Review of Oz the Great and Powerful (2013) by Darkknightg4 — 31 Mar 2013

Oz the Great and the Powerful is an entertaining film, but one that has numerous drawbacks. The story arc of this film is good enough and flows into the original Wizard of Oz quite well. There seemed to be a good amount of respect for the original movie and I think that goes a long ways as to not offending fans of the classic.

This is also a gorgeous film, with great CGI environments and CGI characters. I found the 3D effects to be quite immersive and beneficial. Sadly the acting just isn't up to par, with the two fully CGI supporting characters outshining the live actors in pretty much every way.

I thought James Franco had progressed as an actor after seeing him in 127 hours and Rise of the Planet of the Apes, however he was overly cheesy, in a non-convincing way, in this one. I'll chalk it up to being miscast.

Same goes to Mila Kunis, who was mind bogglingly miscast to be the Wicked Witch from the classic Oz. Not only was the transformation unremarkable, but they continued to use her likeness and voice after she became the witch.

This was jarring and unconvincing. One second you're hearing Meg Griffin and the next you're hearing a wicked witch cackle that was voiced over by someone else. I think this was the biggest problem of the movie and one that could have easily been remedied by using a different actress as the wicked witch and having the transformation happen gradually throughout the movie instead of over the course of 5 minutes.

Seeing the character breaking down over a longer period of time would have made the psychology behind the Wicked Witch much more interesting. Overall the movie is an entertaining one time watch, but could have easily been much more if the acting matched the aesthetics of the movie.