Author: Grant Curtis
Paperback: 256 pages
Publisher: Disney Editions
Release Date: March 5, 2013
Our Score: 2.5 out of 5 stars
When you watch “Oz: The Great and Powerful”, you literally drool at what a visual marvel this film is. There is no denying why this film cost over $200 million dollars. So once watching it I knew that Disney would have to make an equally amazing “art of” book like they have so well done with their releases in the past. “The Art of Oz The Great and Powerful” though is a bit underwhelming. The first thing that I thought when I opened it is that is plays out more like a visual companion or “making of” book than it does an “art of” book. In terms of visual, it is quite impressive but in terms of art it falls a bit short overall.
This release is also a recent first for Disney to publish in paperback only. The book though runs much cheaper at around $15 dollars but I still would prefer to pay a bit more and get a nice hardcover. When I think of “Art of” book, I think of a high quality hardcover collectible. After a wonderful film like “Oz” was, I feel like it really deserved a hardcover binding a little more more TLC, just sayin’. In terms of content though this book is in the right hands. It is written by Grant Curtis, who is also the film’s executive producer and has worked with Raimi before on numerous other projects. He also authored “The Spider-Man Chronicles”, which was a very sharp book as well (despite how bad “Spider-Man 3” was). I feel that he does a good job here with delivered interesting content and images but the book suffers from a general lack of love.
“The Art of Oz The Great and Powerful” focuses mostly on the production of the film and features some never-before-seen film stills, a little bit of concept art, all tied up with some nice interviews with the cast and crew. The artwork included was very environmental including the sets and locations. Since the film is basically all CGI, I would have expected to be a very large plethora of art created by Disney’s talented artists in order to bring their visions to life. I am sure there was but it is not represented here to the extent that I was hoping for. If you are looking for a look more into the filming process, then this might be the ticket to explore the wonderful land of Oz. I just felt like it was missing a bit of the magic that the film was filled with.
