Amph Oz the Bland and Blunderfull

lord have mercy. Please try to follow along. This was a response to Eeth-my-Koth suggesting that a scantily clad Mila Kunis was a solid reason for seeing the movie. Darth Guy criticized my convent analogy due to evidence of décolletage. I accepted the correction and revised the trope. Now you're caught up.

Please report to the jp30 thread for posters who cant read good and would like to do other things good too.

 

Moving on, I'm interested in your apparent belief that there is a pressing need to ignore opinions about movies. I'm all for forming opinions based on first-hand experience, but there are a lot of movies out there, and both time and money are scarce resources. People use whatever means at their disposal to filter options, including professional critics, recommendations from friends, and random posts on the internet. Especially random posts on the internet. That's where I come in. I am all about saving you time and money. You're not one of those John Carter fans are you? I got into trouble with them in the EP7 forum. They are a vocal bunch. I hope I didn't push the wrong button.

 

The Wicked witch has a lame name. I might see it in on Sunday or Monday, depending on the WRA expo I'm going to.

 

Can't you two see that you're in love?

 

I don't see the connection between JC and Titanic, but I noticed that Oz at least filmed with stereoscopic cameras. That seems like a good thing for a movie charging 3D ticket prices. Still doesn't make me want to see it. It didn't help "The Hobbit" any either.

 

so it suggs?

 

It's one of the more normal names she's ever been given in any version. Theodora? It's better than three of her other names: Bastinda, Momba, or Mombi. I'm partial to Elphaba and (out of pure love) Evillene.

 

Seems like an OK kind of movie, why we have occupied all our big screens with it though (including IMAX) is anybody's guess.
I'll probably see it on Monday.

 

If Disney wanted to do an Oz prequel, they should've picked up the rights to Wicked (the musical, not the book. The book isn't really Disney material.)

 

Seriously... in some areas of the world, this is foreplay.

 

I hear there's a race of porcelain statue people in this movie. It's one of those things that makes you think you better not be a klutz around them. If it's something from the L. Frank Baum Oz books, okay, but if not, who did?

 

Yeah,that's why I don't like it.I like Elphaba best.

 

There was a race of paper dolls.I read the series when I was seven.I suppose they are based off of those.

 

I just...what is everyone's obsession with Oz? I grant you that Wicked is a great production, but that has nothing to do with it being about Oz. Somebody help me out.

 

Disney (as in Walt Disney, not just the company) has owned the rights to Baum's Oz works for more than 50 years. In the original plans of Disneyland, there was supposed to be a Wizard of Oz land.

Edit for clarification:

Frank Baum sold the rights to the first Oz book (The Wonderful Wizard of Oz) to MGM in 1934. They made the movie version then in 1939. Walt Disney had wanted the rights but inquired just after Baum had closed the deal with MGM. Instead, Walt bought the rights to 12 of the other Oz books in the 50s, however still never got the rights to the actual "Wonderful Wizard of Oz" because MGM has held it's claim on it. Walt originally was going to make a film version of the Oz universe in the 50s, but it got bumped and delayed and canned.

Disney studios then made Return to Oz back in 1985 to fulfill Walt's original dream. The movie didn't do well and is quite creepy.

Oz the Great and Powerful really was Disney studio's love-letter to Walt's obsession on wanting a proper Oz movie made.

 

As far as I know, Disney owned the rights to Baum's Oz books other than the first one which was held by MGM (and now Warner), but lost them soon after Return to Oz came out. Now the remaining books are public domain. Disney however, can't use anything iconic from the MGM movie--like Dorothy's ruby slippers.

Right to Wicked though, are owned by Universal. My point was just that an Oz story that basically boils down to "a bunch of extremely powerful women need an idiot man to save the day because...reasons" doesn't seem to respect Baum's original stories much. I think Wicked did a much better job at that and Disney should have just obtained those rights back when it first started conceptualizing an Oz story. (Again, talking about the musical. I know some people loved the book, but I am not one of them.)

 

I imagine, especially with how popular Wicked is, that some movie company has probably already got the rights to the musical version and is just holding on to them until they want to make a movie version.

 

I hope so, Wicked is great

 

Saw a couple of reviews in today's papers - they weren't too bad.

 

Wicked has nothing to do with Oz at all.

 

Saw it last night. Some mild SPOILERS follow, so don't ready on if you want to stay 100% unspoiled, okay?


I'm the kind of person who tries to figure out why I liked a movie, or why I didn't, and this movie is a real stumper for me. I say that because, taken individually, there was a lot here I liked. A lot. And liked a LOT. But when all those pieces were put together, the movie felt slightly flat to me. And I am having a hard time figuring out quite why. I thought James Franco was very good as a showman/conman who, at his core, has a good heart. I thought the witches were terrific, and the Wicked Witch of the West has some amazing scenes. I think the "look" of the film was interesting, a blend of "mostly real' CGI and "we are making this look kind of old school matte painting' CGI that blended with some of the imagery from the classic WIZARD OF OZ. I could easily go on - as I said, there was a LOT here that I really liked. But, judged as a whole...I don't know, it didn't quite click for me. Kind of weird.

I do think two elements could have been tweaked, for my tastes, although one was going to be tricky no matter what - and here, no way to fully duck SPOILERS. The movie basically presents the fall of the Wicked Witch of the West, although it is suggested, when we meet her, that there is already some darkness in her. And presenting someone's fall from either goodness or ambivalence to real EVIL is a tricky thing, and especially tricky if you don't have much time. We have discussed whether Anakin's fall is convincing over THREE films; imagine having to show that in ONE film (along with a lot more). That is tough. They try to get around that by suggesting magic is involved - dark magic - but... that is one thing. Another is that I think the movie would have been stronger if there was no hint of romance between Glinda and "Oz". It is a pretty chaste romance, no question, but to me it felt like a misstep. Its not a question of prudishness; I think it just felt a bit off.

But even so... I don't think those two things account for my being less than 100% taken with a movie in which I thought a lot was very engaging. Maybe it is that the slightly more realistic approach doesn't square well with the conflict in the movie; while the WIZARD OF OZ's Wicked Witch was horrifying, and her flying monkeys were plenty creepy, you have a harder time seeing how THIS witch and her army of massively muscled, savagely clawed and toothed flying baboons wouldn't have spilled a LOT of "real" blood. SImilarly, when Glinda is being magically "tortured", it seems pretty dark in a way that is different from the admitted nasty business in some parts of the WIZARD (Scarecrow being set on fire, Witch threatening to drown Toto, laughing as Dorothy sobs at a vision of a distraught Aunty Em, etc).

SO - not here to bash it, and I suspect a lot of folks will enjoy its look and many of its elements, but ultimately, for me (and for those I saw it with), it just didn't quite pull it all together.

 

I've heard rumors that James Franco was really high when they were filming. I really want to see it just for that reason alone.