Screen Magic & Wizards On Quickflix
The final book in the Harry Potter series is upon us – fans around the world
are counting down the days until Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, is in
their hot little hands, the seventh and final book in this insanely successful
book series.
The latest movie adaptation featuring the teen wizard in his battle against
evil is also on our big screens and doing – as you’d expect – blockbuster
business. It’s official: after
Harry Potter and the Order Of The Phoenix, young wizard Harry might
just be the most popular screen wizard of all time.
Though a close second to Harry is “Gandalf the Grey/White”, the genial old
wizard from Peter Jackson’s wildly successful movie adaptation of JRR Tolkein’s
Lord Of The Rings trilogy. Sir Ian McKellen brought Gandalf to life making him
an elegant and powerful foe for Christopher Lee’s evil “Saruman”, a not-so-nice
wizard lured to the dark side by the “evil of Sauron”…
But screen wizards don’t just start and end with Harry and Gandalf; there have
been some equally entertaining and formidable forerunners, and not all found in
fantasy movies either.
The most “Great and Powerful” of them all is in Victor Fleming’s classic family
film,
The Wizard Of Oz (1939). Musical, rite of passage story and road movie,
it featured 20 year-old megastar
Judy Garland playing 13 year-old Dorothy, who after being hit on the
head during a hurricane is air-lifted into the magical world of Oz. The only
way she can get back to her home in Kansas is to find the elusive Wizard of Oz.
Along the way she meets an array of good and bad characters with each teaching
her something about herself.
The
Wiz (1978) was the funky Motown version featuring some of the biggest
R&B stars and actors of the day, including
Diana Ross as Dorothy,
Michael Jackson as the daffy-headed Scarecrow and the late great
comedian
Richard Pryor as
The Wiz, aka “Herman Smith”. Starting out as a Broadway musical it
translated to the screen with suitable success.
Australia also spawned its own 70s take on the Wizard of Oz story with
Oz: A Rock n’ Roll Road Movie (1978). Featuring then stars
Garry Waddell,
Bruce Spence,
Robin Ramsey and
Michael Carman, the classic story is transplanted to a rock n’ roll
setting, with Dorothy (Joy Dunstan) a 16 year-old groupie on her way to see the
every last concert of glam pop icon, the “Wizard”.
But back to the magic: Merlin in John Boorman’s
Excalibur (1981) was a spirited sorcerer appointed to the court of King
Arthur. Comic relief was also provided in Arnie vehicle
Conan The Destroyer (1984) by Japanese actor
Mako, playing Akiro, Conan’s enchanted ‘offsider’, and Billy Crystal’s
shambolic Miracle Max in
The Princess Bride (1987) was conjured to provide laughs…
Perhaps the most memorable of them all is the apprentice wizard played by
Mickey Mouse in The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” section of Disney animation
Fantasia (1940). In his pointy hat and over-sized robe, poor Mickey had
to battle walking brooms and brimming buckets after disobeying his powerful
boss wizard “Yen Sid”. Waving a magic wand never looked so frustrating – or
messy.
- Megan
Megan Spencer has spent way too much of her life in the dark, all for a good
cause though - watching movies as a professional film critic. For the last six
and a half years she has been serving the ever-increasing hunger for film and
DVD reviews as radio triple j's resident film critic, and a year ago joined the
new line up of long-running SBS-TV film review program, The Movie Show.
Every now and then she pops up into the light to make her own films,
documentaries (her latest is 'Fantastic Brutality', a documentary about an
obsessed wrestling fan, to be released next year). She has also written about
film for many publications including J-Mag, Limelight, Inside Film Magazine and
the Age Green Guide.
And the impossible question to ask a film critic: what's her favourite film?
"Blue Velvet would be at the top of the list, so would Fight Club... But then
again American In Paris makes me cry every time."
Megan has also been part of the Foxtel's Project Greenlight Australia as an
on-air panelist and judge.
