Review: Oz the Great and Powerful

So here we are again with another film based on a fairy tale/storybook directed by someone who is famous for directing superhero films. In this case it’s Oz the Great and Powerful, which is of course derived from The Wonderful World of Oz (and The Land of Oz books in general) by L. Frank Baum and is directed by Sam Rami who is probably best known for his Spider-Man film trilogy. So this film, by default, is pretty much something of a companion piece to Jack the Giant Slayer but this film is also obviously Disney’s follow-up to 2010’s Alice in Wonderland. Now since I didn’t like Jack the Giant Slayer and was pretty “Take it or Leave it” with Alice in Wonderland I’m a bit cautious going into this film.

It’s important to note that this flick is NOT a prequel to the Wonderful World of Oz like interviews have suggested and instead it’s clearly a prequel to the MGM Wizard of Oz film from 1939. Now I’m pretty sure they can’t legally admit this but the references and homages suggest that it is. Add the fact that Glinda the Good Witch seems to again be an amalgamation of the Good Witches of the North and South (though that can be debated) and the fact the munchkins are played by little people like in the MGM film it’s pretty clear they were far more connected to that classic movie than the original novel. Is this a problem? Well if you’re a huge fan of the books it will probably be annoying but if you’re one of those folk who didn’t even know there was more than one book and are more familiar with movie anyway then I doubt you’ll care. For this review we’ll try to judge it on its merits as a standalone film.

Also, before I forget, this movie is not Wicked (the book or the stage play). This is something that I think way too many people were confused by (possibly because they didn’t read the book or see the play). It’s a prequel, yes, but it’s a completely different story than Wicked. For example the Wizard in this film is just an asshole as opposed to the genocidal dictator he was kind of portrayed in the musical. A slight difference.

Full review after the jump.

[WARNING: There are some minor spoilers in this review.]
Read More

Share this post