Review: Oz: The Great and Powerful

James Franco stars as Oscar (AKA ‘Oz), a shonky but likeable magician/con man working the Kansas beat when his quick escape plan via hot-air balloon during a tornado goes awry- funnily enough due to the frigging tornado. He finds himself having been transported to the land of Oz, where everyone thankfully has a colour TV. There he encounters a talking monkey (voiced by Zach Braff), and a witch named Theodora (Mila Kunis), who believes he is the prophesised rightful ruler of Oz. Theodora’s sister Evanora (Rachel Weisz), however, says that in order for the prophecy to be truly fulfilled, he must first kill the Wicked Witch of the South. But when he finds this witch, named Glinda (Michelle Williams), who is both beautiful and the embodiment of goodness, Oz begins to see the other two bitch...er...witches in a completely different light, especially when one of them turns a bit green (Sure to piss feminists off, too). Veteran character actor Bill Cobbs turns up as the Master Tinker, whilst Tony Cox turns up as the only Munchkin you’re gonna see in the first hour of the film.

 

Didn’t we learn from the terrifying debacle “Return to Oz” to leave L. Frank Baum alone? Apparently Sam Raimi (“The Evil Dead”, “Darkman”, “A Simple Plan”, “The Gift”) didn’t get the memo, and has attempted with this 2013 film to give us somewhat of a prequel to the beloved “Wizard of Oz” (though no doubt, Raimi will claim the film is more closely related to Baum’s 14 “Oz” novels than it is to the 1939 film. Whatever). Well, the good news is that Raimi’s film won’t likely give the kiddies nightmares like “Return to Oz” (I’m basing this on my own personal experience, by the way. I was 5 and I don’t want to talk about it, OK?). It’s better than “Muppet Wizard of Oz” too (Seriously, what the fuck was that?). The bad news is, that this is an unimpressive, disappointing and surprisingly cheap-looking film, and Raimi proves unequal to a task that really ought to have been left to Spielberg (Scorsese and Burton would’ve gone way too dark with the material).

 

I have no doubt that Raimi’s visual conception of Oz here is captured on screen exactly to his liking, and that lots of money was probably spent. Unfortunately, it actually looks like something out of “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”, from 1988, a combination of live action and 2D cell animation. It’s not that of course, but that’s how bad it looked to me. I could never get lost in the story because the world created looked so clearly artificial that it kept me at a distance in a way that the 1939, for all of its technological limitations, did not for the most part (Those flying monkeys were terrible, though. Hell the entire final third took a bit of a nosedive if you ask me).

 

It doesn’t start out too terribly, with Zach Braff and Michelle Williams interestingly playing dual roles, ala “The Wizard of Oz”. In fact, Braff is one of the very best things about the film, even if in his larger role, the CGI talking monkey, the visage is clearly fake. Worse still, with its bellboy outfit, the monkey is the creepiest thing I’ve seen since “Return to Oz”. I also found it interesting that the soon-to-be Wizard grew up in Kansas and the girl he wants to marry is set to marry someone with the last name ‘Gale’. Cute stuff, without getting in the way for people who don’t get the references. I doubt the kids of today will get the transition into colour, though. In the 1939 film, the transition from sepia to technicolour would’ve been seen as wondrous- hell, it still is to me and I was born in 1980. Here, the B&W beginning will lead many kids to assume something is wrong with the picture, and the rest will quickly lose interest. Sad, but true. The film’s transition to colour this time is sadly ruined by the over-reliance on poorly rendered (intentional or not) CGI. The 1939 film did it much better with vastly inferior technology. The CGI birds and flowers look terrible. They look like cartoons, as I said earlier- “Roger Rabbit” stuff. Hell, this has the technological sophistication of MC Skat Cat and Paula Abdul. Technicolour can look hyperreal at times, but it never gives you quite the impression that what you’re seeing isn’t really there on screen. There’s just no sense of physicality to the images and surrounds, it looks incredibly flat, unsophisticated, and artificial. The 1939 film also looks beautiful to this day, whereas this one looks garish. It probably worked better when seen in 3D, but you know my feelings on 3D by now. I’m sorry, but Raimi has cocked this one up. The porcelain doll character is one of the better CGI jobs, but the character itself is just a stupid idea. She sure as hell ain’t no Tin Man. I will say this, though: The winged baboons here are a lot scarier and more convincing than the flying monkeys in the original film. Comparisons between the films are inevitable (whether Raimi based the film on it or the books is irrelevant, the film is far more deeply imbedded in the public consciousness than the books), and here is the one time that this film comes out on top (The film’s conception of ‘The Great and Powerful Oz’ himself was clever, though). Not so the case of the Wicked Witch’s transformation scene, however. Whose dumbfuck idea was it to turn the green-faced Wicked Witch into the Incredibly Dopey Hulk? When she turns up during the munchkin scene, it’s cute, but she still looks like Hulk in a Hat. The Emerald City is perhaps most disappointingly rendered of all. It looks like it has been carved out of the same material as the Green Goblin’s mask. Bravo, Mr. Raimi, for getting in a shameless reference to one of your own films. It doesn’t even look frigging emerald. Did you ever think about that, Sammy boy?

 

When you think about the film, as well as the 1939 film, and the title character, something rather odd and frankly disastrous will dawn upon you. ***** SPOILER ALERT ***** In this film, Raimi and writers Mitchell Kapner (“Into the Blue 2: The Reef”) and David-Lindsay-Abaire (“Rise of the Guardians”) have the soon-to-be Wizard saving the day...through chicanery and misdirection, and casts Glinda the supposedly Good Witch in a negative light for being complicit in a lie that ultimately sets up the situation the inhabitants of Oz find themselves in when Dorothy lands there in the 1939 film. It’s hard to forget that this good-natured charlatan becomes a far less good-natured charlatan ruler, and it’s quite an off-putting note to end on. Hell, it kinda insults the memories we all have of the original (And please don’t bring up the books. Books are books, films are films. This is a film). ***** END SPOILER *****

 

The casting in this film is quite curious and eclectic, I must say. James Franco is an interesting choice for Oz, and he nor the character bear much resemblance to the character in the 1939 film. Franco is an actor capable of genuinely accomplished, powerful performances (“127 Hours” in particular), but spectacularly bizarre career choices, too (“General Hospital”, “Your Highness”) that make you almost second guess him. He’s likeable enough here, if not especially outstanding, and he appears to be trying to channel Johnny Depp at times. He won me over, in the end, but not in any way I could concretely remember the next day. I guess that means he’s OK. Michelle Williams is an interesting Glinda, taking a much less smiley, saccharine sweet approach, but still quite clearly conveying the character’s goodness. That’s one perfectly fine piece of casting. On the other end of the scale is Mila Kunis as one of two other witches in the film. In her first scene, she acts like Franco isn’t even on screen acting opposite her. Either that or she has decided her character is seriously myopic. It’s mostly a very odd and stiff performance, and there is absolutely no subtlety to her character’s inevitable change. It’s obvious from moment one. Hell, it’s obvious from the trailers. Her performance ends up improving once she’s allowed to cut loose a bit, but by then it’s too late. As her sister, Rachel Weisz is quite a considerable improvement. It’s your standard Disney witch character (she even brandishes a fucking apple at one point. Subtle, guys. Real subtle), but Weisz plays it well. Raimi offers up the usual Bruce Campbell cameo, once again giving his friend and colleague a menial part, as is customary for their working relationship. He even gets whacked on the head, presumably due to Raimi thinking it’s hilarious to subject his friend to ridicule (Read Campbell’s autobiography, it’s hilarious and insightful and paints the Campbell-Raimi relationship much more affectionately than I’m probably making out. They just carry on like a couple of frat boys at times, it seems). It might take you a while to spot him beneath the makeup, though.

 

One of the biggest plusses of the entire film (if not the biggest) is the terrific music score by Danny Elfman (“Batman”, “Beetlejuice”, “Mars Attacks!”). The score is such that you won’t even need to read his name in the credits to know who it is.

 

Even if you don’t hold the original “Wizard of Oz” film nearly and dearly, what Sam Raimi offers up here is simply not up to snuff. It looks horribly artificial, and something you’d expect from the late 80s or early 90s, and certainly not from such a talented director as Raimi. Then again, he is the same man who gave us “The Quick and the Dead”, and this film is at least better than that. It’s just hard to go along for the ride, and frankly rather boring. This film should’ve been much, much better, and the presentation of the title character as the film’s hero plays out very weirdly for anyone familiar with the 1939 film. I like Disney, but they have had three cracks at “Oz” (this, “Return to Oz”, and “Muppet Wizard of Oz”), all unsuccessful. It’s time for them to let it go. At the end of the day, I doubt this film is going to please anyone terribly much and it certainly didn’t do much for me.  

 

Rating: C-