A weak score for Oz means many critics will walk into Maleficent next year still largely unimpressed by any of the previous fairy tale adaptations -- Mirror, Mirror 50%, SWATH 48%, Hansel & Gretel Witchhunters 13%, and Jack 52%.
It means Maleficentit will be facing a very low bar. But it also means half of the critics in the room will be skeptics who have yet to meet a fairy tale film they liked. After so many disappointing films, they may now be weary of fairy tale adaptations.
Oz and Jack both boast dazzling special effects, huge $200M budgets and are helmed by directors with blockbuster super-hero film experience. Sam Raimi directed the first Spider-man trilogy while Bryan Singer made X-Men and Superman.
Maleficent has an equally big budget and will be at least as dazzling, but it has an inexperienced first-time director -- albeit one with two Oscars for Prod design. And it has Angelina. Interest even now revolves around her and her performance will be key.
-- Fussy
The Playlist
Review: 'Oz The Great And Powerful' Dresses Up Dull Prequel Story With Special Effects Wizadry
Reviews byMarch 1, 2013 9:00 AM
We’re coming up on 75 years since MGM’s Technicolor wonder “The Wizard Of Oz” first enchanted audiences on screen, and at the time it was already the fourth movie based on the works of L. Frank Baum. Of course, it has become not only the best known version, but an American cinema classic and icon, and so the prospect of a prequel is always one that was greeted with some wariness. There’s not only the pressure of living up to a film that has been beloved by generations of filmgoers, but there's also the often undiscussed issue of whether or not adding backstory and additional mythology is simply answering a question no one asked. As studios continue to mine fables, fairy tales and comics for franchises, it’s a query they will continue to grapple with, but as for the results cooked up in Disney and director Sam Raimi’s “Oz The Great And Powerful,” it’s a lot of smoke and light, without much behind it.
After a pretty great opening credit sequence that plays like a journey through a pop-up book, the film pays homage to Victor Fleming’s movie, in Academy ratio black-and-white, on sets built and designed on soundstages just as they would have been back in the day. It’s here we meet Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkle Emmanuel Ambroise Diggs aka The Professor aka Oz (James Franco), a not particularly successful huckster, showman and magician whose selfishness outweighs his middling talent. Aided by his assistant Frank (Zach Braff), Oz spends an equal amount of time wooing the ladies as putting on a show of good, if not quite exceptional illusions. But when he tries to hit on the girl who belongs to the strongman, he has to go on the run, and makes his escape in a hot air balloon that's sucked up into a tornado that happens to be passing through at the same time, and when it’s all over, he’s in the widescreen, HD color world of Oz....
Before long, Oz crosses paths with Theodora (Mila Kunis), a good witch who believes he’s the wizard of prophecy come to free the land from the evil Wicked Witch. Lured by the promise that he’ll rule a kingdom, Oz goes along with the story and heads to Emerald City where he meets Theodora’s sister Evanora (Rachel Weisz), and perhaps more importantly sees the giant reserve of gold that could be his...if he kills the Wicked Witch. With the promise of riches beyond his wildest dreams, he heads down the yellow brick road with Finley (voiced by Braff), a monkey with wings he rescued earlier from a lion, who becomes his faithful sidekick. And along the way, they’re joined by China Doll, the lone survivor of China Town that was destroyed by the Wicked Witch. But of course, what our hero learns from the witch Glinda (Michelle Williams) about Oz and the true nature of who is ruling over the land, isn’t quite what he expected.
The prospect of a movie centered around Oz/The Professor and explaining his journey is actually a pretty good one. It’s a smart opening from the 1939 film to take, but it’s pretty disappointing that David Lindsay-Abaire (“Rabbit Hole”) and Mitchell Kapner (“The Whole Nine Yards,” “Romeo Must Die”) couldn’t create a story that didn’t mirror the same template from seven decades ago. Oz and Dorothy both team up with a gang of friends, have one big showdown with the Wicked Witch and all learn some platitudes about life. While the first forty minutes or so of the film offer some promise creating a new fantasy journey for a contemporary audience, when it quickly becomes clear the movie aims to smash directly into “The Wizard Of Oz,” it loses all its steam.
But perhaps the biggest narrative issue is one of originality that goes beyond using the same structure as Fleming’s movie. In “Oz The Great And Powerful” we’re presented with three strong, powerful women, and yet it’s an ordinary man who undoes the villains, saves the day and gets the girl. This has become a pattern in high-concept Disney fare of late, wherein the studio decorates formula storytelling with expensive concepts. “Wreck-It Ralph” and “John Carter” were both essentially princess stories we’ve seen dozens of times over, and in “Oz The Great And Powerful” it’s essentially a knight in shining armor -- or a top hat at least -- who these women are forced into action by, both good and bad. It’s just a shame to think of parents taking their daughters to see “Oz The Great And Powerful” -- with Weisz, Williams and Kunis in lead roles -- only to see their characters never really taking charge. "Oz The Great And Powerful" presents an opportunity to take a narrative risk, approach tired genre conventions and turn them on its head, but everyone plays it safe and it’s a reason why that for all the creative talent being hired for Disney’s “Star Wars” movies, we remain very cautious (but that’s a discussion for another day).
After nearly seven years spent on “Spider-Man” movies, followed by a lukewarm reception to the B-movie “Drag Me To Hell,” any fans wondering if Raimi still had it in him to whip together imaginative new worlds can rest assured. “Oz The Great And Powerful” is certainly his most ambitious movie, and at least on the technical side of things, it’s a homerun. It’s certainly the most impressive digital effects we’ve seen in a long, long time and even the 3D is smartly utilized for key sequences (though, you could just as easily do without).
But unfortunately, nothing else matches the technical accomplishments. Dulled by predictability, the pacing of the two hour plus movie often sags, and the film’s humor never quite establishes the running gags or knocks out the one line zingers with enough success to call it funny, so much as smirk worthy. And since we know how things turn out for The Professor/Oz in the “sequel” (aka "The Wizard Of Oz"), there are no real stakes and thus no believable peril for our hero. Which brings us back to the beginning of this review. “Oz The Great And Powerful” is a valiant attempt to build on the magic of “The Wizard Of Oz,” and while it certainly doesn’t diminish the standing of that movie, Sam Raimi’s film provides proof that the more we know about the mysteries of our favorite stories, the less interesting they become. [C]
Hollywood Elsewhere
At Least See The Beginning
By Jeff Wells
I saw Sam Raimi's Oz The Great and Powerful tonight on the Disney lot, but the invite came with my pledge to not review it until Friday, March 8th, or opening day. Anyway Oz screened in the main Disney theatre with grade-A 3D projection, and when it ended around 9:20-something a review by Variety's Justin Chang had posted. Plus five reviews are now up on Rotten Tomatoes so all bets are off, it would seem. But I'll hold for now.
Chang is basically calling Oz diverting family fare with a few portions that connect, but he's mainly saying that it's composed of thin material that's not very involving -- "rings hollow," "gaudily depersonalized," "visual Baum-bast." He adds that it makes you want to rush home and pop in the Bluray of the original 1939 The Wizard of Oz , which is where the real nutrition still resides. But he praises the film's "exquisite" black-and-white prologue, composed in a 1.33 aspect ratio, set on "a windy strip of Kansas prairie" and showing James Franco's wily circus magician-slash-con man performing and sweet-talking a couple of ladies.
I have to at least say that Chang is right-on about this portion. The opening credits (also in black and white 3D) are inventive and beautiful and altogether quite masterful. Handsome naturalistic black-and-white 3D hasn't been seen since...what?...The Creature From The Black Lagoon? (Frankenweenie was animated.) "This is amazing...delightful...unique," I was saying to myself. "I haven't watched anything like this ever on a big screen...the first time in my life!"
This section recalls the opening of Victor Fleming's The Wizard of Oz in that it lays out character issues and plants a couple of character seeds that will sorta kinda pay off later on. (Of course, if Raimi really wanted to pay tribute to the original Oz he would have rendered this sequence in monochrome sepia.)
Honestly? The lensing, writing and acting in this portion of Oz the Great and Powerful (which lasts maybe 14 or 15 minutes) are better than in the rest of the film, which runs another 110 minutes and has been shot in widescreen color 3D. So I can at least say for now that Oz the Great and Powerful is worth the price just to catch the black-and-white 3D.
Read the original post at Hollywood Elsewhere
The Playlist
Review: ‘Jack The Giant Slayer’ An Unexceptional, But Still Satisfying Fairy Tale Blockbuster
byFebruary 26, 2013 7:01 PM
But, it doesn’t start off well. Delayed from release last summer to this spring, unfairly or not, the movie does have a certain stigma attached, and the opening makes you wonder why the filmmakers didn’t use this extra time to fix it. We start with young Jack and young Isabelle -- one a farmer’s son, the other a princess and heir to the throne -- being separately read the story of “Jack & The Beanstalk” which is reimagined as an involved mythology to set up the movie. And this is fine, but the gaudy, cheap animation -- which never looks better than a PlayStation 2 cut scene (at best) -- used to illustrate the backstory feels like a hasty afterthought, distinctly out of step with the rest of the movie. But it’s no matter. All you need to know is that the world of giants and humans were once connected, and that a magical crown will make whoever wears it the leader of that massive race of creatures, bringing this person immense power. And oh yeah, some magic beans from that bygone era are the only way to re-connect the two worlds. Fine.
So fast forward a decade and mechanics are all set in motion, with sly but not overtly or obnoxiously faithful nods to the old timey tale. Jack (Nicholas Hoult) does indeed go to market, but this time he defends the honor of the now grown Isabelle (Eleanor Tomlinson) -- disguised as a commoner -- when the concealed princess is harassed by some local ruffians when she's roaming in public outside the castle. But that’s just the start of an eventful day that sees Jack come into possession of the magic beans when a monk steals them from Roderick (Stanley Tucci), the king’s advisor (who is also arranged to be married to Isabelle, much to her dismay), and as he is being chased, gives them hastily as collateral to a reluctant Jack, for the horse he has come to sell, which he uses to escape. Not too long later, Isabelle runs away from home, takes shelter at Jack’s house during a rainstorm, which in turn gets the beans wet, creates the giant stalks, and she gets thrust into the mysterious land in the sky. And all this allows Jack to team up with the King’s men to climb up into the sky and rescue her.
The narrative doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but Bryan Singer’s canny moves in the casting department elevate the endeavor into a familiar, but still compelling, well-oiled swashbuckler at its core. Indeed, it’s folks like Ewan McGregor who takes the one-note Elmont, the leader of the King’s army, and turns him into a noble, witty and heroic role model of sorts for Jack. Tucci delivers as always, bringing an appropriate balance of slime and menace as Roderick, while Ewan Bremner is enthusiastically goofy as his henchman. Isabelle is thankfully written as much more than a damsel in distress, playing a young woman coming-of-age in an era when they don’t have much voice, which gives Tomlinson some nice notes to play. And even Ian McShane brings a gravitas a pretty simple part of the widowed King, afraid to lose his only daughter. And finally, coming off “Warm Bodies,” Hoult is emerging as one of the most unassuming leading men out there, and he does a fine job of carrying this film as the aw shucks everyman, thrust into an extraordinary situation.
And while as an entertaining two hours, “Jack The Giant Slayer” succeeds, it’s not without its flaws. The bookend sequences are clunky and feel tacked on, as does the requisite wide open swinging door left for a potential sequel. But perhaps most crucially the digital effects leave something to be desired. The giants never quite feel realistic, always on this side of being cartoons, nor is the creature design particularly inventive. Aside from the one or two main giants, they are largely indistinguishable. And though shot in 3D, its use neither adds or subtracts, making it mostly unnecessary -- you can see the movie without the glasses just fine. And as the magical crown that controls the giants changes hands among three different people, it means there’s no central villain, and the allegiances among the baddies are both vaguely defined and constantly shifting. One gets the sense they were more fleshed out at one point, but excised along the way. So there is that missing oomph of satisfaction at seeing the bad guy(s) defeated and the hero save the day, that would have come with one main figure pulling the strings.
boxoffice.com
Long Term Projections
| Title | Opening Weekend | Cumulative |
|---|---|---|
| Oz: The Great and Powerful | $64,000,000 | $183,000,000 |
| G.I. Joe: Retaliation | $48,000,000 | $125,000,000 |
| Oblivion (2013) | $42,000,000 | $120,000,000 |
| The Croods | $40,000,000 | $150,000,000 |
| Jurassic Park 3D | $25,000,000 | $55,000,000 |
| The Host (2013) | $23,000,000 | $63,000,000 |
| Pain and Gain | $22,000,000 | $55,000,000 |
| Tyler Perry's Temptation | $22,000,000 | $47,000,000 |
| Scary Movie 5 | $20,000,000 | $45,000,000 |
| Evil Dead | $20,000,000 | $47,000,000 |
| The Incredible Burt Wonderstone | $18,000,000 | $55,000,000 |
| 42 (2013) | $17,000,000 | $50,000,000 |
| Olympus Has Fallen | $17,000,000 | $45,000,000 |
| Admission | $15,000,000 | $50,000,000 |
| The Big Wedding | $14,000,000 | $50,000,000 |
| Jobs | $13,000,000 | $33,000,000 |
| The Call | $13,000,000 | $30,000,000 |
| Dead Man Down | $7,000,000 | $18,000,000 |
