Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Oz, the great and powerful, Disney

As a dyed in the wool Oz fan, I had to watch it.  I first saw the original at age 5, my grandmother took me into Boston on the train, (Grandmother didn't drive) in a snow storm.  That was back before we had TV.  And we had a lot of Oz books around the house and I read them.   
   Any how, this is the second Disney attempt to revive the Oz franchise.  It isn't actually bad,  but it lacks something.  The cast are all people I never heard of.  A much younger wizard gets blown to Oz in a balloon by a cyclone.  Once in Oz he has difficulty figuring out what he is there for.  The wicked witch of the east doesn't seem all that wicked, despite wearing black and flying a broom that leaves a trail of black smoke.  He teams up with a cute blonde Glinda the Good, but the relationship never seems to get to the boyfriend-girlfriend stage, let alone into proposals of marriage.    There is a CGI china doll who tries to fill the role of Dorothy but CGI doesn't have the stage presence of a Judy Garland.  There is a CGI flying monkey in a bell boy uniform who winding up carrying the Wizard's bag and cracking a few jokes. 
Over all,  Meh. 

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