Quick Movie Review: Oz the Great and Powerful

Oz the Great and Powerful is a prequel to the classic Wizard of Oz and tells the story of how said wizard came to arrive and ultimately rule in the magical land of Oz.

There are many things that I enjoyed about this movie. The beginning section, similar to the original Oz, is in black and white and 4:3 aspect ratio. It tells the back story of man named Oz (played by James Franco), a traveling carnival magician who is struggling to become what he considers to be a “great man”. Fast forwarding a bit, the soon-to-be wizard arrives in Oz and the movie changes to full color and wide screen aspect ratio. Similar to the original Oz movie, this change serves to really highlight the contrast between the real world and the fantastical world of Oz. However, I feel that this is where the movie starts to drift away from the greatness of it’s predecessor.

First and foremost, this movie is extremely CGI heavy. While this isn’t necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, I felt that all the CGI detracted from the movie experience somehow considering the original’s legacy. To be fair the CGI was well done, especially the beautiful landscapes when Franco first arrives in Oz.

As far as the plot, I can only describe it as sort of “hum-drum”. I believe that this movie suffers from what I refer to as the “prequel syndrome”, in that as viewers we pretty much know how the story is going to end due to our knowledge of the original. Because of the so-called “prequel syndrone”, the prequel movie can’t really deviate from what we already know about the story which culminates in an ultimately anti-climactic ending (i.e., the Star Wars prequels). This, combined with a plot that is overly dialogue-heavy, filled with extraneous characters and runs for over two hours do not a memorable movie make. I feel that this movie could be highly improved simply by better pacing. As I have said, many of the characters in the movie are irrelevant. Rachel Weisz’s character in particular serves no purpose other than to take up unnecessary screen time.

After viewing Oz the Great and Powerful it took me a while to simply decide whether I liked it or not. I would not call this a bad movie, but merely one that suffers from a weak plot and poor pacing.