"I'm scare of his review, Wizard" "And I'm a horrible actor."
Welcome to Poon on Films.
You are about to torch me. I'm aware. I'm OK with it. If you have already seen this movie, then it's the biggest stack of awesomecakes that you have ever taken in, you love Jesus and America and you think cold beer and guns not only go hand in hand, but is your goddamn rights as a human. And you are also blind and shallow. Now I'm not saying that I hate those things. Hell I love America, Jesus, cold beer and guns. I do not love this movie. If you haven't seen this movie or if you have and are just open to not taking things at face value, please read on. If you don't then who cares. We post here when we want and you aren't making us any money.
First, this is NOT a bad idea. A prequel to The Wizard of Oz is something that if brought in front of me for investment money would make sense. "Hey you! Yeah you poor broke guy we for some reason want money from. You want to invest in a prequel to The Wizard of Oz?" "You bet your sweetass I do!" As a matter of fact you couldn't get the money out of my account fast enough. There has always been some unanswered questions on Oz itself although once the original movie is over and you realize it was all a dream, you don't give a shit. Kind of like the fight scene in the last Twilight movie. Once it wasn't real and you realized you wasted almost 3 hours watching bad actors talk through a bad script with no emotion or training and didn't even get to watch a bunch of undeads rip each other's heads off, you just give up on life and move on. It DOES go along the lines of the book. A story where Oz is a real place and not a dream. That is if you believe that it was real before Dorothy showed up, but then she showed up and it was a dream so was it real or a dream or is it real and then she just dreamed about it and just happened to have the same characters? OK. Getting ahead of myself.
So we get that the premise is good. Here are the bad points. Disney. If this was produced by anyone other than Disney, it would have been ten times better. A multi-billion dollar company doesn't become that way by being stupid. Alice in Wonderland worked. And it worked pretty damn well. Should you do the same thing as many times as you can until the public tells you not to? Yeah. Probably. And they did. Sold their dirty Jew hating souls out and will make a shit-ton because of it. If you go into this looking for an update on Disney's CGI and green screen equipment on their Mac's, then you are in luck. The movie quickly turned from "Let's tell a story" to "They will probably like to see these shiny colors here so let's stick to it for an absurd amount of time". So they did. And they continued to for hours. Of course it looked pretty. Why are you talking to your computer reading this and how did you think I would answer? It's just a give up to play into the shallowness and idiocradic society that goes to movies half drunk on a rainy Friday night. (please see last Friday's forecast and my bar tab for reference)
The acting was goddamn atrocious. I like Mila Kunis. Heck I saw her boobies in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. That has nothing to do with her acting, just bragging. I have never thought she was a top tier actress, but she is good. She plays her parts well. For Oz, her part was a horrible actress that was stabbed in the back by family and holds it against another bad actor. This particular film was her worst and probably one of the worst female acting displays I have seen. Her co-star James Franco was equally as horrible. No matter what point of this movie he tried to move us one way or the other, he failed to. He was not believable in any aspect. He had one shiny moment at the very end, but I almost give more credit to the porcelain doll than him. The one actor I will give credit to (outside of the black midget dude from Bad Santa) is Michelle Williams. She portrayed Glinda the Good Witch and was solid from start to finish. And the fact that she gave f-me eyes each time she was on camera buys you extra points in my book. Call me.
The last thing that made this move less than it should have been is that I was not Kennedy'd the second I walked out of the theater. If you look into the timelines and the characters, you start seeing a few gaps.
SPOILER-ISH ALERT-ISH! Because I'm not a dick, scroll past this paragraph if you don't want to see it.
I will give the benefit of the doubt on the timeline. The movie basically starts with a tornado in Kansas in 1905 that ends up taking Oscar to Oz. The book was published in 1900. The movie came out in 1939. There is no direction in the movie as to when it took place or the timeline of the tornado, but let's say that it happened in then current day. So we have book 1900, Oscar tornado 1905, Dorothy tornado 1939. I can buy that timeline, but TWO TORNADOES IN KANSAS IN 35 YEARS!?!??!?? WHO ARE YOU FOOLING?!?? OK, it may be legit. We will not get into the actual timelines and just take it at face value. In the 1939 film, The Wizard is portrayed as kind of a dick overall. Someone protected and rules the land of Oz. In the 2013 flick, he goes from being a manipulator and con man to someone that starts the whole smoke and mirrors to help the people of Oz. "I will keep it here so anyone can come to me anytime they want" he says. Hmm. There is the Cowardly Lion and Scarecrow in both films. If you remember, they were both part of Dorothy's family in the original so there is some gap as to how and why they are in both. Were they real all along and Dorothy just saw them as particular people? Was Oscar's real life really a dream and then Dorothy had a similar dream in a similar land with similar people? Is this some twisted Inception 2 plot and I didn't know it? I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO BELIEVE ANYMORE!!!
Overall it was a stretch at best. Not a bad idea, bad company and actors. It's a shame because it has a lot of potential. How SHOULD you pitch this?
"So I've got an idea that I want you to invest on."
"Go on..."
"We are looking to make a prequel to The Wizard of Oz that will outline where Oz came from and give deep character development so that when you watch the original it will build on itself and make the movie that much better to watch."
"Now THAT is a great effing idea!!!
"Aaaaaaand we are going to get a pretty good, hot actress and a big name actor to play the main roles and then a hot supporting actress that makes f-me eyes through the whole movie."
"MY GOODGODDAMMIT I'M GOING TO BE A TRILLIONAIRE!!!!!!"
What not to say?
1. James Franco
2. We are thinking of trying out this totes rad-ass CGI junk on my Mac and there is this new green screen we want to toy with.
3. For realz 3D stuff that we don't really need, but would be cool just 'cuz it's 3D. THAT WAND WILL BE ALL UP IN YOUR EFFIN FAAAAAAAAAAACEE!!!!
4. But in all realzies, James Franco.......
Or you could just not be a elitist asshole and watch the movie without thinking about all of this crap and enjoy it. I couldn't because I AM BETTER THAN EVERYONE EVER AND YOU ARE AN ELEPHANTS COLOSTOMY BAG!
Always following the yellow brick road,
Poon
