Let me preface this review with the fact that unlike most other cinephiles, I have never been particularly attracted to The Wizard of Oz. Great movie? Sure. Do I see anything markably awesome about it? Ehhhh…not really. 1939 was a magical year for cinema and had I been around at the time to hear the Oscars on the radio I’m almost certain that I would have voted for Gone With the Wind over The Wizard of Oz. That being said (and hopefully I haven’t lost half of my followers by admitting this outright), I’m going to proceed with how my lukewarm opinions about the original film affected my thoughts about the prequel.
The story begins with a fair in 1905. Oscar, Oz for short (played by James Franco), is a magician and has developed a career based on illusion. Tricking his audience is how he makes his living and isn’t bad at using it to pick up chicks either. Actually, this is what seems to get him into trouble. After getting chased by someone who appears to be a strong man, Oz escapes by jumping into a hot air balloon and (he is apparently not the brightest) cutting the tether right in the middle of a tornado. Oops!
After fainting (or floating into the clouds…I forget what the transition was there…), Oz finds himself in a land called by his own name. He is met immediately by the beautiful and timid Theodora, who is amazed and joyous at finding the prophetic “wizard.” Seeing an opportunity to whisk a young lady off her feet, Oz plays along with the notion that he is indeed the wizard of Oz (see what I did there?). Wooing her with the same tired tricks that he won ladies back home with, Oz unintentionally tricks the young Theodora into falling in love with him. After reaching The Emerald City and meeting Theodora’s suspicious-looking sister, he is armed with the task of proving himself as wizard by destroying The Wicked Witch (who ends up being Glinda, the good witch). Of course, after figuring out who is the real wicked witch, he decides to side with Glinda. Forgetting about the naive Theodora, he teams up with Glinda to lead her people into battle, a decision which sets into motion a string of events that lead up to the original film, The Wizard of Oz.
So…the exposition is a little complex in this movie and I don’t want to give too much away. Suffice it to say that those of you who thought that this film would be based more along the lines of the infamous musical Wicked are going to be in for a little disorientation.
Warning: the following contains semi-spoilers depending on how much you want to know. Scroll down until the green lettering if you want to skip this bit and get on with my full review.
The movie is based on the first book in the original book series by L. Frank Baum and is actually kind of sad. Instead of Elfeba (or however the hell you spell that name), who (if memory serves me) is markedly green throughout her entire life, Theodora takes on the appearance after being jilted by Jackass McGee Oz. Losing faith that he is the real wizard and looking for an escape from her pain, she enlists her sister, Evanora, to help her. Evanora, of course, is the real Wicked Witch and makes the horrible mistake of underestimating Theodora’s dark side. What ends up happening is that Theodora, once hopeful and searching for peace, is turned into a green, hook-nosed monstrosity of downright rage. Kind of a sad metaphor for anyone who has ever been seriously let down.
OKAY, GUYS IT’S SAFE TO KEEP READING BELOW
Unfortunately, at least from my own view, this movie is left to deal with the Oz-fanatics of the pre-special-effects, pre-complex-movie era and it sort of limits how far they can go with certain things. The notorious Witch of the West character, for example, had to be kept green with a hooked nose and pointy chin. This kind of makes sense at the end, but I feel like in our day and age, someone deceivingly beautiful is far more terrifying (and easier to look at) than the almost comical frump that ends up on screen. And it’s not like they don’t try to sexy her up a little. Instead of the loose, shapeless black dress, she wears leather leggings and a corset top. However, that trademark cackle doesn’t really seem to fit this Wicked Witch, and thus her character seems a little…off.
All in all, I kind of had the same problems with everything else. The movie, which could’ve done some amazing things with the original book, is kind of limited in trying to mollify the original Wizard of Oz movie fans. Laden with references to the original film (the flying monkey almost gets eaten by a lion, they use a bunch of scarecrows at one point, Oz’s high school sweetheart is named Emmie, etc.), the movie seems unsure of how to proceed without making use of its cult following. The result seems to be that they don’t create anything incredibly creative (which is a serious bummer considering how much you could play with the literary world of Oz). It kind of ends up being a little obsolete, with overly simplified characters and a plot that seems to drag a little.
The one thing that I did enjoy about the movie was how much they play with special effects. Much like Avatar and movies since that have dealt with vibrant other-worlds, it’s a dazzling world of color and it’s mesmerizing that way. The coolest thing that I saw was the character of the China Doll, who is created flawlessly.
All in all, was Oz a bad movie? No. Was I terribly impressed? Eh, not really. This may, however, be due to my ambivalence at the first movie though, as my boyfriend’s mom is a die-hard Wizard of Oz fan and she seemed pretty pleased with having more of her favorite story being put in front of her.
All said and done, I’d give it a 6 outa 10.
*WARNGNI: This post may include some caffeine-induced, jittery-fingered typos. Enjyo!
Large Popcorn No Butter 