Movie review: Oz the Great and Powerful

Just like the colon that is omitted from the title where one would expect it, this prequel to the classic 1939 film The Wizard of Oz by Victor Fleming lacks the charm to sweep us off our feet. Perhaps because there is no Judy Garland, or perhaps because instead of using actual sets director Sam Raimi opted mostly for special effects, the film never allows the viewer to connect as intimately with the main characters as she has for the past 70 years in the best-known film adaptation of L. Frank Baum's work.

Oz the Great and Powerful stars James Franco as the wizard, or rather the magician, Oscar Diggs, who has his own show in Kansas but also has delusions of grandeur. His full name, abbreviated as "O.Z. P.I.N.H.E.A.D." suggests he isn't as sharp as he seems, though, as with Franco himself, the facade of head-in-the-cloud cluelessness also means he is easily underrated.

After being swept up by a Midwest twister, he arrives in the Land of Oz, whose inhabitants have waited a long time for The One, a wizard, to save them from the evil Witch who has brought darkness to their home.

As in Fleming's film, the monochrome images of Kansas are suddenly transformed to color when the main character reaches Oz, but of course today the shock of seeing full-screen visuals in color has long passed, and, despite the well-employed 3-D technology, the colors are less vivid than they were back in 1939. However, it is very likely this is a result of watching the film through 3-D glasses, which dim the brightness of onscreen images significantly. If we watched The Wizard of Oz in 3-D, the result might be equally underwhelming.

What the glasses take away, however, the camera often almost makes up for with graceful movements that see it plunge down from the skies, and it is totally justified, given the adventurous, almost fantastical, tone of the storyline. Raimi, who directed the silly Spider-Man movies with Tobey Maguire, has clearly been inspired by the work he did on those films, and in particular the shots of the superhero soaring through the air.

Like 2011's The Thing, which narratively preceded the well-known 1982 film of the same name, Oz the Great and Powerful vaguely mirrors its famous sibling, complete with the black-and-white opening (this one's a glorious sight of beauty) and the variety of friendships the main character strikes up on his way down the yellow brick road. There are fleeting references to a lion and a straw man, though there is no tin man in sight (these were the three characters that accompanied Dorothy on her way to The Emerald City in The Wizard of Oz).

This film has a flying monkey, a girl made out of porcelain and Glinda the Good Witch. But first, Oscar meets Theodora (Mila Kunis), another good witch - one who falls head over heels in love with him - and her sister Evanora (Rachel Weisz), who is obviously the bad apple of the bunch. But the film has a few surprises up its sleeve, and in the process Oscar's greed, ambition and honesty are put to the test in a way that always seeks to entertain and never to underestimate us.

For the vast majority of viewers who are familiar with the original film, however, the lack of any significant bridge between the two is rather disappointing. We get no reference to water - an element that would come to play a crucial role in subsequent events - nor is there any indication at the end of the film of what might lie ahead, which would have endeared the viewer through shared knowledge and a sense of clairvoyance.

The film's use of voices is interesting, as the action in Oz draws constant audio parallels with its black-and-white prologue. So, for example, the voice of the flying monkey, who lugs Oscar's suitcase around everywhere, belongs to Zach Braff, who played Oscar's assistant back in Kansas. Michelle Williams, who plays Glinda, also plays an important part in black and white, though she only appears briefly before Oscar is whisked away in a hot-air balloon and dragged to another universe.

Nobody was expecting another classic. Oz the Great and Powerful doesn't do an injustice to the memory of Fleming's film, but it doesn't much contribute to our understanding of the world of Oz either, which is strange given Raimi's contention that The Wizard of Oz is his favorite film.

André Crous can be reached at
acrous@praguepost.com