Well I suppose the general concept of this was good, although in no way original, but it was just badly carried out on every level.
To begin with the script. Better writing could really have saved this movie, despite all of it's other flaws, but instead we get underdeveloped characters, easy to spot plot-holes and an odd pace of things, that is to say that a lot of the boring introductory stuff is slow paced, which really didn't need to be so, and a lot of the later scenes in Oz, which really could have used the extra time, are rushed and feel almost silly. Added to all of this the dialogs and jokes are just plain bland, I understand that this movie was made for kids but still, you don't have to make it seem like a cartoon. Then we have the ending, which is utterly inconclusive, Oz hasn't killed either of the witches (and on that note it's worthy to mention that nobody actually dies in this movie) but simply forced them to run away, and we are told that they will soon return. Oz neither marries the Queen nor returns to his homeland, it just ends after the final battle leaving us wondering what exactly happened. Characters like Oz always return back to the real world, Alice did it, the Narnia kids did it, Hell even Harry Potter did it, you can't just leave your characters hanging in a fantasy universe. Bad writing.
Now for the CGI, almost 90% of the movie is green screen, and for some reason it's just awful. Pretty much all through out I could tell the differences between the actors and the background, they just didn't naturally blend into the background scene. It really felt like people standing in front of a painted cardboard cutout. A lot of the times the lighting and shadows felt a little off as well, especially in the field of sunflowers where the whole countryside was a bright brilliant yellow and the actors were walking in a much darker shade of light, it made everything feel so disconnected. Then we have the lightening that Rachel Weisz's character shoots out, it looks cheesy and ridiculous, I'm trying to think of something to compare it too but nothing comes to me, so in short, it's just stupid. Everything lacks realism, the castles the walls, the creates, they all look like they are made out of plastic, they just don't have any features to them. Speaking of features, the green evil look that Mila Kunis adopted after her character turned evil looked like a rubber mask, they could have at least done some proper prosthetics.
As far as acting goes, it was bad all around, James Franco seemed completely un-invested in his character and really just smiled and said his lines, quite possibly his worst performance yet. The "witches" were slightly better in that they tried to play out their parts, but still their performances were weak and had that "staged" element to them. My guess is that since all of this was green screen, none of the actors could really get a feel for their characters or the settings. Zach Braff was the only good 1 here, his 5 minutes of screen time in the beginning is sadly the best piece of acting you'll see in this film.
To sum up, the movie is entertaining if you're in the mood for a childish fantasy, but overall I doubt anybody over the age of 8 will actually love this film.
To begin with the script. Better writing could really have saved this movie, despite all of it's other flaws, but instead we get underdeveloped characters, easy to spot plot-holes and an odd pace of things, that is to say that a lot of the boring introductory stuff is slow paced, which really didn't need to be so, and a lot of the later scenes in Oz, which really could have used the extra time, are rushed and feel almost silly. Added to all of this the dialogs and jokes are just plain bland, I understand that this movie was made for kids but still, you don't have to make it seem like a cartoon. Then we have the ending, which is utterly inconclusive, Oz hasn't killed either of the witches (and on that note it's worthy to mention that nobody actually dies in this movie) but simply forced them to run away, and we are told that they will soon return. Oz neither marries the Queen nor returns to his homeland, it just ends after the final battle leaving us wondering what exactly happened. Characters like Oz always return back to the real world, Alice did it, the Narnia kids did it, Hell even Harry Potter did it, you can't just leave your characters hanging in a fantasy universe. Bad writing.
Now for the CGI, almost 90% of the movie is green screen, and for some reason it's just awful. Pretty much all through out I could tell the differences between the actors and the background, they just didn't naturally blend into the background scene. It really felt like people standing in front of a painted cardboard cutout. A lot of the times the lighting and shadows felt a little off as well, especially in the field of sunflowers where the whole countryside was a bright brilliant yellow and the actors were walking in a much darker shade of light, it made everything feel so disconnected. Then we have the lightening that Rachel Weisz's character shoots out, it looks cheesy and ridiculous, I'm trying to think of something to compare it too but nothing comes to me, so in short, it's just stupid. Everything lacks realism, the castles the walls, the creates, they all look like they are made out of plastic, they just don't have any features to them. Speaking of features, the green evil look that Mila Kunis adopted after her character turned evil looked like a rubber mask, they could have at least done some proper prosthetics.
As far as acting goes, it was bad all around, James Franco seemed completely un-invested in his character and really just smiled and said his lines, quite possibly his worst performance yet. The "witches" were slightly better in that they tried to play out their parts, but still their performances were weak and had that "staged" element to them. My guess is that since all of this was green screen, none of the actors could really get a feel for their characters or the settings. Zach Braff was the only good 1 here, his 5 minutes of screen time in the beginning is sadly the best piece of acting you'll see in this film.
To sum up, the movie is entertaining if you're in the mood for a childish fantasy, but overall I doubt anybody over the age of 8 will actually love this film.