Oz the Great and Powerful (2013)Movies

In order to be disappointed, you don’t have to compare director Sam Raimi’s “Oz: The Great and Powerful” to its predecessor, the 1939 masterpiece “The Wizard of Oz.” This prequel would disappoint just fine on its own lack of merits.

In all, L. Frank Baum wrote thirteen “Oz” novels after the success of his first, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz,” upon which the Judy Garland classic is based. Using material from the sequels/prequels, Disney obviously hopes to create a lucrative franchise, starting with this story that goes back twenty years before “The Wizard of Oz” to explain how the Wizard ended up in Oz.

Set in 1905, a charmless James Franco plays the title character, a hack magician and serial womanizer who narrowly...