Based on the cult classic, “The Wizard of Oz,” director Sam Raimi brings a new vision and pays homage to the iconic images and timeless sense of wonder in “Oz the Great and Powerful.”
The imaginative mix of live-action and CGI make the audience feel familiar with the material by playing with nostalgia throughout the film. Emerald City and the Yellow Brick Road are examples of this nostalgia present in the film replicating its’ appearance in the 1939 original.
The actors play dual roles similar to how it was in the original with small parts in the Kansas prologue and larger roles in Oz. This was true for Michelle Williams, Joey King, and Zach Braff.
Like the original, the film starts off with a black-and-white- prologue with Oscar Diggs (James Franco) as a horrid egotist and fake illusionist. A tornado sweeps him off in a hot-air balloon into Emerald City where he is greeted by Theodora (Mila Kunis) who believes that he came to Oz to fulfill a prophecy. She escorts him to Oz where he meets Evanora (Rachel Weisz) who tells him that in order to claim the throne; he has to defeat the Wicked Witch in the Dark Forest. Indulgently he agrees and figures out from Glinda the Good Witch (Williams) that the real Wicked Witch was one of the sisters that he left behind to find Glinda. Oscar Diggs (Franco) has companions on his journey, including a China Girl ( King) and a flying monkey named Finley (Braff).
Franco is playing a stranger in an astonishing land, a similar role to what Dorothy had in the original. Franco can’t seem to handle playing a believable conman wizard. Through parts of the movie he is dismayed and senseless and at other times he is creative and daring. He was too helpless and crude for this role.
Better candidates for the role would have been Robert Downey Jr. or Johnny Depp, who would have played the role with more confidence.
The screenwriters Mitchell Kapner (The Whole Nine Yards) and David Lindsay-Abaire (Rabbit Hole) missed the main element for the film of pervasive wit and grace. Instead, the film takes a suggestion from Tim Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland” and uses 3D to throw things at us like for example it shows witches on a broomstick and disclose fangs of aerial baboons.
The film doesn’t offer a lot of surprises and suspense in the prequel for “The Wizard of Oz.” Oz presents a color and clever homage to one of the most loved films of all time. However it does not live up to its expectations by being exhausted by predictability, the pacing, and the film’s humor.
Rating: 2 and a half stars out of 5
