Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return Poster

Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return (2013)

Animation | Family | Musical
Rayting:   5.5/10 5.5K votes
Country: USA | India
Language: English
Release date: 9 May 2014

Shortly after a tornado rips through her Kansas home, Dorothy returns to Oz to save her friends from a villainous jester.

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User Reviews

shottsy 16 June 2017

My fiancé and I can be cartoon masochists. Sometimes we watch questionable animated movies out of morbid curiosity and enjoy making hun of hem, but this movie was so bad it wasn't even enjoyable to make fun of. It looked like it was animated in the 90s, the music was forgettable and the characters were horribly one dimensional and stupid. I wouldn't have even enjoyed this as a child. What were they thinking? They spent all their money on voice actors and none on the film or story writing. How this ever got theatrical release is beyond me! What an awful awful movie!

pinkled5 13 May 2014

Fmovies: I'm a parent who has 3 animated movies in his top 10 favorite movies of all time (Frozen, Wreck-It Ralph & Incredibles) so I'm a good candidate to review this film objectively.

I took my 8 yr old son and 9 yr old daughter to see it. Final analysis?

Me & my son: It was o.k. My daughter: I liked it a lot!

I think most kids will enjoy this movie a lot. I was moderately entertained, which is more than I can say for a lot of the animated drivel that passes through our theater. I give it a 6 out of 10. It certainly doesn't deserve to bomb at the box office. I thought it was better than mindless sequels like Rio 2 or even Despicable Me 2, which I didn't enjoy much. But here's a full breakdown of my review:

VOICE ACTING 8/10: Martin Short was outstanding, and raises the score here. Kelsey Grammar was also very good. I love Dan Akroyd, but his portrayal of Scarecrow left a lot to be desired. Jim Belushi and Lea Michele were adequate in their roles, if not rather forgettable.

ANIMATION 6/10: The animation definitely has a sub-par appearance compared to large studio productions (such as Disney or Pixar) but it isn't anywhere near direct to DVD levels. I could tell the animators put their heart and soul into this film, they just didn't have the tools to make it look amazing. Dorothy's animation is a distraction, but many of the non-human characters were great. There was a lot of attention to detail but, unfortunately, the movie suffers from its low budget appearance. People do judge a movie by its cover and it suffers here.

PLOT/STORY 5/10: There's nothing new or interesting about this story. It progressed from point A to point B without any real surprises or a sense of what was propelling the characters forward.

CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT 5/10: The villain was the best part of this film. Excellently portrayed by Martin Short, he was a lot of fun to watch. Dorothy and most of her companions were pretty flat and uninteresting. Marshall Mallow was interesting but his relationship to his love interest seemed forced and a little contrived.

MUSIC/SONGS 6/10: The songs were technically proficient and had a professional feel to their production. Unfortunately, they were also rather uninspiring and not very catchy. There's no way anyone would be able to hum or sing any of those songs after just one viewing, as one "reviewer" claimed, they were just too unremarkable.

scottitaliaander 9 May 2014

I saw Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return in an advance screening last weekend. I took two of my sons with me, neither under the age of 16. Older teenagers are natural-born skeptics when it comes to kids' movies so I was sure they'd pan it.

Much to my (pleasant) surprise, they enjoyed the film as much as I did. From the opening credits-- which re-imagined the tornado sequence in the 1939 Wizard of Oz that we have all seen dozens of times--to the final frame, we were captivated by the characters, the songs and the storyline. In addition, the pacing of the movie was great, though there were a few moments where it felt a little "draggy." But just a few: my guess is the target audience (ages 6 to 12) won't even notice.

This independent film has some surprisingly big stars as voices of the characters, most notably Lea Michele of Glee fame. I had never heard of her a few months ago, but then I checked her out and found out she has 3.4 million fans on Facebook! She seems to be big among the teen set. Anyway, she plays a winsome yet spunky Dorothy, a 2014 version of the character popularized by oh-whats-her-name in 1939.

The Scarecrow, Lion and Tin Man are voiced by Dan Ayckroyd, Jim Belushi and Kelsey Grammar respectively. They have kept the inner core of these lovable characters while updating them to suit modern tastes.

The freshest part of the film are the new characters introduced as Dorothy returns to Oz and tries to make her way to the Emerald City, where an evil Jester (terrificly played by Martin Short) is wreaking havoc. In an echo of the original film, Dorothy first encounters and then wins over these characters (Wiser the Owl; Marshall Mallow, the Dainty China Princess and Tugg, played by Patrick Stewart) as she makes her way down the yellow brick road.

Some of the songs are forgettable but there some that really connect. "Even Then," a love ballad written by Bryan Adams and Tift Merrit, is sure to cause a lump in your throat. And "When the World" will probably be the tune that stays with you as you leave the theater. I wouldn't be surprised if the soundtrack is more popular than the movie itself.

All in all this is a film that the whole family should find charming and fun. And at 88 minutes it is the perfect length to tell the new Oz story while keeping your attention. Ignore those critics complaining about the quality of the animation. Its a kids' movie, for crying out loud!

trylontheatre1 15 June 2014

Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return fmovies. Disney tried to recreate the magic of the 1939 classic motion picture with OZ: THE GREAT AND POWERFUL; it didn't work and it doesn't work with this latest animated movie. The posters made it look interesting, but than there is the film itself. The story line was lousy and all the name star's voices did not help the picture. Can't the makers of movies, like this, see that it isn't good? Doesn't Hollywood have screening rooms any more? And what is with all these great reviews for this movie? Come on now. The way people write about this film you would think it was the second coming!!! Today's filmmakers need to forget about messing with one of the greatest motion pictures ever made and come up with new ideas.

james1844 10 May 2014

I find it hard to trust the 1st dozen or so reviews on some films found at this sight. Of course I could be mistaken but, I saw this film and found it to be full of nonsense and trite cliché dialog. With the mega cast that participated in the making of this film I expected a much better and more interesting story to be explored in this sequel classic.

As I watched the various characters enter the beginning scenes I felt they were very cardboard like. The few comedic scenes seemed almost too childish even for children. As to the animation, it was not to my liking. It seemed that it was taken from generic Saturday morning cartoons. It was bland and even boring to a degree.

Lastly I noticed that production costs of this animated film were surprisingly much more than I expected it to be. Nearly a million bucks a minute. I felt that for that kind of mega bucks this should have been a higher quality of product. The next few weeks will show weather the movie goers buy and or embrace this less than stellar movie.

Not every children's Animated film can be a "Frozen" or a "Finding Nemo" but they should at least aim for that quality and level of product.

amendpa 21 June 2014

As I suspected from its origins, this film is uninspired, unoriginal, and mostly humorless. Apparently it is doing poorly at the box office-- and rightly so. What is missing is the sense of humanity and wonder that infuses L Frank Baums's classic books (especially the first few) and the MGM classic film based on his first book. I think the problem with this film is that it is based on the rather mediocre "Dorothy of Oz" written by a Roger Baum, a great grandson of L Frank Baum. "Dorothy of Oz" has the same deficiencies as this film: lack of universality, originality, understanding of humanity or appeal to adults. Because of these deficiencies, even children will find this film as forgettable as Roger Baum's book. Instead of true originality we are given some new "cute" characters like Wiser the owl. It can't just "get by" on cuteness or nostalgia for the original Oz story. It just doesn't work. Successful children's books and films are driven by vision and heart: this film (and the book it's based on) have none.

I became aware of this film even before it was made, when people soliciting investors for the film contacted me. They were surprised to learn that someone actually knew about L. Frank Baum and his wonderful books (beyond the MGM film that almost everyone has seen). They appeared to believe that anything connected to the Wizard of Oz was golden, and were outraged by the idea that Roger Baum's book is uninspired and that a film based on it was doomed to fail.

Unfortunately, in the end the producers were not able to rise above the unoriginal "Dorothy of Oz." I feel sorry for whoever did invest in this boring debacle. I recommend that you skip this film, no matter the age of your children. Instead see a classic: rent Pinocchio, MGM's "Wizard of Oz," or Disney's "Mary Poppins" each of which has the heart that this film lacks.

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