Movie Review: Oz the Great and Powerful

By the blog author

Oz, the Great and Powerful is a movie nearing the end of its first run at American theaters. The film was directed by Sam Raimi and produced by Joe Roth. David Lindsay-Abaire and Mitchell Kapner wrote the script. James Franco plays Oscar Diggs, a con artist, effective ladies man and carnival magician. Of course, the character is whisked away to Oz, where he uses his training as a magician to pretend to fill the prophesy of a Wizard who will free the entire country of Oz from a tyrannical witch who overthrew her father, a benevolent king.

Mila Kuis plays Theodora, a good witch who meets the magician upon his landing in Oz, Rachel Weisz plays Evanora, the sister of Theodora, and Michelle Williams plans Glinda.

Early in Oz, Diggs uses the magician’s prop of fireworks to save a flying monkey from an attack by a lion. The flying monkey volunteers to serve the magician throughout his lifetime. Diggs is also able to repair the legs of a living china doll. She and the monkey accompany him for the rest of the adventure.

There are several key elements in the movie which are exhibited with perfection. Like the 1939 Wizard of Oz, the wizard himself is a con man and a humbug. The writers did a thorough job looking through the L. Frank Baum Oz books to show that this supposed leader was a man of very modest talents. This is seen early when Diggs escapes a furious husband and strong man at the circus by climbing into a balloon to get away. When an approaching tornado spins the balloon into the vortex, Diggs is terrified and begs to be allowed to live and amend his ways. His shrieking and cowardly begging in the tornado funnel are so banal that the scene is actually funny. Landing in Oz, his character appears not change at all. But the adventurous situations that arise often have parallels to Diggs’ immature and cowardly actions in Kansas.

It isn’t difficult to sort out which witches are good and which are bad, but nonetheless the drama is well displayed and presented. What matters, centrally, is the humanity of Diggs’ companions, the flying monkey and the china girl. These are the buffers who move Diggs’ wizard toward maturity.

The wizard grows up to the point that he realizes he cannot defeat the enemies of the good side with singing Munchkins, sewing Quadlings and tinkers. But he is encouraged by Glinda not to underestimate himself. This inspires Digs into using magic and slight of hand to challenge the power of the witches, who themselves are in possession of the Emerald City.

Historically, the fight for the Emerald City is an analog to a military truth: when mechanics fight farmers, the mechanics always win. This is the power of the eccentric and unwarlike tinkers as led by Diggs.

In the final scene, Diggs accepts the wizard title and rewards his allies. This is performed and filmed magnificently. The new wizard’s exchanges with the china girl and the flying monkey are exemplary – just the sort of thing that children should experience at a movie theater.

There’s a lot more to this movie than a bag of special effects and green screen technology. It is a genuine and well-researched tribute to the gentle philosophy of L. Frank Baum, himself America’s answer to the brothers Grimm and to Hans Christian Andersen.
That the critics didn’t get it and gave this film mixed reviews is heartening. The 1939 Wizard of Oz lost money and wasn’t regarded as a classic until it was shown annually on television in the 1950s and 1960s. Oz the Great and Powerful may be the only legitimate companion to the 1939 film; both movies are proper presentations of Baum’s philosophy, itself a masterpiece of understanding of the minds of children. That the Disney studio can captain such a project is remarkable and respectable.