| The Wonderful Land of Oz | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Barry Mahon |
| Written by | Barry Mahon |
| Based on | The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum |
| Produced by | Barry Mahon |
| Starring | Channy Mahon Zisca Baum Caroline Berner George Wadsworth |
| Cinematography | Barry Mahon |
| Edited by | Steve Cuiffo |
| Music by | George Linsenmann |
Production companies | Childhood Productions Cinetron |
| Distributed by | Childhood Productions |
Release date |
|
Running time | 71 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
The Wonderful Land of Oz is a 1969 film directed by Barry Mahon. [1] It is a low budget but faithful adaptation of the 1904 novel The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum.
When Tip's witch guardian Mombi threatens to granitize him, Tip evades Mombi and flees to the Emerald City with his recently-animated companion, Jack Pumpkinhead. Along the way, he meets up with General Jinjur, leader of the Army of Revolt, who imprisons Tip and marches her troops to take over the Emerald City. Tip escapes to warn the Scarecrow, now the ruler of the city, and together they leave to find the Tin Woodman and assemble their own army.
Jellia Jamb and Omby Amby also appear but are uncredited.
Characters and incidents difficult to stage are left out, including the Sawhorse, the river crossing, the Jackdaws, the Wishing Pills, the Sunflowers, and the Griffin. The Field Mice are represented by a single white rat who does not speak. The Gump appears but its screen time is minimal.
The Soldier with the Green Whiskers and the Guardian of the Gates are combined into a single unnamed character. This conflation was originally done by Jack Snow in the novel The Magical Mimics in Oz (1946), in which case it was a continuity error, and has been done deliberately by some more recent film adaptations, including Oz the Great and Powerful .
In an apparent plot hole, Jack Pumpkinhead, speaking shortly after his "birth," knows that although Mombi enlivened him, Tip built him, and thus he considers Tip his father. By this point in the story, neither Tip nor Mombi had told him about his origin.
The Emerald City appears to have a population of exactly three (The Scarecrow, Omby Amby, and Jellia Jamb) prior to Jack Pumpkinhead's arrival.
The younger female characters, such as Jinjur and Jellia Jamb, wear 1960s miniskirts and go-go boots, and have then-fashionable haircuts. The "girlish" grievances of the Army of Revolt, set in the context of suffragettes in the 1904 novel, have been updated to include "homework" and "babysitting," and they are played as typical "rebellious teenage" stock characters of 1969.
The most radical departure comes at the end, when Tip's spiritual essence flies away to dwell in all the boys in the land, leaving an amnesiac Ozma who has no memory of the whole adventure. The idea that Tip and Ozma could exist as separate entities originated in Jack Snow's short piece "A Murder in Oz," published posthumously in 1958, and has been recycled by other authors.
Mahon told Variety that he was planning to get Judy Garland to narrate, but eventually she did not. [2] A popular rumor is that Jinjur's Army of Revolt is composed of actors who had previously appeared in Mahon's nudie films. This is, however, not the case. The nudie films were made in New York City, while the children's films were made in Florida. Mahon did not bring any of his former performers to appear in the film. [3]
According to Michael R. Thomas, Hilary Lee Gaess, the actress who played Glinda, had extreme bouts of stage fright.
Mahon and songwriters Linsenmann and Falco re-teamed for Jack and the Beanstalk and Thumbelina, both released in 1970. All three films are owned by Jeffrey C. Hogue.
Another oft-repeated error is the claim that the songs are by Loonis McGlohan and Alec Wilder. [4] This is derived from the fact that they wrote music for the Land of Oz theme park in Banner Elk, North Carolina, released on a vinyl record titled The Land of Oz. [5] Their songs were inspired by The Wonderful Wizard of Oz , not The Marvelous Land of Oz . The songs for the film were composed by George Linsenmann with lyrics by Ralph Falco.
The Wonderful Land of Oz played in Saturday "kiddie matinee" [6] [7] venues, but was not released on VHS until after it had been issued on DVD, making it something of a lost and often misreported legend. Some sources, such as Allan Eyles's 1985 book, The World of Oz, claim that Dorothy Gale accompanied Tip on his journey in this film, but this is not the case. (It is, coincidentally, the case in Ozu no Mahōtsukai from 1986.)
The film was released on VHS in 2001 and DVD in 2002, as a double feature with Jack and the Beanstalk, by Something Weird Video. [8] [9] That it remained unavailable on any home media until the 21st century may explain the rumors published by Eyles and others.[ original research? ] RiffTrax released a comedy commentary track in 2017. [10]
The Marvelous Land of Oz: Being an Account of the Further Adventures of the Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman, commonly shortened to The Land of Oz, published in July 1904, is the second book in L. Frank Baum's Oz series, and the sequel to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900). This and the following 34 books in the series were illustrated by John R. Neill. It was followed by Ozma of Oz (1907).
Princess Ozma is a fictional character from the Land of Oz, created by American author L. Frank Baum. She appears for the first time in the second Oz book, The Marvelous Land of Oz (1904), and in every Oz book thereafter.
Glinda is a fictional character created by L. Frank Baum for his Oz novels. She first appears in Baum's 1900 children's classic The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, and is the most powerful sorceress in the Land of Oz, ruler of the Quadling Country South of the Emerald City, and protector of Princess Ozma.
The Land of Oz is a magical country introduced in the 1900 children's novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz written by L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W. W. Denslow.
The Deadly Desert is the magical desert in Nonestica that completely surrounds the fictional Land of Oz, which cuts it off from the rest of the world.
Oz Squad is a comic book series using characters and setting from L. Frank Baum's Land of Oz series, "updated for a more adult audience".
Jack Pumpkinhead is a fictional character from the Land of Oz who appears in several of the classic children's series of Oz books by American author L. Frank Baum. Jack first appeared as a main character in the second Oz book by Baum, The Marvelous Land of Oz (1904), and returned often in subsequent books. He got the starring role in Ruth Plumly Thompson's 1929 book Jack Pumpkinhead of Oz.
Journey Back To Oz is a 1972 American animated adventure musical fantasy film produced by Filmation. It is loosely based on L. Frank Baum's second Oz novel The Marvelous Land of Oz (1904), although Baum received no screen credit.
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Mombi is a fictional character in L. Frank Baum's classic children's series of Oz Books. She is the most significant antagonist in the second Oz book The Marvelous Land of Oz (1904), and is alluded to in other works. Mombi plays a very important role in the fictional history of Oz.
General Jinjur is an antagonist in the 1904 novel The Marvelous Land of Oz. She is a character in the Oz books by L. Frank Baum and his successors.
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, known in Japan as Ozu no Mahōtsukai (オズの魔法使い), is a Japanese anime television series adaptation based on four of the original early 20th century Oz books by L. Frank Baum. In Japan, the series aired on TV Tokyo from 1986 to 1987. It consists of 52 episodes, which explain other parts of the Oz stories, including the events that happened after Dorothy returned home.
Jellia Jamb is a fictional character from the classic children's series of Oz books by American author L. Frank Baum. She is first introduced in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900), as the head maid who works in the royal palace of the Emerald City which is the imperial capital of the Land of Oz. In later books, Jellia eventually becomes Princess Ozma's favorite servant out of the Emerald City's staff administration. She is also the protagonist of Ruth Plumly Thompson's 1939 novel Ozoplaning with the Wizard of Oz. Her name is a pun on the phrase "Jelly or jam?"
The Marvelous Land of Oz is a 1981 musical play by Thomas W. Olson (book), Gary Briggle (lyrics), and Richard Dworsky (music), based on the 1904 novel by L. Frank Baum. Briggle originated the role of the Scarecrow in the original production, directed by John Cark Donahue at The Children's Theatre Company and School of Minneapolis.
The Soldier with the Green Whiskers is a character from the fictional Land of Oz who appears in the classic children's series of Oz books by American author L. Frank Baum and his successors. He is introduced in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900). His name is Omby Amby, but this was so obliquely stated that he also became known briefly as Wantowin Battles.
Emerald City Confidential is a 2009 computer adventure game conceived by Dave Gilbert, developed by Wadjet Eye Games, and published through PlayFirst.
The Marvelous Land of Oz is a comic book series published by American company Marvel Comics based on The Marvelous Land of Oz book written by L. Frank Baum. It is an eight issue limited series written by Eric Shanower, penciled by Skottie Young, and colored by Jean-Francois Beaulieu. It is a sequel to a previous adaptation of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz from the same team.
The Woggle-Bug is a 1905 musical based on the 1904 novel The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum, with book and lyrics by the author and music by Frederic Chapin that opened June 18, 1905 at the Garrick Theater in Chicago under the direction of Frank Smithson, a Shubert Organization employee. The musical was a major critical and commercial failure, running less than a month. Chapin, however, had proven quite saleable to the publisher, M. Witmark and Sons, and many of the songs were published. The music director was Frank Pallma. The surviving sheet music was published by Hungry Tiger Press in 2002.
Dorothy Must Die is a 2014 young adult book by Danielle Paige and her debut novel. The book, which was produced through Full Fathom Five, was released on April 1, 2014 through HarperCollins and was preceded by the novella No Place Like Oz.
