whatthewalt

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Z-O-M-B-I-E-S (2018)

Do zombies really want to eat your brains? Or would they rather play football, date cheerleaders and fight apartheid? You know zombies are pretty much mainstream and domesticated when they feature in a Disney Channel Original Movie. Can the walking dead make West Side Story interesting? Will the colour scheme of this movie fry your TV set? It’s George A. Romero meets High School Musical in Disney’s Z-O-M-B-I-E-S.

Nostalgia Alert

This movie is not even two years old. I had never heard of it before scrolling through the app. I hadn’t even heard any one mention this movie ever. So I’m going into this one completely blind. 

Showtime!

Z-O-M-B-I-E-S begins with an animated sequence explaining the backstory for the movie. Finding a creative way to info dump at the start of a movie is always going to win points with me. The sequence answers my number one question going into this movie: what kind of zombies are we dealing with here? Are they Romero, slow-moving folk risen from their graves by some mystical/unknown power? Or are they the 28 Days Later type: fast-moving and ferocious victims of a viral outbreak? Z-O-M-B-I-E-S goes for a third option - they are victims of nuclear fallout from an explosion which mutated them into mindless freaks who crave delicious brains. Now years have passed. The zombies have been tamed by the wonders of medical science and are back to normal. But not normal enough for the world at large. They are confined to the Zombieland ghetto, refused access to the same resources as everyone else, and are kept under strict curfews and harsh police treatment. Yep, in this movie zombies are a metaphor for black people in apartheid era South Africa or the segregated mid-20th century American South. If anyone has written a think-piece on this movie from an African-American perspective, please shoot me the link - I’m sure it would be a fascinating read.

The first thing that struck me once we transitioned from the animated sequence to the main, live action section of the movie is the set and costume design and colour palette. The Zombies stand out with their grey skin, green hair and drab, ill-fitting clothes. This is in stark contrast to the bright, clean-cut and matching pastels worn by the “normals”. Zombieland looks like the set designer of Sesame Street took one too many tabs of LSD at a 90s rave party. And that’s not an attack - anything that makes me think I’m stuck inside of an issue of the Tank Girl comic book is a win in my book. It’s obvious that there’s not a single scene in Z-O-M-B-I-E-S where the production team half-assed it. There’s something visually interesting happening in every shot.

It’s the first day of school and something is about to happen that has never happened before - zombies are being introduced to normal high school for the first time. Sort of. A chain link fence separates the students and the zombies are restricted to the basement where they are taught by a zombie teacher (who was a janitor the week before). We can’t have the nice, normal kids mixing with those brain-eating freaks. Zed is a teenage zombie who dreams of joining the football team and showing everyone that zombies and humans can get along peacefully. But it’s hard to fulfill your dreams when you aren’t allowed near the football field or fellow students. Addison is also experiencing her first day of school, but from a different perspective. She comes from a respectable family and has been training her entire life to be a cheerleader. Even though her cousin is captain of the cheerleaders and the coolest guy at school, she is afraid that people might discover her secret and label her a freak. Of course Zed and Addison will meet, fall in love and bring about a whole cheerleaders vs zombies West Side Story apocalypse. 

Do you know why I said West Side Story instead of Romeo and Juliet? Here I am, innocently watching a movie, appreciating all of the pretty colours, when someone starts singing. “No!” I say to myself, “Is this a musical? Surely this isn’t a zombie musical?” And yes it was. People start singing their feelings. Crowds break into choreographed dance routines. And I’m loving every minute of it. Which isn’t a give. I’m not a huge fan of musicals. Just read my review of Newsies to see how musicals can very rub me up the wrong way. But this is glorious. The cheerleaders are pretty and peppy and sparkly. The zombies move like they have grown up watching Michael Jackson’s Thriller their entire lives. One song later in the movie literally has the characters bouncing off a concrete floor. This is like High School Musical, except, you know, good. 

Of course, Zed joins the football team and proves to everyone that zombies are okay. Addison’s secret is revealed and she doesn’t care who knows that she’s in love with a zombie. The movie climaxes with a cheerleading competition where humans and zombies work together to fight prejudice and end apartheid. And at no point do I care how cliched the plot is because every moment of this movie is constructed out of pure joy.

Was It Any Good?

A million times yes! If you have seen this movie and hadn’t told me previously how awesome this is, shame on you. This could well be my favourite Disney movie of all time. And the thing is, I would never have watched it if it wasn’t for this blog. I’m not the target market - I’m not a pre-teen girl and never have been. Why isn’t my social media newsfeed filled with Z-O-M-B-I-E-S memes? Why aren’t I hearing kids in the school I teach at singing these songs? Why aren’t cosplayers swarming Comicon in Z-O-M-B-I-E-S inspired getups? This is a tragedy and can’t be allowed to continue. Go watch Z-O-M-B-I-E-S now. If you don’t have a Disney Plus subscription, sign up today and wait to watch The Mandalorian until you have thoroughly consumed this undead masterpiece. Being exposed to this singing and dancing assault on the senses has made my subscription and this blog 100% worth it. Run (in a dragging, zombie like way) right now and check it out. 

[whatthewalt]

The Black Hole (1979)

In 2012, Disney bought Star Wars for 4 billion dollars. But it wasn’t the first time Disney chased those Star Wars dollars. Let’s take a trip back in time to 1979 and see if cute robots and a complete disregard for the laws of physics can save us from The Black Hole.

Nostalgia Alert

I have never saw The Black Hole as a kid. But that didn’t stop The Disney marketing machine from trying to imprint on a small child’s memory. At the very least I had Black Hole story books as I clearly remember how VINCENT and Old BOB looked. I couldn’t tell you what they did or anything about the plot of the movie but I could definitely pick those two bots out of a line up and tell you where they were from.

Showtime!

A space exploration team encounter a strange ship at the edge of a black hole. Boarding the ship, they find an eccentric mad man, an army of robots and a crazy plan to travel through the black hole to discover what’s on the other side. Of course, the mad man is deadlier and more insane than they had realised and they try to escape before the murder-bit army can kill them all. Will they live long enough to escape the black hole?

Going into The Black Hole, I had two fears. There were a fair few attempts in the late 70s to replicate the magic of Star Wars. Arguably none of them pulled it off. Would this be a terrible schlock-fest like 1978’s Star Crash, of which the only good thing you can say about it is that it makes a good episode of Mystery Science Theatre 3000 or How Did This Get Made? Or could it be just like Star Trek: The Motion Picture - long, boring and makes you wonder how any body was convinced to make a second one, let alone a franchise? Surprisingly, The Black Hole managed to avoid both these traps. It’s by no means a perfect movie, but it looks pretty and doesn’t over stay its welcome.

To say that The Black Hole is polarising is putting it mildly. Some people love it. Some hate it. None of the reviews I read can even agree on what are the good bits and what are the bad bits. So these are my thoughts without any attempt to be objective (but really, if you’ve been following What The Walt? you should be expecting this by now).

The Good

The opening title sequence looks far better than it has any right to. 1970s computer graphics of green lines crossing and crossing should look dated and cheap. But somehow it manages to be graceful and beautiful. Well done for not being gimmicky.

The whole look of the movie is amazing. Control rooms full of lights and buttons that look like they could actually pilot a ship through space. Vast, moody corridors. A variety of different shaped robots that don’t look like they were leftovers from a B grade sci fi movie made 20 years earlier. And the black hole itself just looks gorgeous.

I went into the movie thinking I was going to hate the robot VINCENT, with his stupid looking anime eyes. But I was quickly won over. He’s the real hero of this movie. Great dialogue, great special effects. And he’s a stone cold bad-ass when it comes to firing a blaster. I want a VINCENT action figure on my desk. Now please.

The Bad

This movie has some significant flaws. For instance, I’m reasonably sure the screenwriter did zero research on black holes. Or on any kind of physics. If you’re the kind of person who finds a movie unwatchable because of bad science, a) avoid this movie, nothing to see here and b) I’m not sure I ever want to sit next to you in a cinema.

I found the orchestral score distracting. It’s so over the top, yet struggles to accurately portray the mood of any given scene, let alone the pacing. Scenes which should have been urgent and nail biting, end up just being… there.

So, how about that ending? Normally, I’d try not to spoil the ending of a movie in a review. But if there’s ever been a pure What The Walt? moment, it’s the ending of this movie. Telling you about this completely whack ending before you see the film is a public service. Our surviving crew members managed to leave the ship on a probe vessel, just as the ship is being bombarded with meteors and crushed by the black hole. They have no choice but to travel through the black hole. We then see our main villain floating in some kind of hellscape, before being merged with his #1 murder robot while a legion of zombie robots look on. Then after some lacking psychedelic imagery (which, come on, you can do better. This is 10 years after Kubrick’s 2001 for Walt’s sake!) the crew is brought through a crystal hallway by an angelic being and find themselves travelling towards a peaceful light. For reals. I did not make any of that up. Actually Watching the scene will do nothing to help you understand what I have just said. They’re definitely trying for something. But they are also definitely failing.

And I haven’t even talked about psychics who can only talk telepathically with robots; zero gravity that kind of, sort of works, maybe; robots who play target practice for funsies and murder each other if they don’t like the results; or what was going on with the creepy zombie robots. There’s so much going on here.

Was It Any Good?

You should watch The Black Hole. Unless you are one of those nit picky science people, then you should watch this movie just for the suffering you deserve. It looks great, doesn’t over stay its welcome, and is more entertaining than it has any right to be. The special effects clearly set Disney back a few pennies and it shows - a lot of those effects hold up even by today’s standard. And if you don’t love VINCENT, you can go sit with those science dorks, because I don’t want to be your friend.

[whatthewalt]

Newsies (1992)

Young Bruce Wayne Jack Kelly is a charming paper boy singing and dancing his way through late 19th century New York in Newsies. He leads an army of underage workers who go on strike when the newspaper mongols cut wages, which is an interesting plot for a movie coming from a studio that was notorious for its low wages in the 1990s. Will pubescent boys performing an overly choreographed dance number with the aid of Vinnie from Doogie Howser, MD be able to solve the problems of the working class?

Nostalgia Alert

Here’s the thing - until recent years, I had no idea this movie existed. Which is curious. Because it was released at a time where I was hyper aware of movie releases. My obsession with movies was well in play by the time 1992 rolled around. Every week I would pour over the entertainment section of the newspaper, reading reviews, checking screening times. Even more so when it came to the video store (Hey Kids! Remember video stores?) - I knew the release date of every movie hitting the new release section. Even the movies that went straight to VHS. Especially the movies that went straight to VHS. But I never heard of Newsies. I asked on Facebook and none of my friends remembered this movie ever coming out. It’s my suspicion that this movie has never been released in Australia… until Disney+. If you have any information to help me in working this out, I’d love to hear from you.

So no, never seen Newsies before. I had heard it in passing over the years, usually as a pop culture aside from a snarky character in a comic book. Which these days is at least 45% of characters in comic books. So let’s see what I’ve been missing out on. 

Showtime!

Newsies is based on real life events that happened in New York in 1899. I’m assuming with a lot less singing and dancing. Seriously, there are so many teenage boys dancing in this movie that if you were a young lad who could dance and lived near Hollywood in 1992 and you didn’t get cast in this movie, then you’d seriously have to reconsider your life goals. I would not have doubted you for a single moment if you told me that they had to pause rehearsals half way through so they could hire another fifty dancers to fill in every available gap of the sound stage. Fair warning - the singing and dancing aren’t particularly great. The dancing always feels a little over done. I feel like it’s trying to be a throwback to an earlier era of movies, but it just doesn’t cut in 1992. If this had been a high school theatre production, I would have kept my mouth shut to be polite, but inside my head being really critical for trying too hard. And the singing? Nothing to write home about. None of the songs are memorable. No show stopping numbers here.

Where was I? Oh yeah, the plot. I think this movie had one. Hovering around somewhere while a pre-Batman Christian Bale rides a horse through New York for some reason. Where was I again? That’s right, the plot. Poor teenagers barely survive in New York city by selling newspapers (the Newsies of the title). Newspaper owners are not making a bajillion dollars, so instead of improving the quality of the papers or increasing the cover price, they charge the Newsies more for their papers, effectively giving them a massive pay cut. The working class heroes won’t be put down by the man any longer and go on strike. The movie goes on for about another 2 hours before something actually happens. Every underpaid, underage worker in New York gathers together for a massive protest strike. At this point I’m starting to get my hopes up. What will happen next? Will we get a Les Miserables style barricade with medleys, gunshots and drama? Of course not. They fill the sound stage with extras and that’s it. The. Movie. Just. Ends.

Sigh.

Was It Any Good?

It’s not a bad movie. But it’s not a great one either. Clocking in at 2 hours, it’s at least 30 minutes too long. At least. This movie needed more time before going into production, either to improve the quality of the music and throw in at least one song that everyone will be singing as they exit the cinema, or to tighten up the plot and make that final act strike actually mean something. Seriously, this strike would have been a big deal. If it wasn’t a big deal, why would someone be making a movie about it nearly 100 years later? But at no stage do you feel like any of the main characters are in danger. Or that they have anything to lose. Disney animation was going through a Renaissance during the early 90s. Shame the same thing wasn’t happening with this live action production. 

I hear the stage production of Newsies is better. I might give it a shot. Can’t see how it could be much worse.

[whatthewalt]

The Haunted Mansion (2003)

From the studio that gave us Pirates of the Carribean, a multi-movie franchise based on one of their theme park attractions that made all of the moneys, comes another big budget movie based on a theme park attraction. The Haunted Mansion traps a young family in a… you know… haunted mansion. Family friendly spooky hijinks ensue.

Nostalgia Alert

I had not previously seen this movie. I was a fully grown adult when this film was released and everything about it screamed stay away. It had been at least 10 years since star Eddie Murphy had been in a movie I had enjoyed. The posters made the movie feel tacky and looked like it was trying so hard and not quite hitting the mark. Did I misjudge The Haunted Mansion? 

Showtime!

Not at all. This movie is a steaming pile of garbage. At multiple points in the movie I wanted to switch this off and physically destroy any device that had been tainted by this monstrosity. If you had told me that this script had been sitting in a draw at Disney since the 1970s, I would have believed you. If this movie had been made in the 1970s, I would be more willing to overcome its serious flaws. But this was made in 2003 and everyone involved should have known better. 

We begin with G-Rated Eddie Murphy as one half of a husband-wife real estate team. Which could be interesting, except we are never shown Mrs Eddie Murphy (I refuse to remember any of the character names) doing anything real estate-y. The closest we get is her wearing a headset in the car while driving. We then spend the rest of the movie watching her complain that Eddie Murphy spends too much time at work and neglects the family. Why isn’t she out there looking for clients? Why isn’t she the one getting people to sign on the bottom line? What does she actually contribute to this company? You get the feeling that the film really wants her to be a stay at home mother but needs her photo on the company pamphlets in order to make the plot work. If it wasn’t for Mrs Eddie Murphy being angry at her husband for single-handedly keeping their business alive, she would be completely devoid of personality. And she’s not the only one. Eddie Murphy’s son is scared of spiders. Eddie Murphy’s daughter is sassy. Mr Murphy himself at least gets two dimensions: he is a neglectful father AND he can’t stop talking about real estate. Does any of that make you want to invest in these characters? No, it does not. 

In order to show us how bad a husband and father Eddie Murphy is, the movie has him drag his family along to visit a property that, if he manages to sell it, set his family and business up for life. No one, not even his supposed business partner/wife seem to recognise this and spend the whole time complaining. Turns out the place is full of ghosts and random events that seem to happen for no reason. You know what I would do if my family got stranded in a creepy old mansion? I would make sure I knew where my wife and kids were at all times. I would not let them go wandering. I would at the very least wonder where they are. Mrs Eddie Murphy is the worst when it comes to this. She spends most of the movie hanging out with creepy ghost guy and never once thinks to check on her kids. Or her husband. Or wonder why there are at least four people living in this mansion and not one room has been cleaned in over a century.

I really hope that this movie was shown in 3D in the cinemas. The opening credit sequence alone is full of objects whoosing across the screen and into your face. It was so intense that I was suffering from motion sickness while sitting still on the lounge. It was so distracting that I could barely make out the important back story going on. Until, whoah! Is that a guy hanging from a noose? In PG rated family movie. Hard Pass. Needless to say, I’m glad I didn’t have that dangling dead guy projected into my eyes in 3D. And it doesn’t stop with the opening credits. No opportunity to thrust an object at the viewer is left untaken. That may play for an amusement park ride, but that’s not what I signed up for. 

I’d try and talk more about the plot, but there’s nothing here worth talking about. Stuff happens because there’s 90 minutes to fill. Looks like Mrs Eddie Murphy is the reincarnation of spooky dead guy’s beloved. Sure, why not. But no mention of why this rich dude was engaged to a woman of colour in an era where that would have been a significant deal? Is that why Terrence Stamp killed her? No apologies for the spoiler, I really don’t want you to watch this movie because I have too much respect for you to make you endure this. Was her death racially motivated? We don’t know because the movie is too toothless to even discuss it. But really, if you hire General Zod as your butler, you have to expect something to go wrong. 

Why were the staff cursed to live as ghosts in the mansion along with their master? Did the mansion only have three staff for a place that size? Why could the Murphy’s see the ghosts when the ghosts believed humans couldn’t see them? Why was there a crystal ball with a ghost gypsy in the house? How did she get there and what was she doing? Why did a fire demon come out of nowhere to eat Terrence Stamp? Why did the Murphy’s take the singing statues with them on holidays? So many questions. And I honestly don’t care what the answers are. 

Watching this movie, I kept thinking that with just one change I might have actually enjoyed this movie. If Mr and Mrs Murphy had been replaced by Joel and Sheila, married real estate agents from Santa Clarita Diet. A couple that love and understand each other. Who are both passionate about their work. Who have each other’s back no matter what. I’m not saying you should whitewash this film. But what if Mrs Eddie Murphy was the main character? What if she was the one who would go to any length to find the dream home for her client? What if she and her husband bounced off each other, going manic for the renovation possibilities of the mansion? What if the romantic tension between husband and wife was so strong that you felt sorry for Lord Goth Ghost Guy for even trying to make a move on her because he clearly didn’t stand a chance. Give that woman a personality! Give her agency! Give her something to do in this movie other than nagging and crying! 

Was It Any Good?

Can I say anything nice about this movie? Let me think… There were some scenes with Wallace Shawn that were almost entertaining. There’s a 1 minute scene where ghosts did ghost things that was ok. But really, don’t bother watching The Haunted Mansion. There are better ways to kill 90 minutes and countless brain cells.

[whatthewalt]

The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes (1969)

If you are reading this, you know a little something about computers. Even if you’ve never used a computer in your life and a loved one has just put their phone in front of you so you could read this review, you have at least seen some kind of computer device. Which gives you an advantage over the team who made The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes, because I am certain no one working on this film had ever seen a computer in action, let alone had any idea of what computers can do. Baby Kurt Russell becomes a super genius and TV’s The Joker wants him killed because of… [checks notes]... low stakes horse betting? What is actually going on here?

Nostalgia Warning

I grew up in an era where a family trip to the local video store was an adventure. My parents would let me and my brothers loose in the store to hunt down the treasures we would be watching over the next week. On one of these trips, something caught my eye in the family video section. On the cover was a giant supercomputer with the buttons and magnetic reels arranged to look like a face. And the computer is walking around wearing sneakers. The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes promised so much. I grabbed it off the shelf, eager to watch a movie about a walking, talking computer that got into adventures. Show me the robots!

The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes was an early lesson in how video covers are in fact a nest of lying vipers, ready to strike anyone foolish enough to fall for their deceit. The disappointment when I put that cassette into the VCR player and there wasn’t a single robot to be seen… I can still feel the hurt 35 years later. In fact, the bitterness I felt towards this movie was so pervasive, that I could not remember anything at all about this film. Except for that empty promise of robots that was never fulfilled. 

Showtime!

Before he Escaped from New York, but after he visited Giligan’s Island, Kurt Russell played Dexter, a young college student with only the barest hint of a personality. Through shenanigans involving dodgy electric cabling and 1960s computers that are big enough to fill a warehouse (but with insufficient RAM to run Windows 3.1), Dexter has his brain rewired and becomes a human computer. There’s a battle between two colleges to enroll him, the inept machinations of a shady businessman (played by Batman ‘66 Joker Cesar Romero), and some kind of televised college quiz show that needs to be won for... college funding… I think. 

The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes is a movie constantly in search of a plot. You can just imagine the production meeting:

“Computers are the future! We should make a movie about computers!”

“Have you ever seen a computer?” “No”

“Do you know what a computer can do?”

“They open and close doors, right?”

“Sure, why not. How do we make a movie about a computer? They just sit there and go beep.”

“We get a good looking, but non-threatening teenager to become the computer. And when they look into his eyes, they see computer parts moving.”

“How are we going to make that happen? Are we going to have him undergo surgery and become a machine man?”

“Nah, we’ll just electrocute him”

“Makes sense.”

“What will he do with these new powers?”

“We’ll work that out later. We start filming tomorrow!”

There’s just so much about this movie that doesn’t make any sense. In fact, I can’t think of many movies where it would have improved the coherency of the plot by having a mystical amulet be the cause of all the high jinks. At least that would have been a more plausible explanation than creative electrocution. But the dumbness doesn’t stop there. Why does a group of friendly (yet obviously not smart enough to earn a degree) college students bug the Dean’s office so they can listen in on a budget meeting? Why does a prominent businessman involved in illegal gambling need to keep the addresses of all of his dodgy venues on a computer that seems to only be used for this purpose and kept in a secret bunker with a hidden elevator but can be accessed by a happy go-lucky college student looking for spare parts? Why do we only get ten minutes of Dexter using his powers to learn languages and tell diamond cutters what to do and the rest gets squandered on a televised quiz show that has to be the most boring piece of television ever produced? The only saving grace in this movie is a pretty decent car chase scene (for 1969) with kids throwing bright coloured paint out of the back of a pickup truck. But then the movie has to go ruin this climatic chase by making the actual climax the snore inducing quiz show that Dexter wins while clearly having a stroke and no one doing anything about it. Seriously, he should have been rushed to hospital, not made to answer questions about generals during the Revolutionary War. 

But do you know what the absolute worst thing about this movie is? It was successful enough to spawn two sequels. Two more movies where Kurt Russell gets superpowers. And somehow I doubt either of them make any sense either. Only one of the sequels is currently on Disney+ and you better believe that it’s on the What The Walt? List. On the weekend I was making jokes about what this movie would be like if they had remade it in the 90s, picturing a purple iMac wearing Converse sneakers. What I didn’t know is that Disney actually remade this movie in 1995 with Kirk Cameron in the Dexter role. This movie is not currently on Disney+ and this is a travesty that needs to be corrected immediately.

Was It Any Good?

Oh, this was bad. And I didn’t even mention the opening theme song that tells us:

“The computer wore tennis shoes and a twinkle in his eye. 

Never met a groovier dude and an electric kind of guy.”

The creators obviously wanted to make a fun teen movie with a computer but had no idea how to go about it. What I would have rather seen is a movie where NASA grab hold of this 18 year old supercomputer and had him get to work on winning the space race for the good ol’ USA. That’s a movie I would be interested in. If you have to endure this movie, fast forward to the car chase scene at the 1 hour 13 minute mark. Watch that and then call it a day. The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes should have taken those shoes off and had a lie down instead and saved us all a lot of trouble. 

[whatthewalt]

Return to Oz (1985)

The dark sequel to the classic Wizard of Oz musical carefully constructed out of pure nightmare fuel. If you thought the original had too much singing and not enough commentary on the horrors of early 20th century psychiatry, then this might be the movie for you.

Nostalgia Warning

I saw this movie in the theatres when I was a small child. I’m sure my parents had no clue that this movie would be so dark. The opening 20 minutes were so traumatising that I still remembered it more than 30 years later. In fact, I still remembered huge chunks of this movie, which I can’t say for some movies I watched 10 years ago, let alone 30. Is Return to Oz as needlessly dark as I remember it? Is it as big a failure as the box office figures suggest, or is this a hidden classic? Let’s find out!

Showtime!

6 months after Dorothy had her grand adventure in Oz (or 46 years - time is relative y’all), Aunty Em and Uncle Henry are worried about their young niece. Not only will she not stop talking about these fantasy characters that are a clear sign of a mental disorder, she’s somehow de-aged by about 10 years. Finding a mysterious key is either a sign that Dorothy is about to take another trip to Oz or that she’s about to lose her last grasp at sanity and is about to descend into a psychotic hellscape from which there will be no return, so it’s time to ship her off to a mental health clinic and cure her with the healing powers of electroshock therapy.

During a blackout, Dorothy manages to escape from the shock machine with the creepy face and after nearly drowning, finds herself back in Oz. If things looked bleak back in the crazy house, things aren’t much better in Oz, where the place is in ruins and everyone has been turned to stone. Dorothy gathers new companions Billina the Chicken, Jack Pumpkinhead, Tik-Tok the Clockwork Man and the Gump, faces off against the fluro-punk Wheelers, head-stealing witch Mombi and poorly animated Gnome King, all in a last ditch effort to save the people of Oz and uncover the secret of Princess Ozma.

Cards on the table: I love the Oz books but I do not love the old school Wizard of Oz movie. Don’t get me wrong, the music, visuals and acting are great. It’s the framing sequences back in Kansas that ruin it for me. Dorothy goes on this massive quest where she overcomes incredible challenges, inspires people to greatness and delivers an entire country from the clutches of an evil being. Then she gets home to Kansas and it turns out it was all a hallucination caused by a bang to the head and all the people she met in Oz were just caricatures of people she knew back in Kansas. What a way to ruin an epic adventure. So I got nervous when the same thing started happening in Return to Oz. The film tries way too hard to stuff references to all the upcoming events in Oz into the opening Kansas scenes. It’s done so poorly that I wonder if the director actually wanted to pursue this route or if he was forced into it. The squeaky wheels of the hospital trolleys sounding just like the sound the Wheelers make is one thing. I can almost understand the doctor and nurse being played by the actors playing the Gnome King and Mombi (though we are never given any reason why the hospital had to be EVIL in all capital letters. Could that nurses outfit scream gothic supervillain any harder?). But when you have a random girl, who may or may not exist, bring Dorothy a carved jack o’lantern pumpkin, and it isn’t even Halloween, then you’ve gone too far. And the thing is, the movie doesn’t need all this Oz foreshadowing. It doesn’t even do anything with it. In fact, I believe the movie would have been stronger if we had skipped the psych ward all together, had Dorothy find the key, get lost in a storm and begin her Oz adventure 15 minutes sooner. Then maybe we could have spent more time establishing the Princess Ozma mystery instead of dumping it all in the last 10 minutes.

There is some truly great stuff going on here. The ruins of Oz are wonderfully shot and I would love to spend time running around and exploring. The puppet work on display with Jack and Tik-Tok is amazing. Tik-Tok is my favourite Oz character and he doesn’t disappoint on screen. And what Brian Henson does with both Jack’s voice and his physicality just knocks it out of the park. The villains are scary, the plot is substantial and Dorothy’s eventual victory feels earned. But there are some weaknesses. The Gnome King looks great when he’s a human actor in makeup. But as soon as he becomes an animated special effect, it instantly dates the movie. The Gnomes never look right, which is more a limitation of 1980s special effects than poor filmmaking. Whoever composed the score must not have got the memo that they were composing a kids action adventure flick and not a gothic horror movie because it’s 100% dread and 0% fun. And I sure hope gravity works different in Oz than in the real world because whenever someone falls in this movie it takes forever and looks like someone is dangling a pumpkin on fishing wire instead of simulating a rapid descent. 

Return to Oz smooshes together all the best bits about the books The Marvelous Land of Oz and Ozma of Oz. Unfortunately it also throws in the elements of the 1939 movie I like the least. The result is a movie where it was clear that not everyone was on the same page when it came to the tone or purpose of this film. 

Was It Any Good?

You know what, surprisingly the answer is yes. Sure it has its flaws. But the location work, character design and story line (mainly the Oz stuff, not so much the Kansas stuff) work together to overcome the problems. I’m surprised this movie managed to get a G rating as there is some truly terrifying things happening on screen. But for adults and older kids, this is a pretty fun movie. I’ve read a bunch of the Oz novels with my 5 year old and he loves them. At the moment, he’s too young to watch this film. But in a few years time I’m looking forward to sitting down with him and watching the heck out of this crazy thing.

[whatthewalt]

Welcome to What the Walt?

With the launch of the brand new Disney+ streaming service, we now have access to more Disney content than humanly possible to consume. When you look past the Marvel, Star Wars and Pixar content, when you check off all the major animated movies, you might notice that there is something hiding in the corner. Something not quite right. Something strange. Something moving when it should not be moving. In the dark corners of Disney+ you’ll find the Weird World of Disney. The movies and TV shows where you have to wonder “What were they thinking?”

And that’s where What the Walt? comes in. I’ll search out the strange and ill-advised. I’ll subject myself to pure craziness. And I’ll let you know if it’s worth watching. Sometimes it will be a childhood favourite. Sometimes it will be something I’ve never seen before. Nothing is off limits as we wonder What the Walt?

If you have any suggestions for movies or shows you’d like me to tackle, let me know!