Oz The Great And Powerful

Could have been a Grand Film & has a very good cast, they did well with what they had to work with but it was very lacking in the presentation. Nothing there to get excited about, it's kind of like we've seen it all before. Disney let us down this time, not up to their usual standard. Glad rented before not buying, have no desire to ever watch again. Added note: Not saying others will share my view, many may like to see & re-watch this film. Not a bad film just poorly presented. Mic Cl;-(~ Ririe, ID USA

Not the worst prequel we could have gotten. The movie has a beautiful creative vision, but it's not executed to its fullest extent. It could have been much better than it is. I think this movie failed by being overly ambitious. Its running time is already over two hours, but it doesn't feel like they spent enough time on meaningful story elements. I wish I could have gotten more out of it. Visually, there are some scenes that were a little off, but most of the movie was well-crafted enough to complete the illusion. Overall, I do think this movie is worth watching.

The story was entertaining and James Franco is a great actor and is always entertaining, managing to maintain his character in the face of almost nothing to act against besides a green screen much of time. The trend of CG used to fantastic excess managed to drag down an otherwise totally entertaining film - the moments of not-quite motion-matched interaction with computer generated co-stars, or Franco floating just slightly odd above an entirely cg background really interfere with the suspension of disbelief required for such a film. It's not that the computer work was bad either, it's just not-quite-real, falling into the uncanny valley between completely real and obviously fake. Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland suffered a similar problem, CG for no reason, when physical effects would be much more believable (and probably more economical too). Kids will probably love it though, and they're more likely the target audience for this movie. It's worth a watch, I'd say but isn't likely to creep out from under the shadow of the original 1939 classic.