This movie is boring and forgettable and not worth talking about. Its not terrible, there's just nothing here.

MY GOOOD! I can believe they did that.I don't even know where to start. This movie is incredibly able to have worse effects than the one of 1939. It is worse than the Star Wars prequel's. Most of the CGI is without details and without life (except for the Porcelain Doll), it seems even a lazy production, EVEN THE TREES ARE MADE WITH GRAPHIC COMPUTING! WHY?! WHYYY?!That wouldn't be such a big problem if the movie was good, but that's not the case. From the beginning the movie tries to take the nostalgia of the original. For example, in the beginning, that just like the iconic 39's movie starts without colors and only when we get to Oz do they appear. However, even on that the film fails, starting with the black and white image, when the original is brown and white. From then on several forced citations and small references are played during the movie to perhaps make you care (like the various references to Scarecrows).That said, let's look at the story itself, without considering that this thing tries to serve as a prequel to the work of art that was launched in the 1930s. The plot (if you can call it a plot) is confusing and things do not seem to happen for any particular reason, the perfect example of this is the transformation of "Theodora" into "Wicked Witch." The goal is to look like she had a broken heart, so she decided to turn bad once (eating an apple? Really?), That would even work, but how long had she interacted with the Magician? 2 DAYS?! And how can she be that stupid? How can everyone in the city be so dumb, to spend decades on the command of a tyrant and evil Witch and not realize? Look, I know it's a fantastic world, I know that even the original follows very basic premises of fantasy and that being too critical isn't very correct, but to me that's lazy to try to make a minimally coherent story, not a complex story, just a coherent one.I'm going to skip the bad performances (James Franco), not to mention that only ridiculous things surround the movie, there are three cool things worth highlighting (but they do not change the quality of the movie very much, nor do they make it worth your time).It is clear that every single scene Mila Kunis is trying to do something cool, and from the moment she becomes the Wicked Witch of the West, for me, she delivers a performance that lives up to the original, with the character's striking features.The final "battle", when it is shown the great trick that Oz planned is a good scene, it seems something the original Wizard would do, even though it is a predictable scene, it is good. Pay attention, this scene is good, the """battle""" of the two Witch's after that isn't.And finally, by far the best thing in the movie: Michelle Williams. She is simply fantastic as Glinda, every moment she appears on the scene no one else matters, it's amazing how she managed to do something extremely faithful to Billie Burke's performance, and at the same time add something more to this character that doesn't appear much in the first movie. Amazing! Wonderful! Beautiful! But that's it, she's the only great thing in the whole movie.OH! One more thing I remembered: DO YOU REALLY NEED TO EXPLAIN THE F#CKING BROOM ?! Seriously?!

I think this film is a very charming prequel to the original Wizard of Oz with Judy Garland. Not every film in creation needs blood, sex, swears and gore. This film is well made, beautiful cinematography, great special effects and great story. Suitable for children as well. Give it a chance. I did and loved it.

This film, conceived as a prequel to the famous "The Wizard of Oz", 1939, shows us how the "sorcerer" goes to that fantastic land, and how he managed to become the greatest sorcerer in the country. Directed by Sam Raimi, this film has a script by Mitchell Kapner and David Lindsay-Abaire. The cast is headed by James Franco, Mila Kunis, Rachel Weisz and Michelle Williams.This prequel was made almost a hundred years after the original film, probably due to the status of "classic" that it won through the decades. And the idea to revive Oz, decades after Dorothy's journey through the big screen, is quite good.The script is interesting and the story isn't bad, unrolling quite naturally from the moment the magic arrives in Oz. The biggest problem is that this film completely breaks with its '39 predecessor in a key point of the story: everything that Dorothy does in Oz never happened, it was just a dream but, in this film, the magic really goes to Oz, awake and aware, and the film never explains how. This would never be a problem if the rest of the film wasn't an attempt to prequel the first film but, if it's a prequel and Oz was a dream in the first one, it should have remained a dream in this film or, at least, the arrival of the magic should have been better explained.The actors generally fulfilled reasonably with their work. Rachel Weisz was excellent in the role of Evanora, and her British charm gave to the character an additional dose of calculism and cruelty that was very welcome. Michelle Williams also didn't disappoint as Glinda, managing to personify the qualities of her character. Mila Kunis is very good to roles with personality and great presence, but this isn't the case of Theodora, a woman highly influenced by her bad sister and suffering because of their impulses and passions. Perhaps this has posed problems for the actress, and the way she sought to overcome them has not been the best. The fact is that her character, initially too warm and bland, just improves when becomes a villain. James Franco was an extremely seductive and charming magician, but also opportunistic, hypocritical and more concerned with saving his own skin than helping others. The way he changes was well achieved by the actor, but his performance was generally irregular, with very good scenes followed by other totally uninteresting.The production gave the biggest attention to the sets and visual effects. Raimi knew that the public would require a re-creation, with current techniques, of the colorful and fantastic universe of Oz, and the computerized effects would be essential to achieve that. The result is excellent and worthy of being admired. The photography also helped a lot, and we must emphasize especially the way it helps to mark the "border" to the world of Oz, with a gradual change of color and screen format. The special effects were also made with great detail. The soundtrack, however, is absolutely disappointing. The music was an essential part of the first film, which had great musical moments, and there isn't a single decent musical moment in this film, and the main theme are too regular to be worthy of any positive mention.