OZ, THE GREAT AND POWERFUL! (WE'RE OFF TO SEE HIM!)

Goblin Jr hangs up his hover board for a hot air balloon in the prequel to Dorothy's adventures!

Just got home from watching "Oz The Great and Powerful" and I really felt the need to review it right away!

Why?  Because it was so much better than I anticipated (although I must admit, I wasn't expecting much).

This movie gives us insight into "the man behind the curtain" and what makes him tick.  When con-man, playboy and struggling magician Oscar Diggs (the artist known as the Wizard of Oz) is whisked away in his hot air balloon to the magical land of Oz (no, the land was not named after him!) he is told that he is the fulfillment of a prophecy to free the land from the hands of an evil witch.  Wanting nothing more than riches, Oz decides he'll embark on this suicide mission to take on the wicked witch in order to become king of the land and inherit the heavy load of gold in the Emerald City.  Along the way, he meets with a few characters who help him in his quest to free the land.  A battle ensues and we're introduced to the legendary Wizard of Oz along the way!

I won't bore you with details of the original classic film (because if you haven't seen it, you're living under a rock at the bottom of a mountain under the sea); instead, I'll just jump into the pros and cons of this one.

Let's start with the cons:

1.  I understand the need to start the film in black and white (ala the original "Wizard of Oz" film), but I felt where the creators messed up was in making the "real world" as cartoonish and unbelievable as the land of Oz. Where the original film had a complete separation between the black and white scenes and the colorful Oz, this film felt as if the only difference between the two was color and landscape.

2. Mila Kunis' acting was very shoddy in the beginning of the film.  She just wasn't convincing to me at all in her first scenes.  I didn't see a chemistry between her and James Franco or between her and Rachel Weisz when she first interacted with them.....which brings us to the pros list

Pros:

1.  Mila Kunis was (in my humble opinion) FANTASTIC as the young wicked witch of the west!!  From the moment she appeared, all I wanted was to see more of her.  She nailed it so well, and she may have done a better job than Margaret Hamilton (the original wicked witch of the west)....please don't stone me to death for saying this.  I just felt that Kunis captured the meaning behind the animosity the witch had towards everyone.  I even felt understanding and sorry for her at one point.

2. The movie itself was beautiful.  The land of Oz was very colorful and lively....a little TOO lively at times.  At times the special effects looked less like CGI and more like a movie/cartoon crossover ("Who Framed Roger Rabbit" style), but, thankfully, it seemed to only happen at the beginning...after that it seemed to even out lovely.

3.  Several nods to the original film without going overboard to connect them.  This is because a sequel is already in the works for this movie, but it was still great to see some familiar faces and landscapes...the munchkins make an appearance and we're shown the place where Dorothy starts her trek on the yellow brick road.  You'll get to see the famous poppy field, meet the Tin Man's maker, see the scarecrow's cousins and actually get to meet the cowardly lion!  And in a "blink and you'll miss it" moment, you also get to meet Dorothy's mother!!

All in all, I was so pleasantly surprised by this film.  It's more fun if you go in with no expectations and not trying to compare the two films.  If you go in just wanting to have fun, you'll leave satisfied!  Just make sure to see it in 3D!

My Rating:

3.741124341397754690 out of 5 stars

This movie made me want to re-watch the original movie; the TV movie/miniseries "Tin Man"; the much darker sequel to the original film, "Return to Oz"; the Broadway show "Wicked"; the Motown version of the original "The Wiz" (one of my all time favorite movies); and then read all the books for perspective on the whole franchise again.  

Ease on down the road!



Jay