Oz of the Week: 'The Wizard of Oz' at Las Vegas' Sphere

I really hate this Wizard of Oz at the Las Vegas Sphere bullshit. At bare minimum, I think the idea is cool, expanding the world of the film to fill out the world's biggest screen ever or whatever the Sphere's claim to fame is. But they have just screwed this up so badly. Using AI for the world-extending is one thing (terrible is what that thing is), but using it to replace part of the original image is sacrilegious. Why was that necessary?

I don't care if they blow smoke in my face during the twister or whatever theme park-level crap they do, you don't have to mess with this movie.

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention that they've cut about 30 minutes off the runtime. I would ask why, but I think it's safe to assume so they can squeeze in more showtimes every day. My real question is: what did they cut? The movie is only 100 minutes long to begin with. If it's been a while since you've seen it (it's my favorite movie, by the way, which is why this bothers me so much - I've seen it a million times), I think you'd be surprised how short each sequence is. After they visit the Wizard for the first time, it really takes off. Is this whole sequences we're talking? That's just plain awful.

I'm also curious how they got Ben Mankiewicz to plug this crap on CBS Sunday Morning, a man I usually respect and a program I usually love. Over the last month, he has gotten a lot of (deserved) crap online for not only talking about this with any reverence whatsoever, but for essentially promoting it. His reputation, from his time as host for Turner Classic Movies, precedes him, and when it comes to classic cinema, his stamp of approval means something. His opinion is trusted and his decisions are believed to be thought-out. His excuse that it gets people to watch an 85 year old movie with Judy Garland could hold any water if it wasn't one of the biggest movies of all time and never needed to splash water in people's faces or whatever it does. Seeing him talk about ripping this thing apart with AI and who-knows-what cutting...well...it breaks my heart.

The whole thing does. And it should break yours too.