Hotel Transylvania [Blu-ray]

Hotel Transylvania is a movie that almost never happened. The film was in the making for six years, and cycled through five directors before Genndy Tartakovsky finally signed on and got the project rolling for good. It?s a good thing he did, because Hotel Transylvania broke box office records back in September, making Hotel Transylvania one of the more successful animated films this year.

The Movie:

Hotel Transylvania follows Count Dracula (Adam Sandler), a hotel entrepreneur and over-protective father who has built a niche for himself and his vampire daughter, Mavis (Selena Gomez), in the middle of Transylvania. The hotel has developed a reputation as a secret haven for monsters like the Frankenstein family (Kevin James and Fran Drescher), werewolves (Steve Buscemi and Molly Shannon), the Invisible Man (David Spade), and even Quasimodo (Jon Lovitz). However, when a human boy named Jonathan (Andy Samberg) happens upon the hidden hotel and begins to fall for Mavis, the Count must determine whether to intervene or let his baby girl make her own chances.

The story is surprisingly touching for a cast that features frequent Sandler collaborators and was written by Borat co-writer Peter Baynham and SNL?s Robert Smigel. Sandler?s movies have always been tinged with family lessons alongside the jokes, but in Hotel Transylvania there?s a great balance between Sandler?s Count and a focus on Mavis? wants and needs, and the movie subsequently becomes more than just the Adam Sandler Show.

Still, there are touches of more standard, juvenile jokes throughout. There?s a lengthy fart joke involving Frankenstein?s legs going rogue that Tartakovsky openly admits in the commentary to being a part of as well as a werewolf bum sniffing joke that pops up later on. Audiences that can patiently sit through the kiddy laughs will find some performances and side comments that are terribly clever, and besides, even the fart joke isn?t the worst I?ve seen.

In a year filled with strange, scary and macabre animated films, Hotel Transylvania stands out with its animated characters, who retain many of the looks and appeal of the most horrific monsters from legend, while giving them cute or goofy faces and expressions that won?t make them intimidating for kids. Part of the reason I believe Frankenweenie and ParaNorman didn?t do so well with audiences was that those films focused on animation that was strange and scary. While the looks of those movies may be innovative and gleeful for some audiences, a lot of children don?t want to be frightened, and Hotel Transylvania doesn?t fall into that trap.

Hotel Transylvania isn?t the type of movie that will stand out as one of the greatest animated films of all time. It won?t break down barriers or usher audiences into a brand new era of animation, but it is a pleasant family tale that can be enjoyed again and again, and as such, it?s likely a worthy addition to any family collection.

The Disc:

The packaging for Hotel Transylvania is oddly sized. The set itself is thicker-than-normal, and I was surprised the 3D Blu-ray didn?t feature a signature blue case, like most other standard Blu-rays. While I didn?t catch the 3D version of the film while watching, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment?s film is crisp and heavily detailed on Blu-ray, and the menu page is easy to navigate.

As far as special features go, ?Goodnight Mr. Foot? is a cartoon extra which gives us another glimpse at the hotel featured in the movie, but focuses on different lead characters, with an almost Tom and Jerry-like plotline with a witch and a spider. This aired in certain theaters with the theatrical release.

I?m never a huge fan of deleted footage in an animated movie. Most of the scenes are never fully realized before they become part of the disc and are crudely drawn and difficult to watch. With Hotel Transylvania there are several deleted scenes. One in particular is a lengthy scene that explains more about Dracula?s meet-cute with his wife that is worth a watch if you liked the film. However, they are still unfinished scenes.

?Making the Hotel? is actually a great segment. For some reason, animated films are often a lot better at giving behind-the-scenes looks that focus a little more on process. In this segment, the animators discuss their love for their work and then show us some of the changes that are made while working on scenes as well as how animation goes through multiple stages of drawing and computer effects to achieve a final project.

?Progression Reels? is actually an explanatory piece that shows some of the effects different types of animation can achieve. This is really dry, so if you aren?t in to specifics on animation, it?s not the best use of your time. Additionally, the segment looks at some 3D effects, which obviously aren?t nearly as cool on the regular Blu-ray copy. However, if you want a step-by-step look at certain processes, this is one of the most comprehensive segments with a set I?ve ever seen.

A few other bonus features are available with Hotel Transylvania, including ?Meet the Staff" and "Guests: Voicing Hotel Transylvania,? which focus on the actors, a music video and a behind-the-scenes segment for the music video, and commentary from director Tartakovsky, producer Michelle Murdocca, and Daniel Kramer, the visual effects supervisor. There?s a nice mix of extras for kids and grown-ups, and a few oddities aside, it?s a spectacular set.

Distributor: Sony Pictures Home EntertainmentStarring: Adam Sandler, Selena Gomez, Andy Samberg, Kevin JamesDirected by: Genndy TartakovskyProduced by: Michelle MurdoccaWritten by: Robert Smigel, Peter Baynham

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Seven Psychopaths [Blu-ray]

From exploding cars and a stolen Shih Tzu to a heartwarming romance between two lovestruck serial killing serial killers, Martin McDonagh?s second feature film Seven Psychopaths has a little bit of everything in it. Now that it?s coming to home video, let?s go see if it?s a set that's worth a purchase.

The Movie:

For Martin McDonagh, a playwright and director celebrated for his dark comedies, the cruelest joke of all is probably that his films are consistently undermined by underwhelming marketing campaigns. When his first feature, In Bruges, came out it was to the tune of an extremely dull trailer, but the film was such a truly captivating experience that word of mouth has given it new life. Seven Psychopaths followed suit with a dated lime green poster accented with a small dog did all but promise prospective theatergoers that there would be some adorably quirky comedy coming their way. But the marketing team, the relentless villain that it is, has somehow managed to twist the knife in even deeper with the home video box art. The four male leads stand with the all but muted grit of an Expendables group shot in front of an exploding ?7,? thus ensuring Seven Psychopaths will be dismissed as a generic action movie, something it is decidedly not.

For those of us who aren?t fooled by the marketing?s chicanery, getting past the posters allows us to experience a vibrant film that is both smart and disarming. The characters and the scenes in which they breathe have such an inherent value to them that they are nothing short of precious stones sticking out in what could?ve been just another ?fun and gun? action movie. We follow the story of an aspiring screenwriter Marty (Colin Farrell) and his relationship with his best, and only, friend Billy (Sam Rockwell). Marty is struggling with his screenplay called ?Seven Psychopaths? and Billy is desperately trying to support him with inspiration whenever he?s not occupied with partner Hans (Christopher Walken) in his side business of stealing dogs and returning them to their owners for reward money. Through their interactions we are treated to the men?s ideas for the screenplay and these scenes enrichen the film with a quality almost similar to a collection of shorts but nowhere near that obvious.

As the story progresses, and a particular stolen dog gets our guys in trouble with a local hothead crime boss named Charlie (Woody Harrelson), the movie evolves into something else. If a film written by McDonagh led by a character named Marty who is working on a screenplay wasn?t a big enough hint, the audience should soon realize that what they watching is about to get even more self-referential. The characters in the movie begin to run through possible scenes in their movie and before long I started to realize that this whole adventure might just be McDonagh talking to himself. Suddenly there is no Billy or Hans. There is only Marty. Billy and Hans are merely the voices in his head suggesting what Marty should be writing. Should he be making the smart intellectual movie that Hans wants or the blood thirsty one that Billy craves?

Watching this play out, I realized that Marty may just want to write both of those movies and the challenge is set for McDonagh to try and pull it off. It?s a little bit like Spike Jonze?s and Charlie Kaufman?s Adaptation, but where that film has this debate as the climax, Seven Psychopaths plops it somewhere near the middle and covers its own tracks just enough to make you question if those scenes are even important to the larger narrative. Essentially, the viewer is allowed to be Marty, Billy, Hans, or even the ?played for laughs? gangster Charlie, in how they choose to enjoy the movie. To its credit, no one voice overpowers the other (except maybe for Billy?s since his scenes have more flamethrowers). If I am exploring the film on this level, maybe the whole ?stealing dogs to return them for reward money? is some big metaphor for selling the same old movies to audiences year after year. Hey, in that case, maybe the generic marketing is actually a genius joke.

Seven Psychopaths may not be a movie that audiences will watch every week and quote with their friends, but it is an experience that leaves you with a lasting impression and only gets better when remembering certain scenes and marveling at how they all fit together in this film about the writing process that refuses to settle on ever being finished. This lack of finality comes in the form of a coda which suggests that the film might not be ready to end just yet--but it?ll get back to you whenever it is.

The Disc:

The disc might as well be barebones. Out of its six featurettes (or a poetic seven if you count the trailers for upcoming releases) none of them exceed two-minutes. All of the extras are little more than teasing trailers with bits of interview cut into them--reused interviews at that. If anything is a highlight it is the novelty ?Seven Psychocats? which recreates the film?s trailer with cats. However, even this segment loses its appeal seconds in and would be nothing more than an easter egg in a standard Blu-ray release. The worst featurette is called ?Layers.? In the segment, clips of the movie are cut in a way to create some sort of rhythm, but this will probably only make you question why the extra even exists.

Picture and sound quality are fine, although the film seems extremely grainy and the opening scene looks so blown out that I wonder if it?s intentional or the result of poor quality control with the transfer. Surprisingly, the menus are nice and the copious use of typewriter sound effects do a great job to underline that you?re watching a movie from the writer?s point of view. This is not a disc to buy for anything other than the film itself because unfortunately, thanks to the lackluster box art, it does little to improve the look of your shelf.

Distributor: Sony Pictures Home EntertainmentStarring: Colin Farrell, Christopher Walken, Sam Rockwell, Woody Harrelson, Tom Waits, Abbie Cornish, Olga Kurylenko Produced by: Martin McDonagh, Graham Broadbent, Peter Czernin

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Jack The Giant Slayer

The beanstalk has been eliminated from the title of this version of Jack and the adventure that happens when he brings home magic beans, and we have to wait a hell of a long time to see it. When padding out a children's fairy tale to become an epic, CGI-heavy film, you've got to add some story in there somehow, and in its opening act Jack slides painfully from animated recreation of the giant legends to meet-cute between our hero and heroine to the political instability of a kingdom that doesn't exist.

Even when the beanstalk erupts, and Jack (dewy and engaging Nicholas Hoult) joins a rescue party to rescue the pretty princess (Eleanor Tomlinson) who's trapped atop it, director Bryan Singer can't quite wrap his arms around this wily revisionist fairy tale. Only when those titular giants emerge, miraculous creations of motion-capture and imagination, do Jack the movie and Jack the person seem to find their purpose, spinning a children's film with surprising violence and even more goofy humor, a fairly standard-issue fantasy with just enough sparks of wit that show someone cared enough to make it better.

That's not necessarily what I'd hoped for from Singer, who's spent the the four years since the muddled release of his terrific film Valkyrie working on this and overseeing the X-Men universe. Though Jack works with some excellent moments of tension-- like when Jack and his princess love are on the verge of being cooked into a giant pie-- it's not nearly the high wire expertise Singer has shown in the past, and the grinding mechanics of the script credited to four different people keeps the film leaden for far too long. A movie that gets good only after 45 minutes is a tough sit, but Jack only manages to become OK-- a hard sell both to the kids it's aimed at and the parents who might know Singer is capable of better.

Jack isn't as chaotic as Clash of the Titans and not nearly as self-serious as John Carter, which at least puts it ahead of some of its fellow early-spring fantasy competition. And its bright spots are often remarkable, like the swashbuckling Errol Flynn-style performance from Ewan MacGregor as the head of the rescue party, or Stanley Tucci as the princess's sniveling intended, with his own secret plans for how to rule the kingdom. When the rescue party begins the men-- of course they're all men-- are an unruly gaggle of about a dozen, and only after about half of them literally fall off the beanstalk is it possible to figure out group dynamics (Eddie Marsan is in there somewhere, but has a hard time breaking out of the pack). And though it's hard to to sense the love connection between Jack and Princess Isabelle that sends him clambering up that beanstalk, once they're reunited they have a nice thing going on. It's a shame the adventuresome princess barely gets to be a part of the actual action, but with so much else going on in the plot, it's almost a relief to have one less story to deal with.

The giants, and especially a motion-capture Bill Nighy as the leader Fallon, are a mighty impressive CGI creation, covered in all kinds of weird warts and growths and, on one of them at least, a second head. Shooting much of the film outdoors allows the giants to feel even more authentic, though parents might find that realism a bit too intense for kids. In an effort to balance that intensity Jack is crammed with silly humor, leaving it in an odd middle-ground between straight-up family adventure and a more familiar fantasy cribbed from Lord of the Rings. It's a strange hybrid, and not entirely a successful one, but hey, at least it's trying something different.

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Die Hard: 25th Anniversary Collection [Blu-ray]

The Die Hard: 25th Anniversary Collection has basically been released three other times with a few different tweaks since Live Free or Die Hard hit theaters in 2007. What audiences are getting that is different with this set is a bonus disc featuring seven brand new featurettes that retrospectively look back on 25 years of John McClane.

The Movie:

The 25th Anniversary Collection features three hard R-rated flicks, Die Hard, Die Hard 2: Die Harder, Die Hard with a Vengeance, as well as the PG-13 2007 film Live Free or Die Hard. Each of the films vary in picture quality, as they were shot during different time periods and don?t seem to have been particularly cleaned up for Blu-ray. Excepting the special effects in Live Free or Die Hard, these would probably all look similarly fine on DVD. I?d almost rather have grittier picture quality when it comes to a McClane movie, anyway.

It has been much easier to see how the Die Hard films have continued to resonate over the years when this set showed up and I could watch them one after another. Ever the reluctant hero, McClane (Bruce Willis) hasn?t really changed over the years, although the problems and circumstances he faces have changed and the spectrum has grown from one building to a much broader landscape over the years. Fans may always be privy to the same old McClane, but they never have to go on the same adventure.

Partially, this is due to the variety of rich villains and side characters the franchise has traditionally offered, with only a few missteps. Peppering each of the movies are fan favorite performances, from villainous characters played by Alan Rickman or even Maggie Q to side characters that have lived on in pop culture, including Holly Gennero McClane (Bonnie Bedelia), Sgt. Al Powell (Reginald VelJohnson), Trudeau (Fred Thompson), Zeus Carver (Samuel L. Jackson) and Marvin the Janitor (Tom Bower)--the list goes on and on.

When considering the Die Hard movies, normally fond moments and characters pop up, first. However, the Die Hard: 25th Anniversary Collection offers the somewhat unique ability to view each of the four films released in the franchise in order, to really sit up and pay attention to the material, and to hone in on the deft dialogue, the recurring themes, and a few other delicately handled moments that make the entire franchise a cohesive entity. It?s really not just the, ?Yippee ki-yay motherfucker? that holds the franchise together, it?s a lot of careful work by several different directors who believed in the character of McClane and what that character can bring to audiences time and time again. Whether or not fans have favorites among the four movies, I still believe it?s worth it to own all four.

The Disc:

It was a big disappointment that there was not a ton of cohesiveness between discs. The first three movies are set up with the same menu and formatting and the fourth flick in the franchise is literally the regular Blu-ray release just tacked on as part of the set. In fact, the Live Free or Die Hard disc was still sporting previews for The Simpsons Movie, which I actually appreciated, and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, which I would otherwise have forgotten existed.

Each of the discs come with a set of bonus features that have been available with other releases. The first Die Hard film, for instance, comes with commentary and news reels, among others. With some of the other movies, deleted scenes and featurettes are available. With Die Hard with a Vengeance an alternate ending is even available. There?s more, but that?s the gist.

The Bonus Disc is split into two sections. Viewers can choose the ?Decoding Die Hard? path or the Die Hard Trailers path. I actually chose the trailers first, and was happy I did, as I was rewarded with the A Good Day To Die Hard trailer at the end.

?Decoding Die Hard? is a lengthy set of retrospective segments that take a look at the making of the first 4 films in the Die Hard franchise, as well as other retrospective interview footage. There?s a full segment on McClane?s character called ?Modern-Day Hero,? which discusses everything from Willis having firm opinions on his character to the gun click over the ?mother fucker? line in the fourth Die Hard film that kept the rating at PG-13.

Each of the bad guys gets a lengthy segment and each of the sidekicks and most of the side characters are remembered during another segment. ?Punishing Blows? takes a look at the action sequences and how Maggie Q?s big scene in the fourth film is the first time McClane has been evenly matched by a woman during an action sequence, which is worth a watch. Following this is a segment on the ?explosive? effects. The most exciting of these is the discussion of the miniature work that goes on in the first couple of films.

While the retrospective featurettes are certainly worth the watch, the packaging is unremarkable and even features a piece of paper listing the extras on the bonus disc glued to the back. If you?ve been hankering for copies of all of the movies in the franchise, the Die Hard: 25th Anniversary Collection certainly fulfills that niche and even offers some worthwhile extras, but it isn?t anything to write home about and it may be worth holding out until the newest film can be added to the mix.

Starring: Bruce Willis, Alan Rickman, Samuel L. Jackson, Justin Long, Maggie QDirected by: John McTiernan, Renny Harlin, Len WisemanProduced by: Joel Silver, Lawrence Gordon, John McTiernan, Michael FottrellWritten by: Jeb Stuart, Steven E. de Souza, Doug Richardson, Mark Bomback

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The Last Exorcism Part II

New Orleans is a really spooky place. It?s a strange mix of buttoned up Christianity, hidden superstitions and nighttime sin. It has its own pace, its own bilingual history and its own demons. In many ways, it?s the perfect setting for a horror movie interested in creepy and off-putting visuals and/ or backstories involving slavery, vampires and old mansions that have fallen into disrepair.

At times, The Last Exorcism really seems to understand the potential in its location. It cuts to creepers in Mardi Gras masks and disturbing painted street performers. It even throws in some voodoo-like rituals, but none of it is enough to save a flat exorcism story arc that few of us asked for and even fewer will enjoy.

Even casual horror fans have probably seen at least one young woman?s body twisted, contorted and raised into the air. If not, they?ve at least seen one member of a weird cult or religious organization get called out of the bullpen to try his home spun remedies on a protagonist slowly losing his or her mind. That?s why exorcism movies have to be about the characters now, as as characters go, The Last Exorcism is short on good ones.

After the de-possession story of the first The Last Exorcism, Nell Sweetzer (Ashley Bell) is discovered in the woods and brought to live in a group home for troubled young girls. After repeatedly being told the demon who possessed her, Abalam, isn?t real, she starts to make a real life for herself. There's a potential boyfriend (Spencer Treat Clark) to awkwardly go to the zoo with, a gaggle of girlfriends to talk about it with, and a job as a maid in a local hotel, but alas, we all know that bliss can?t last in an exorcism movie. Abalam reappears in various forms to sometimes torture her, sometimes woo her and consistently confuse the hell out of any viewers with common sense.

There?s a difference between a genre movie not answering every possible question a viewer might have and a horror movie straight up not making sense, and The Last Exorcism 2 is on the wrong side of that unforgiving line. We?re told Abalam is powerless without Nell; yet, he?s apparently capable of inhabiting people?s bodies and committing a boatload of felonies with only a marginal bit of effort. Sometimes we?re given evidence to believe certain characters and certain behaviors are figments of people?s imaginations, and sometimes we?re given evidence to believe certain characters and certain behaviors are actually happening. It?s a big jumbled, needlessly complicated mess.

The Last Exorcism worked because it made clever use of a skeptic, got a great performance from its lead actress and offered just enough genuine scares. The Last Exorcism 2 gets that same great performance from Bell, but beyond that, it doesn?t offer much more than confusion and the occasional New Orleans shoutout. Unlike its predecessor, this one isn?t destined for good word of mouth, and if we?re in luck, it won?t be destined for another sequel either.

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Dark Skies

There are times when I think that the horror genre is a club that?s slowly trying to exclude me because I?m not afraid of children. In the past six months I have reviewed three underwhelming horror movies that used creepy children to spook audiences, but with each one I was left pleading for studios to find another trope to run into the ground. Instead I get Dark Skies, or as I like to call it, ?Number Four.?

Unlike The Posession, Sinister and Mama, at the very least writer/director Scott Stewart?s new film trades demons and spirits for aliens, but doesn?t do much more than put a sci-fi twist on a plot device that has sincerely worn out its welcome. It?s not hard to see what the filmmaker was trying to do with the story; the problem is that it fails in execution.

The film stars Kerri Russell and Josh Hamilton as parents of two kids (Dakota Goyo, Kadan Rockett) who are dealing with the usual suburban family problems when they begin to experience strange events that could be the work of extraterrestrial forces. Of course, it?s the children that have the most direct contact with the otherworldly beings and come to harm as a result. To his credit, Stewart broaches on interesting themes and social conflicts, like innocent parents being suspected of abusing their children, but anything even remotely interesting is dragged down by the languid pace and overuse of clich?s. How many more times do I have to see a stoic youngster draw a crude crayon drawing of their spooky invisible friend?

Dark Skies isn?t a found footage film, but it uses a very similar story structure to the Paranormal Activity films and succeeds in being just as boring. Each night Russell?s character wakes from her sleep, walks around the house and discovers something weird. The next day they deal with the weirdness, call the proper authorities, and try and figure out what?s going wrong while the youngest son acts strange and talks about the Sandman visiting him at night. This pattern is repeated multiple times with each night escalating the situation and therefore the drama between family members. It doesn?t take long to see the structure and it gets old fast.

Slow as it may be, the film shows some flashes of subtlety. While Stewart has a long background in visual effects he keeps them to a minimum here, taking the Jaws approach and understands that sometimes less is more. The film does occasionally take a heavier-handed approach to scares, such as scenes where small birds suicide bomb the family?s home and Russell gets put into a trance and bashes her head against a sliding glass door (which comes across as absurd more than frightening), but sometimes you have to appreciate convention being bent when it?s not being broken.

In the film?s second act the parents go to visit an alien expert played by J.K. Simmons who proceeds to give them a test to see if they are legitimately experiencing extraterrestrial contact. As he reads off the list of strange events and the parents begin to nod and share worried expressions you begin to realize that this was the same list that the writer/director got his hands on before writing the script and used it to structure the film. But while Dark Skies may live up to ?Believer? codes, that doesn?t make it an entertaining time at the cinema.

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Oz The Great And Powerful

In a world of sequels, reboots, remakes, re-adaptations and re-imaginings, prequels have become one of Hollywood?s hardest nuts to crack. There have been far fewer successes than notorious missteps, from George Lucas? second Star Wars trilogy to X-Men Origins: Wolverine. In directing Oz The Great and Powerful, Sam Raimi was facing an uphill battle working to live up to the legacy of Victor Fleming?s classic The Wizard of Oz, but by embracing what was great about the old film while introducing plenty of new to the world, he has succeeded.

The legacy of both Disney and Oz both could have found a way to stifle Raimi?s style, but Oz The Great and Powerful is undeniably a Raimi film. The director brings all of his little flourishes that he?s had since The Evil Dead to the new blockbuster - most notably the quick-zooms that distinguish scenes of chaos ? and he?s also even able to play around with some scarier elements. The film is never any more frightening than The Wizard of Oz is, but between dragon-winged baboons, intense witches and a scene involving some freaky plant monsters, the movie will raise your pulse at times.

And credit to Raimi for actually building Oz for his actors to interact in instead of a bunch of green screens. Not only does it give the film a surreal quality, convincing the audience of its otherworldliness, it?s also a boon to the 3D cinematography, which succeeds in not making the characters look like cardboard cutouts against a matte painting. But where the CGI does come in its fantastic, particularly in the design and integration of the China Girl, who looks impressively photorealistic.

As an origin story for The Wizard of Oz, this film cleverly balances its own story while also embracing the elements that made the original great to begin with. Raimi includes many nods to Fleming?s movie, including the sepia-toned 4:3 aspect ratio opening that turns to color and widescreen in the Land of Oz, and the fact that both stories have a group of unlikely heroes joining together to go on a great adventure, but keeps the story surprising and clever enough for it all to play as loving homage. The troupe that the movie pulls together - which includes Oz (James Franco), the con-man/magician/presumed wizard destined to save the land from the wicked witch; Finley (Zach Braff), a flying monkey who owes a life-debt to Oz; and the aforementioned China Girl (Joey King), a sassy young porcelain doll who Oz rescues ? has wonderful chemistry and conflicting personalities, while the three witches Glinda, Evanora and Theodora (Michelle Williams, Rachel Weisz, and Mila Kunis) all get interesting new backstories that add surprising depth to previously underdeveloped characters.

Fun as Franco is in the eponymous role, it?s surprisingly his CGI co-stars that wind up stealing the show. As Finley, Braff has the benefit of getting the lion?s share of the funniest one-liners and quips, but the actor deserves the credit for his great timing and simply having the perfect voice for the part. King, meanwhile, brings the ideal level of pluck and cute humor to the China Girl without ever being cloying or reducing the character to being a stereotype.

Unlike 2011?s The Thing, Hannibal Rising or Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd, Oz The Great and Powerful is the rare prequel that fans will want to rewatch back to back with the original classic, not only finding the places where the stories sync up, but also just enjoying the story of it all. It?s an entertaining family movie, a true Sam Raimi film, and a fun return to a merry old land.

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