"Oz" Both Great and Powerful

“There’s a Disney ride,” one audience member deadpanned as the hot air balloon holding the man destined to become the Wizard of Oz careened down a precipitous and preposterously cerulean waterfall. And it’s true—Disney’s “Oz the Great and Powerful” is every inch an advertisement for the roller coasters, action figures, and perhaps even sequels that will follow in its wake. But the film, directed by Sam Raimi, doesn’t pretend for a moment that it is anything else. Irreverent yet lovingly referential, and gorgeous to boot, “Oz” is a film that mirrors its protagonist: manipulative, but more than capable of putting on a good show.

“Oz” is the latest in a spate of films—not to mention musicals and TV shows—that gather their box office momentum by reimagining classic tales. Like “Wicked,” it is a prequel to the storied “The Wizard of Oz,” but where Gregory Maguire’s novel and the subsequent Broadway blockbuster asked us to forget the Oz we thought we knew, this spinoff encourages us to revel in it. The movie chronicles how a carnival magician named Oscar Diggs (James Franco) becomes the Wizard of Oz.

The film spends most of its 127 minutes winking at the audience. Its favorite trick is to pull a cliché in for a bear hug even as it turns it on its ear. The yellow brick road is there, all right, but one character complains of yellow brick potholes. As the wizard is conveyed via tornado to Oz, the bicycling neighbor in the original is replaced by a floating caravan, which hurtles back at the wizard and punctures his balloon. Oz and his comrades encounter a lion in the woods, but this feline shows no signs of being cowardly or capable of speech. An impression of homage flirting with parody is sustained throughout the film. It’s a loving contrast that lends “Oz” vitality and encourages us to forgive its plodding over well-trodden ground.

A 200-million-dollar major motion picture cannot be labeled camp (if this is camp, it is the air-conditioned-cabins, day-trips-to-Six-Flags variety)—a better descriptor for “Oz” may be ebulliently self-aware. The dialogue is stilted, the characters are caricatures, but everyone is in on the joke—no one more so than the film’s star, Franco, whose Oscar Diggs aspires to Houdini-Edison hybridity. As Glinda (Michelle Williams) describes him, he is “selfish, slightly egotistical, and a fibber.” Nevertheless, you root for the guy—or rather, you root for Franco. It is clear from the outset that this is not the Franco of “Howl” or “127 Hours,” but the Franco of “General Hospital” and “Saturday Night Live.” He hams it up as best he can, and as is often the case with Franco, his best is pretty darn good. Williams and Mila Kunis, as Glinda and the wicked witch Theodora, follow Franco’s lead, gamely trading shameless doe eyes and face-contorting snarls as occasion requires. The trio is spectacularly unafraid to overdo it, and they seem a ruby slipper’s length away from breaking the fourth wall.

The film’s charm is bolstered as much by 3D glasses as it is by two-dimensional characters. Raimi’s Oz is beautifully overdone, all bright colors and absurd architecture. Far from cheapening these visuals, the three-dimensionality of “Oz” underpins the celebration of artifice that pervades the film as a whole. This mood is further reinforced by a jocular score from the ubiquitous Danny Elfman and a delectable array of costumes designed by Gary Jones.

Elfman and Jones might have lent a hand to screenwriter Mitchell Kapner in keeping the film interesting. Perhaps unsurprisingly given its prequel status, “Oz” is weakest when it comes to plot. The backstory that explains the ascent to power of the witch Evanora and why the citizens of Oz feel in need of a wizard is poorly fleshed out. And the poisoned apple that triggers a female character’s descent into madness may read as an uncomfortable biblical allusion.

But these are trivial faults for a film that is intentionally ludicrous. “Oz the Great and Powerful” will not collect any gold statuettes, but it does not remotely expect to. Where previous films of this ilk, such as Tim Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland,” have fumbled by taking themselves too seriously, “Oz” succeeds by reveling in its frivolity.

—Staff writer Emma R. Adler can be reached at emmaadler@college.harvard.edu.