Director Report Card: Sam Raimi (2013)

14. Oz the Great and Powerful

After making a fairly triumphant return to lower stake horror with “Drag Me to Hell,” there was this perhaps naive hope that Raimi was done with massive blockbuster entertainment. Once you have a success like the “Spider-Man” trilogy to your name, I guess big budget studio movie making will inevitably come calling again. After the inexplicable success of Tim Burton's “Alice in Wonderland,” Disney started searching around for other, similar properties to exploit. (They had yet to touch upon the idea of just doing shot-for-shot remakes of their cartoons.) They soon realized “Wizard of Oz,” that other public domain classic of children's fantasy literature, about an outsider adventuring through a marvelous world, was the next natural choice. Combining the idea with another then-hot trend – origin stories! – resulted in “Oz the Great and Powerful,” a prequel to Frank L. Baum's beloved classic.

In the early 1900s, Oscar Diggs travels the American Midwest as part of a carnival sideshow. He works as a magician, trying to impress largely apathetic crowds with mediocre parlor tricks. Mostly, he passes the time seducing farm girls. That gets him in trouble and he's forced to flee the carnival in a hot air balloon, just as a tornado blows into Kansas. He is transported to the magical land of Oz, where prophecies speak of a wizard coming from the skies and saving their world. Oscar is certain this isn't him but is quickly wrapped up in a quest to save the Emerald City, led by the seemingly friendly Evanora and Theodora, from the Wicked Witch of the West. But all is not what it seems...

On the surface, “The Wizard of Oz” doesn't seem like the kind of thing that would interest Sam Raimi. Supposedly, the director has been a long-time fan of MGM's iconic 1939 film version, which would certainly explain his interest in wicked witches. However, Raimi fans can't help but notice something about “Oz the Great and Powerful:” It has a lot in common with “Army of Darkness.” Both films are about a caddish guy getting tossed into another world. The locals believe he's a hero but he dismisses their claims, only desiring to go back home. Despite that, he's encouraged to rouse the locals into fighting back against a villainous force. He uses his modern engineering abilities to build machines to help win that battle. He seduces a local woman who is then transformed into an adversary. It's not a perfect 1-to-1 match. There are no skeletons in the Wonderful World of Oz, for one. But the similarities are such that it seems unlikely they were unintentional.

Aside from directly referencing one of his previous cult classics, Sam Raimi brings other elements of his style to the table. Once or twice, the camera goes askew and crash-zooms into people's faces, when people hear someone ominous arriving or a witch reveals herself to the camera. There is, naturally, a montage full of colorful cross-cutting and images overlapping, when Oz is designing his various tricks and tools. The director of “The Evil Dead” working for the House of Mouse is such an unlikely situation but you can see a little bit of that ambiance here. A shot of Glinda walking through a foggy, spooky forest with a big rusty gate or some of the film's wackier monsters – flying baboons or aquatic fairies with big fangs – brings some horror movie flavor to this PG family flick.

Still, “Oz the Great and Powerful” does play into some of Raimi's worst instincts as a filmmaker. As the “Spider-Man” trilogy progressed, you could see the director getting more and more fascinated with CGI trickery, sometimes to the detriment of the story and characters. This unfortunate tendency continues here. The film was obviously shot with a 3-D release in mind. Countless times, objects, characters, and creatures are thrown towards the camera, flying over the audience's head. Moreover, there are multiple moments when the film just stops so the cast can ooh-and-aw over CGI imagery. (Admittedly, some of this stuff, like blossoming flowers made of jewels, is pretty neat.) Both of these problems rear their head during a sequence where Oz and Glinda float around in giant bubbles. By the time CGI scarecrows are rolling out of a forest on unicycles, I had officially had my fill of this.

Something I really disliked about Tim Burton's “Alice in Wonderland,” a movie I really disliked in general, was how it squeezed Lewis Caroll's work of absurdist literature into a typical sci-fantasy, “chosen one” action/adventure narrative. “Oz the Great and Powerful” does something similar, which is, admittedly, another thing this film has in common with “Army of Darkness.” Apparently, Oscar's arrival in Oz was foreshadowed by an extremely specific prophecy, that a wizard bearing the land's name would arrive to save it. Where this prophecy comes from is never expounded on. Oz's journey from selfish cad to hero is a totally expected one that leaves little room for surprise or variation.

Considering most of Disney's attempts to replicate “Alice in Wonderland's” success would draw upon their own library of titles, it's interesting that this was the second of the fairy tale adventures they chose. Walt Disney always wanted to adapt Baum's books as an animated feature but lost out on the film rights. (This interest would eventually culminate in “Return to Oz,” a future cult classic but then-flop.) With no Disney “Oz” to draw on, Raimi's film is obviously beholden to MGM's classic. Though legally forbidden from using any icongraphy unique to that film, such as the ruby slippers, Raimi still clearly calls upon its legacy. Appearances from a lion or scarecrows are meaningless unless you know where this is all headed.

But one way this film interacts with the 1939 one is kind of interesting. No doubt in an attempt to piggyback off the popularity of “Wicked,” “Oz the Great and Powerful” focuses extensively on the Wicked Witch of the West. Theodora has a somewhat tense relationship with her sister, Evanora. The older witch seems to boss the younger one around, often being annoyed with her more naive sensibilities. Of course, this is all foreshadowing for the obvious reveal that Evanora is actually the story's villain. This continues a theme of sibling rivalry that has floated through Raimi's work since at least “A Simple Plan.” Even more interesting is how Theo begins her march towards villainy. She is totally justified in her resentment towards the Wizard, as he clearly did emotionally manipulate her. (They have a romantic fireside dance, the PG version of a sex scene.) The film could've leaned more into this tragedy, how a good woman is turned into a green skinned villain to protect a wounded heart, but then Disney might as well have just made a “Wicked” movie.

As much as I want to hate “Oz the Great and Powerful” on principal, as another soulless corporate product from Disney and true proof of Sam Raimi selling out, it's not a bad movie. In fact, it's a perfectly serviceable popcorn muncher for the majority of its run time. The opening sequence, in another deliberate homage to the 1939 film, is shot in black-and-white. Raimi has a clear affection for the circus setting, the eccentrics on stage and the country bumpkins in the audience. The image is cramped into Academy ratio so that, when Oscar arrives in Oz and the screen opens up, it makes more of an impact. The gadgets Oz cooks up to help save the Emerald City, involving a home-made movie projector and smoke bombs, are similarly inventive and clever in a way that seems distinctly Raimi-esque.

The setting of Oz presents enough creative opportunities, enough neat ideas, to keep audiences hooked. Turning the flying monkeys in big, snarling baboons was a clever idea. Throughout his adventure, Oz journeys through a village made entirely of china, populated solely by sentient china dolls. There he meets one of several sidekicks he acquires throughout the film. The little china doll, voiced by a more-than-capable Joey King, is adorably spunky, especially during the cute scene where Oz asks her to leave. Zach Braff plays a flying monkey named Finley, acting as the conscious to the frequently amoral Oz. Munkins shows up eventually, as you'd expect, being introduced through a gleefully silly musical number. Tony Cox plays an especially grumpy munkin, which is right in the actor's wheelhouse. This stuff is all pretty fun, as is the inevitable cameo of Bruce Campbell as a winkie guard.

For all its likable elements, there's a primary reason why the audience finds Oz's redemptive arc so unbelievable. By the end of the film, Oz has gone from a con artist and a womanizer to a real wizard who has a genuine romance with Glinda the Good Witch. What makes this hard to swallow is that he's played by James Franco, real life manipulator and womanizer. Franco is exactly as smarmy in this part as you'd expect, wearing a shit-eating grin for roughly 70% of his screen time. Yeah, Franco is really well cast as a bullshit artist. He's even visibly having fun when playing tricks on his opponents. It's only when he's asked to behave like a normal human, who's in love and believes in things, that it start to feel funny. That's another weird side effect of the star/director of “Interior. Leather Bar” headlining a Disney movie.

Luckily, the rest of the supporting cast picks up the slack for Franco's weaknesses. Mila Kunis is inspired casting as Theodora, a beauty who projects a child-like naivety. Once she begins her transformation into the green-skinned Wicked Witch – she's not any less sexy even then, by the way – Kunis is equally good at displaying a fiery, feminine rage. Rachel Weisz is another solid choice as Evanora. Weisz has to act benevolent while projecting a sinister undertone, a challenge she's more than up too. Michelle Williams, an excellent actress, plays the Glinda the Good Witch. The part doesn't ask much more of her than to be a smiling, graceful angel. But, hey, Williams can obviously pull that off.

Disney pretty clearly expected “Oz” to launch a franchise. It ends with Oscar established as the Wizard of Oz, ready to go on further adventures. While the film ditches the “It was all a dream” ending of the thirties classic, it does create real world equivalents to most of the people we meet in Oz, suggesting some sort of connection. The film probably made enough to justify a sequel too, though it was far from a hit on the level of “Alice in Wonderland.” However, Raimi had zero interest in returning for a follow-up. And Disney has clearly focused on other endeavors, so it seems unlikely we'll ever return to this particular iteration of Oz. Unlikely to be remembered among Raimi's best films but far from terrible either, “Oz the Great and Powerful” is a 200 million footnote that entertains without sticking in the brain. [Grade: B-]

It's been six years since Sam Raimi has directed a movie and I'm increasingly wondering if he has another one in him. Oh, Raimi has stayed busy as a producer, having a hand in creating successful horror flicks like "Don't Breath" or "Crawl." Yet he's gotten into the bad habit of being attached to projects that ultimately never come to fruition. Like epic fantasy adaptation "Kingkiller Chronicles," a remake of French crime drama "A Prophet," a tornado heist thriller called "Stormfront," or an adaptation of the novel "Love May Fall." More recently, he's been attached to a fun-sounding Bermuda Triangle movie with Ryan Reynolds and has even started talking about doing more "Evil Dead" stuff. (Though I'm doubtful he'd direct that, if anything comes of it.)

It's hard to say why Raimi is having such trouble returning to directing. Maybe he's gotten too big for his britches. Maybe he truly is focused on producing. Or maybe never getting to make his "Spider-Man 4" broke him. Either way, I suppose we'll probably see him back in the director's chair eventually but I also suspect his hiatus will last a while longer. Don't know why, just a feeling I have.

Thank you for reading this Director Report Card. I'll be throwing in a few more reviews for Raimi adjacent projects next, so stay tuned.