Rating: 
Summary: Gee Wiz That Was Good
Review: The Wizard of oz is a good movie for the whole family!!!! Find out the story about a girl named Dorothy (the main charecter) and all she wants is to go home. Toto her dog that she realy cares about. The Cowardly Lion who wants to be brave. The Tin Man who wants a heart. The Scarecrow who wants a brain and the Wicked Witch of the West.
There is a tornado in Kansas whitch transports Dorthy to the land of OZ where she meets The Cowardly Lion,The Tin Man and The Scarecrow who all want to see the wizard of oz so they can have what they want but The Wicked Witch of the West creats some conflicts.
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Summary: perhaps, the most legendary film of all time
Review: there have been only a few films to achieve the legendary status of "The Wizard Of Oz", such as "Casablanca" and "Gone With The Wind" but even those 2, as magnificent as they were, still didn't quite achieve the legendary magnificence of "The Wizard Of Oz". this film will be immensely enjoyed by generations to come. it has been loved by all ages since initially released in 1939. as for the DVD, it is absolutely loaded with special features including a very special documentary hosted by Angela Lansbury. the picture and sound are astonishingly so well-preserved and transferred to disc, it's absolutely incomprehensible that a movie this old (62 years) could look this great. if you don't buy it now, you will regret it if it goes out of print.
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Summary: ONE OF THE ENDURING STANDARDS OF FILMMAKING
Review: Walt Disney's, ``Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'' had made a very big impact on audiences when it first came out in 1937. There had been cartoons in color for some time. But Disney's genious was in producing a full length animated feature film that woukd not simply be the usual short cartoon before the big movie. It WAS the main feature. Big changes were shaping the world around this time. When in 1939 the WIZARD OF OZ premiered in Hollywood, Adolf Hitler's Nazis had been running Germany since 1933 and Benito Mussolini's Fascists had even earlier taken over Italy. By 1938, Germany invaded Czechoslovakia signaling the beginning of World War II. The 1939 Worlds Fair opened in New York City, ushering in television and all sorts of life changing new inventions. Also in 1939, David O. Selznick released, "Gone with the Wind" which broke all box office records. This was a four hour long, spell binding antebellum and Civil War saga set in the South ... all of it in color. By the way: L. Frank Baum's book on OZ was first filmed in 1925 with Oliver Hardy (of Lauarel & Hardy) playing the Tin Man. This version was pretty ambitious but it was completely overshadowed by MGM's making of ``Gone With the Wind.'' Finally, MGM's new WIZARD OF OZ was mostly shot in color (the opening scenes are in the then customary black and white) which was probably believed to be critical because the film company needed a response to Disney's hugely successful, 1937 pioneering color animated feature, "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs." Why has the WIZARD OF OZ become so important to us? Is it because certaine elements in this movie can fill a void inside many children. Dorothy has problems at home, and so she runs away with Toto to escape them. But in the end, all she wants to do is to get home. So then, at a certain age, home is everything. It is, the center of the world. Yet over the rainbow, it seems, is a wide, fascinating world, whiochj at the same time is terrifying. Perhaps, the WIZARD OF OZ taps into our deepest fear that events may carry us from the safety of home and we will become stranded far away in a strange place. What would we find there? New friends! They can advise and protect us. And Toto, of course, because we as children have such a strong symbiotic relationship with our pets, we assume they we'd get lost together. Further researching on the Web who first saw WIZARD OF OZ as a child, Salman Rushdie, growing up in Bombay, first saw the movie when he was 10 years old. "It made a writer out of me,'' he is quoted as writing. He wrote, the movie's, "driving force is the inadequacy of adults, even of good adults, and how the weakness of grownups forces children to take control of their own destinies.'' As an African-American child growing up in northern Michigan, Terry McMillan recalls, " ... [I] completely identified when no one had time to listen to Dorothy.'' McMillan learned something about courage from this movie, about, "being afraid but doing whatever it was you set out to do anyway.'' "The land of Oz wasn't such a bad place to be stuck in,'' decided McMillan as a young girl reacting to her discontent with life in Michigan. "It beat the farm in Kansas.'' What about the actors who made OZ? Judy Garland had an unhappy childhood. Some biogrpahies say, MGM's quack doctors shot her full of "uppers" in the morning and tranquilizers at night to keep her going. Nevertheless, she was a great performer. Although made to look younger, Garland was almost 17 when she played young Dorothy. Garland's key importance to the movie was projecting vulnerability and a certain sadness in every tone of her voice. Ethel Merman once quipped that a brassy young child star [Shirley Temple?] would have been fatal to this material. Garland's character projected a frightened uncertainty. When she hoped that her troubles would "melt like lemon drops," you were REALLY made to believe that she had BIG troubles. Dorothy's friends on the Yellow Brick Road (Tin Man, Scarecrow, Cowardly Lion) are clever projections of every child's secret fears. Who are we? Are we ugly and silly? Are we brave enough? By helping her friends, Dorothy can help hersel, like an older child who overcomes fear by acting brave in front of a younger one. The good and bad adult figures in Oz are the Wicked Witches of the East and West ,and the Good Witch Glinda. Dorothy needs help from her friends but instead she must help them. The Wizard of OZ orders Dorothy's timid group to bring back the Wicked Witch's broom and the ruby slippers. In the end, the key to Dorothy returning home to Kansas is the pair of ruby slippers; a pair of very grownup shoes. When Dorothy gets back to Kansas, all the color is gone from the movie. Her Yellow Brick Road magical friends are ordinary people again. In spite of, or maybe because of everything, Dorothy says she discovered that "there is no place like home."
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Summary: The Wonderful Wizard
Review: After first viewing this delightful movie, I was hooked. The atmosphere is so inviting, and no one can resist the cute little munchkins. The story line was of course nothing that I was accustomed to, and I think that was what drew me in from the beginning. The characters are all do different, and each one has their own quality about them. The magic that surrounds this movie makes it so intriguing, and the ending is especially delightful. This movie will forever remain in the hearts of many, and each generation will come to love it as well.
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Summary: THE MOST WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ !!!
Review: I have seen this movie more times than any other. (I watch it sparingly now as I don't want to cheapen the experience. As If!). In the movies, on video, (many different versions), and now on DVD. Each time it is a new experience. The DVD version has introduced a new dimension to this great film. The picture quality is astounding as is the sound. Everything is so much more in your face and that's how it should be with this kind of movie. It's like sniffing a bouquet of flowers for the first time since last spring and realising that summer is just around the corner. I love this film. This is not 'ET', or 'The Sound Of Music', or 'The Rocky Horror Picture Show'. This is - " OZ! The Great And Powerful". It really IS that big a film and it deserves the respect that it commands as one of the very biggest movies of all time. For me it is! The cast are loveable and you really do feel like a kid again just by sharing this wonderful experience with them. Be it for the first time, or the 100th or beyond. I feel like I've just been home when I watch this movie. And you know what the motto is - "There's No Place Like home!" If you are wondering about the extras on this DVD there are no worries. It is full of extracts and outtakes and cast information. The 'Jitterbug' rehearsal, behind the scenes home movie footage is present too. A great insight as to what might have been in the movie. Please don't be put off by the fact that the soundtrack for the 'Jitterbug' is not the recording of the cast members (Judy Garland etc!). This is a vocal coach recording that was used to play over this silent film. As this is an outake and has nothing to do with the actual finished film no one should complain. However it would have been nice to have had the original cast sing the song as in the '50th VHS Anniversary Edition'. The DVD deserves 5 Stars. 'OZ' is timeless. No one should be dissapointed with what we get as as 'EXTRAS' on this release. After all that is what they are. For example - Angela Lansburys 'OZ' Documentary'. Great stuff! This is simply the best to date!
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Summary: Bounty of Color, Whimsy, and Underlying Existential Meaning
Review: This movie is so well-known and so much-reviewed, that I will say little in the standard way of a review: "The Wizard of Oz" is a colorful, musical, enchanting fairy tale that was done as well as any movie ever was. It overflows with color and whimsy, the bad guys are abhorrent (as they should be), and you want the good guys (and girls) to move into your neighborhood. Everyday pieces of reality are enhanced and patched together into a fantasy land that looks part abstract and part American primitive art. This is one of the few movies that can be watched yearly (or more often) without viewers getting tired of it. On to my more non-standard point: after watching this movie many times as I grew up, I realized one day that one way to view it is as an existential expedition in search of the self. Dorothy, the Tin Man, the Cowardly Lion, and the Scarecrow all go to see the wizard in search of that which is most dear to them (home and belonging, a heart, courage, and intelligence (a brain), respectively). In the end, they realize that, through their journey and through coping with adversity, they have discovered, or created within themselves, that which they sought outside of themselves. The lesson: do not look too far for what you seek, for the answer probably lies within and not without.
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Summary: The Wonderful World of the Wizard of Oz
Review: This is a classic movie, and one of, if not THE, best movies ever
and deserves the best possible reviews. I have seen this movie a thousand times and never get tired of watching it. I love it so much I'm going to be Dorothy for Halloween. Judy Garland adds the most unbelievable performance, voice, and all around awe ever.
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Summary: I LOVE IT!!
Review: I have to agree with the viewer from Baltimore who says anyone that would rate this with 1 STAR has NO TASTE. Out of curiosity I scrolled down to find "Bob Marley's" 1 STAR comment.. I'm not surprised... By the way he TOTALLY misspelled insignificant, I'm guessing that he didn't like it because he couldn't UNDERSTAND it! This movie isn't a classic for no reason ~ its fantastic! I watch it every year when it comes on television!!
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Summary: Nobody has any taste
Review: You all have no taste who rated this movie with 1 star.. This movie is a classic and it will always be a classic..
Rating:
Summary: What a wonderful Wiz he was...
Review: The Wizard of Oz may never have looked this good. Restored for a theatrical re-release, this DVD edition looks better than I've ever seen the Wizard of Oz before. One of my favorite films from childhood, owning an archival quality edition of the film is a must. The colors are amazing, and the sound is quite nice as well. There are more features included here than I know how to get through, so there is more than enough for an Oz fan to get into. Presented here is almost every shred of video and audio related to MGM's 1939 production. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
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