The first full length trailer for the new movie Oz: The Great and Powerful has been released by Disney, so let's take a look shall we:
Hmmm...okay, at just over 2 minutes it's hard to really make to many judgements but let's try. First thought, it looks very Disney and I'm pretty sure this is going to be in 3D from the style. Actually I'm going to say it's like Disney took a sign from Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland" which would make sense since he did it for Disney. It does look very storybooky, slightly bordering on looking to fake and cartoony. With fantasy films like this it can be a green screen challenge to walk that line and make things look seamless and moderately realistic enough that you aren't sitting there going..."that looks so fake" like some 1950's sic-fi movie, and hope it's more like "Lord of the Rings". It pays homage to the original by starting in black and white and then becoming color when the "wizard" balloons into Oz. There are witches, munchkins, flying monkeys, monkeys in bell-hop outfits, porcelain dolls that come to life, a yellow brick road, James Franco, Michelle Williams, Rachel Weisz and a cast of thousands! So the trailer doesn't really tell you all that much. They are just trying to pull together what they think are all the best parts to pique your interest enough to actually go out and plunk down your money for the movie when it comes out. Fine consider me piqued, but I like fantasy films so it's not that hard. The hard part will be buying the storyline of the movie and of course James Franco as Oz. I'm hit or miss with him in some films and feel like he doesn't so much act as broodily sleep walk through a film with the occasional crying/yelling/fighting scene. The hope is that it's not one of those man trying to find himself films and that they don't spend too much time boring us through a slow black and white beginning, or at least not more than 20 minutes, before they send mother natures tornado wrath through town to whisk him away.
The fact that this is Disney will always give one trepidation that the movie won't have enough of an edge and be too much a kids movie, which would not be good. The cartoons that come out these days, yes are primarily aimed at the kid audience since they will watch something over and over and over again, but companies are adding in jokes of adult humor to draw in parents and adults to broaden their audience, it's something Pixar has made a good living at (and why Disney bought them several years ago to shore up their own flailing animation division). Because of this I think, hope, dream Disney has a clue and will do more with this movie than just ripping off "The Wizard of Oz" because they couldn't come up with any other new ideas. Who knows. Will I see the movie, yes, probably. Till then, I will keep wishing on a star it won't totally suck.
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