| Return to Oz | |
|---|---|
Theatrical poster by Drew Struzan |
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| Directed by | Walter Murch |
| Produced by | Paul Maslansky Executive: Gary Kurtz |
| Written by | L. Frank Baum (novels) Gill Dennis Walter Murch |
| Starring | Fairuza Balk Nicol Williamson Jean Marsh Piper Laurie Matt Clark |
| Music by | David Shire |
| Cinematography | David Watkin Freddie Francis |
| Editing by | Leslie Hodgson |
| Studio | Walt Disney Pictures Silver Screen Partners II |
| Distributed by | Buena Vista Pictures |
| Release date(s) | United States June 21, 1985 United Kingdom July 10, 1985 |
| Running time | 113 min. |
| Country | United Kingdom United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $25,000,000 |
| Box office | $11,137,801 |
Return to Oz is a 1985 film which is an unofficial sequel to Victor Fleming's The Wizard of Oz.[1] The film is based on the second and third Oz books, The Marvelous Land of Oz (1904) and Ozma of Oz (1907). The element about Tik-Tok being "The Royal Army of Oz" derives from Tik-Tok of Oz (1914), in which he is made the Royal Army of Oogaboo, and also makes frequent cries of "Pick me up!" That book was itself based on a dramatic production, The Tik-Tok Man of Oz (1913).
It was made by Walt Disney Pictures without the involvement of MGM, the studio that made the 1939 film. No approval was necessary, because by 1985, the Oz books on which the film was based were in the public domain, and the subsequent Oz books had been optioned to Disney many years earlier. A large fee was paid, however, to use the ruby slippers, which were still the intellectual property of MGM at the time (the rights to the 1939 film and all elements now rest with Time Warner). The film was directed by Walter Murch, a respected editor and sound designer. Although it did not fare well at the box office and received mixed reviews from critics it has gained a loyal following.
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The movie's plot is a combination of L. Frank Baum's novels The Marvelous Land of Oz and Ozma of Oz, sequels to the novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Six months after returning from the Land of Oz, Dorothy Gale has become a melancholic child who cannot stop dreaming of the people she met in the magical land, concerning Aunt Em and Uncle Henry, who are skeptical of the place's existence. The two decide to take her to see Doctor Worley, known for his shock therapy treatments. Before going, Dorothy (thanks to her chicken, Billina) finds a key she believes her friends from Oz sent to her on a shooting star. Aunt Em leaves Dorothy at Dr. Worley's laboratory under the care of Nurse Wilson. As she is taken to have treatment, the lab has a blackout, and Dorothy is saved by a mysterious blonde girl who reveals that some patients have been driven insane by Worley's treatment and are hidden in the basement. The two escape with Nurse Wilson in pursuit, but they fall into a river. The blonde girl vanishes underwater - and, unbeknownst to Dorothy, returns to Oz - but Dorothy survives by clambering on board a chicken coop.
Upon awakening, Dorothy finds herself back in Oz with a now talking Billina for company. The two discover the ruined Yellow Brick Road, which leads them to the Emerald City, now in ruins, missing its emeralds, and all of its citizens including the Tin Woodman and Cowardly Lion turned to stone. Pursued by the Wheelers, who have wheels for hands and feet, Dorothy and Billina hide in a secret room using the key, and meet a clockwork mechanical man named Tik-Tok: The Royal Army of Oz [the only member of said army]. Taking charge, Tik-Tok explains that King Scarecrow is missing; the Nome King, they later learn, has captured him. When the three go to visit a head-exchanging witch named Mombi (who looks just like Nurse Wilson), for more information, they end up imprisoned, and meet Jack Pumpkinhead, a man made of tree limbs with a pumpkin for a head. Jack refers to Dorothy as his mother, having forgotten his own creator, and reveals he was brought to life via Mombi's Powder of Life. They all then formulate a plan to escape to the Nome King's mountain; Dorothy steals the Powder of Life and uses it to vivify The Gump, a moose-like animal whose body is made from a winged sofa. They escape and fly across the Deadly Desert, Mombi and the Wheelers pursuing underground.
The Gump's body falls apart while airborne and the group lands on the Nome King's mountain. The Nome King meets Dorothy and accuses the Scarecrow of stealing the emeralds from his kingdom, and then turns him into an ornament. The Nome King offers Dorothy's group a chance to locate the Scarecrow in his large ornament collection, but three guesses wrong, and they will be turned to ornaments as well. All meet this fate, and with each one changed the Nome King becomes increasingly human (who looks like Doctor Worley). During Tik-Tok's turn, his gears run out, and Dorothy is allowed in to wind him. On Dorothy's turn, before she enters the ornament room, The Nome King reveals to her that he conquered the Emerald City courtesy of her discarded Ruby Slippers. He offers to use them to send her back home, but she refuses and goes to find her friends.
On her last guess, she manages to locate the Scarecrow and the two begin restoring the others, who are all green ornaments. Upon learning this, the enraged Nome King traps Mombi in a cage and then confronts Dorothy and company in a gigantic, monstrous form. Intent on killing each one of them, he has his minions block off any possible escape route. He then tries to eat them, but Billina, who had been hiding in Jack's hollow head, lays an egg in fright and it falls into the Nome King's mouth. The Nome King drops Jack and he, his minions, and his kingdom begin crumbling to pieces, as eggs are poisonous to Nomes. As the palace crumbles and they seem to have no means of escaping, Dorothy finds the Ruby Slippers in some rubble. She quickly kicks off her black shoes, puts the slippers on and wishes for the Emerald City to return to normal and for her and her friends to escape, which they do. At the Emerald City, during a victory celebration, Dorothy spots the girl who had helped her escape the hospital in Kansas named Princess Ozma, Jack's long-lost creator and the rightful ruler of Oz who had been enchanted into a mirror by Mombi. Taking her place on the throne, Dorothy hands over the Ruby Slippers. After Mombi is imprisoned in the dungeon, Ozma then invites Dorothy to visit Oz any time she likes before sending her home, with one condition; Ozma herself will check in with Dorothy from time-to-time, to make sure that she is alright, and promising that if Dorothy ever wishes to return to Oz, she will make it so. Dorothy says goodbye to her friends and disappears in a flash of bright, white light.
Back in Kansas, Dorothy is located on a riverbank by her family. Aunt Em reveals that Worley's hospital was struck by lightning and burned down and Worley was killed in the fire; he had gone back to rescue his machines and perished in the fire. Nurse Wilson, who looks exactly like Mombi, gives Dorothy a glare and is arrested and carried away in a prison cart. Upon returning to the farmhouse, Dorothy sees Billina and Ozma - who has stuck to her word and is checking up on Dorothy - peering at her through her bedroom mirror. Seeing Mombi in the cart, and Ozma and Billina in her bedroom mirror can only mean one thing; Dorothy's adventures in Oz are not over yet.
Murch began development on the film in 1980, during a brainstorming session with Walt Disney Pictures production chief Tom Wilhite, “it was just a fishing expedition on both of our parts," recalls Murch. "But one of the questions he asked was, ‘What are you interested in that you think we might also be interested in?’, and I said, ‘Another Oz story.’ … And Tom sort of straightened up in his chair because it turned out, unbeknownst to me, that Disney owned the rights to all of the Oz stories. And they were particularly interested in doing something with them because the copyright was going to run out in the next five years.” [2]
Murch took a decidedly darker take on Baum's source material than the 1939 original, which he knew starting out would be a gamble.
We knew going in that it was going to be risky, but it had been 45 years since the original film came out, and I thought enough time had passed for a different sensibility to have a chance--to present a somewhat more realistic view about Dorothy and her life on the farm, and have the film not be a musical. Plus there were now whole new ways of doing special effects and creatures that I thought could be used to make something that looked and felt more like the books themselves, rather than the stagy, vaudevillian approach that had been taken in 1939. I definitely felt that if we had tried to really do a sequel, which is to say, do something in the style of an MGM musical, we would have been in even greater trouble, because there's just no way you can reinvent that particular combination of people, technology, and attitude, which really reached a peak in the late 1930s and never recovered after the war.
Walt Disney Pictures was so unhappy with the project's slow progress that after five weeks they fired Murch from the film. George Lucas stuck up for Murch and convinced the studio to keep the director on.[2]
Lucas, who's a friend, heard about what happened and flew to England from Japan, where he was at the time. He met with me and looked at what I had shot, then met with the Disney executives and said "No, this is going to be great, you guys just have to be more patient with this process, let's see what can be done to facilitate it." And he guaranteed the rest of the production--he said that if something else happened, he would step in and take control. That was enough to make the executives at Disney feel more confident about what was going on, and I was back directing again after a few days. It was a fantastic act of generosity and commitment on his part.
Murch used the book Wisconsin Death Trip as an historical source for the film.[3]
The movie received mixed reviews from critics, who described the film's content as too dark and intense for children. "Children are sure to be startled by the film's bleakness," said The New York Times's Janet Maslin.[4] "It's bleak, creepy, and occasionally terrifying," added Dave Kehr of the Chicago Reader. [5] Siskel and Ebert gave the film a highly negative review,[6] they even included it on their "Worst of 1985" list.
The film earned $2,844,895 in its opening weekend, finishing in seventh place. The film ultimately grossed $11,137,801 in North America. It has since gained a cult following.[7]
The film received an Academy Award nomination for "Best Visual Effects". Fairuza Balk and Emma Ridley were nominated for Young Artist Awards. The film received two Saturn Award nominations for Best Fantasy Film and Best Younger Actor (Fairuza Balk).