Those Other Oz Movies
As of August 25th of next year, it’ll be eighty-five years since audiences first went to Oz with Judy Garland and company. The 1939 film wasn’t the first Oz movie ever made and it certainly won’t be the last, although I hope it will always be the most beloved.
What about those other movies, though? Well…here’s a sampling of some of the pre- and post-1939 movies to have graced screens big and small. The quality will vary. Oh, good golly.
The Wizard of Oz (1910)
This one-reeler was made by L. Frank Baum himself due to contractual obligations, but apparently sticking to his own story wasn’t part of the contract. Dorothy finds the Scarecrow before the twister carries her (and him) to Oz, along with a cow named Imogene and a mule named Hank. Dorothy’s house is not their conveyance, either, but a remarkably stable haystack.
The movie draws more from the Oz stage play than Baum’s novel and is one of several films L. Frank Baum produced, but unfortunately he was a little too ahead of his time. See my reviews of some of his other films here.
The Wizard of Oz (1925)
Behold, one of the worst Oz adaptations and one of the worst silent films ever made. Good grief. The 1925 feature owes almost nothing to the original novel, but we do get duck vomit, a love triangle, racist tropes (including a black man named Snowball eating watermelon), court intrigue, biplanes, and a teenaged Dorothy.
It’s boring. It drags. Dorothy, the farmhands, and Dorothy’s Uncle Henry are all whisked to Oz in one of the farm outbuildings during the twister, leaving poor Auntie Em behind. We never see her again and it’s a bummer.
On the plus side, the special effects aren’t bad and the movie shows the Kansas farmhands becoming Dorothy’s Oz friends like another film we can mention. And we see a pre-Laurel and Hardy Oliver Hardy as a farmhand and as the Tin Woodman.
The Wonderful Land of Oz (1969)
While the 1925 version might be commonly thought of as one of the worst Oz movies ever made, the 1969 “sequel” definitely gives it some stiff competition. Bad singing, bad acting, bad sets, and props that are somewhere between terrifying and hilarious.
The film only follows the plot of Baum’s orignal book, The Marvelous Land of Oz as far as the basic plot, at least the parts that don’t require any major special effects. Director Barry Mahon made the film on a fifty-thousand dollar budget and expected to make almost a million dollars on the film over the following two years, which was a tad optimistic. Read my full review here.
The Wiz (1978)
We’re not in New York City anymore, Toto…oh, wait. We’re still in New York, only it’s been thinly transformed into the Land Of EST. Not Oz. Good grief, this movie is horrid. While Michael Jackson is cute as the Scarecrow and the film has some positive messages, there’s none of Baum’s story’s sweetness or innocence, it’s way too long, it hasn’t aged well, and it’s painfully disjointed despite direction from the normally great Sidney Lumet.
Not suprisingly, E.Y. Harburg, who wrote the lovely lyrics and sections of rhyming dialogue for the 1939 classic, absolutely despised The Wiz. According to Aljean Harmetz, Harburg later said:
“I was horrified by it. They had taken the beautiful imagination children have at a certain age—the one age when they have idealism—and thrown rotten eggs and mud at it. When a child sees the real Wizard after The Wiz, he’s already made fun of it, so he has to see the real thing with a cynical eye.”
Return To Oz (1985)
This one is rather infamous, and depending on who’s asked, a little scary. I don’t know what it was with Hollywood in the eighties, but us Gen-Xers got a lot of dark, complicated stories passed off to us as children’s entertainment. Explains a lot, doesn’t it? ;-)
Anyway, the film is mostly an adaptation of Baum’s third novel, Ozma of Oz with a few bits thrown in from The Marvelous Land of Oz, and it hits plenty of nostalgia feels. We even get to see the Ruby Slippers, although they have silk bows this time around.
Also of note is a young Brian Henson playing Jack Pumpkinhead, a character who’s really fun and winsome, and a great performance by Fairuza Balk as Dorothy. I only wish we had gotten to see more of what was in Dorothy’s lunch pail besides the ham sandwich.
The Wonderful Wizard of Ha’s (2007)
Both an homage to the 1939 film and a retelling of the Parable of the Prodigal Son from the Bible, this VeggieTales episode somehow manages to hit many of the high points of the Oz canon. It also blurs the lines between Kansas and Oz because the characters don’t actually go that far. In this iteration, Darby wants to use money his dad’s put aside for him for his future to go to a big fancy amusement park called Ha’s, but Dad says no because that money needs to be saved for later.
As timing would have it, though, Darby just happens to have his money with him when a twister hits. He and the family pig, Tutu, take refuge in the family Streamliner, and they land right outside of Ha’s, where they meet a lot of new friends. After living it up in Ha’s, Darby finds himself broke and unable to get home.
Fortunately, Splenda the Good Witch has a few surprises up her filmy sleeve and nothing goes very badly. Oh, and there aren’t any ruby slippers or silver shoes, but Ha’s gets around that.
Oz the Great and Powerful (2013)
Disney’s attempt at a prequel is pretty fun, the visuals look superb, and kudos to them for tapping in some characters that have never really been included in other Oz films, such as the little girl from the China Country. James Franco plays it up as Oz, a small-time magician who wants to be a combo of Harry Houdini and Thomas Edison. He then has to get a clue when he’s whisked away to Oz.
That said, the film does do a slight bit of retconning, and it seems to lean more Wonderland than Oz. Glinda is princess of the Emerald City, which we know she wasn’t. The Emerald City wasn’t built when the Wizard arrived; he asked the people of Oz to do it before secluding himself and pretending to be all big and bad and stuff. It feels slightly awkward and clunky.
Then again, it wouldn’t be the first time a movie has deviated from the source material (ahem, Oz 1939), so it’s no biggy.
What’s your favorite Oz film besides the 1939 classic? Least favorite? What’s the weirdest Oz you’ve ever seen? Leave a comment below…
For further reading:
Harmetz, Aljean. The Making of the Wizard of Oz. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1977.