wrong with this movie.Weather another doc will be made about this movie is pretty unlikely, but this one is worth watching if you like Plan 9. Just don't expect anything insightful or memorable from this doc.
Boba_Fett1138 This is obviously being a low-budget and almost fan-made documentary about Edward D. Wood Jr.'s notorious 'opus magnum' "Plan 9 from Outer Space". It's not an impressive looking or put together documentary by any means but it's being a pretty insightful one, that shares and elaborates on some fun facts.It's not necessarily a documentary about the making of "Plan 9 from Outer Space" but more one about Wood's entire career, in which "Plan 9 from Outer Space" plays the central role, holding and bringing everything in this documentary together. It's something that works out well but can be deceiving for those who are expecting a documentary purely focused on the making of "Plan 9 from Outer Space".They managed to get a whole bunch of people in front of the camera, who in one way or the other were involved with "Plan 9 from Outer Space". They share their thoughts and memory of the movie but more so of Ed Wood and those who had passed away already, such as Bela Lugosi, Tor Johnson and Criswell. Most of the information is pretty insightful and helps you to learn more about the movie as well as those involved who had passed away already, which also includes Wood himself of course.This is a fan project, so there are nothing but kind words about him (well, almost entirely) but otherwise this would had most likely been a very depressing documentary, without any fun to it, since Wood's life was far from a happy tale, so I actually don't mind this. It's actually great to see how all these people, after all these years, can speak still so passionately about him and praise him for what he all did and achieved, which might not seem like much but is still quite a big accomplishment all when you look at it objectively. He at least often succeeded to get some big names in his movies and he (almost) always managed to get the movies made in the first place, with basically no money.His passion and love and devotion to his projects made up for his talent, which just wasn't quite there. It's actually great to see Wood himself directing some scenes for a movie in this documentary. It was just like I always had imagined, he was extremely passionate and committed about it and seemed to be just happy to do it as well. He truly was in his element. There is some more unique footage of Wood himself in this documentary, which was always something I was interested in.This is being a pretty good and insightful documentary to watch, if you can forgive it for its somewhat amateur like look and feeling at times. But you shouldn't have any problems with that if your interested in "Plan 9 from Outer Space" and Edward D. Wood Jr.!7/10 http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/
dbborroughs This 1992 documentary is included on one of Image Entertainments releases of Plan 9. Covering not only the making of the film it also deals with the life and times of Ed Wood. Containing a good number of interviews with the surviving cast we get a good idea what it was like to know and work with Ed. There are also interviews with critics and directors (Sam Raimi and Joe Dante) who talk about Ed and his film in the usual contexts of their lives and influence of others. Running close to two hours this film is 35 to 40 minutes longer than the movie it documents. While for the most part this is a breezy and informative documentary its simply too long a film for the subject it covers (hell its ten minutes shorter than Tim Burton's Ed Wood and that covered more material). Almost an hour in an I found my attention started to drift. While I did make to the end I found I ended up using it more as radio on the TV rather than as a documentary to watch. To be fair I'm not sure if the disinterest was do to the film itself or simply knowing a good deal about Ed Wood and the movie already. Worth a look if you run across it (actually one of the Starz movie channels does run it from time to time), but not worth searching out unless you've never seen anything on the film or Ed Wood.
Adrian Smith (trouserpress) This is an interesting and thorough documentary. My only real complaint is it's almost total disregard for quality in it's production. It's like watching a student video. However, this is true to the aesthetic of Plan 9 itself, so I suppose they truly are companions.