The Wizard of Oz (1939)

Whisked by a tornado from Kansas to the colourful Land of Oz, Dorothy soon learns there’s no place like home in MGM’s immortal musical fantasy.

It’s difficult to believe this evergreen family film was a commercial failure on its release, only acceding to its now iconic status after perennial revivals on television. MGM’s lavish production, which switches from sepia for the Kansas farmland sequences to glorious Technicolor for Oz, magically brought to life the original novel by L. Frank Baum.

From Dorothy’s (Judy Garland) wistful ballad ‘Over the Rainbow’ – where she dreams of life away from her dreary home – to the adventures along Oz’s Yellow Brick Road, in which Dorothy is joined by the Scarecrow, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion, every aspect of the film holds a special place in the public consciousness.

1939 USA
Directed by
Victor Fleming
Produced by
Mervyn Leroy
Written by
Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, Edgar Allan Woolf
Featuring
Judy Garland, Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger
Running time
98 minutes

Ranked in The Greatest Films of All Time poll

Sight and Sound

Who voted for The Wizard of Oz

Critics

Charles Bramesco
USA
Joaquín Chazarreta
Argentina
Sophie Determan
USA
Elsa Fernández-Santos
Spain
Hannah Hamad
UK
Mark Harris
USA
Maori Holmes
USA
Justin Johnson
UK
Stephen Jones
UK
Andrew Kendall
Guyana
James Kleinmann
USA
Dorota Lech
Canada/Poland
Kjetil Lismoen
Norway
Kristen Lopez
USA
Simon McCallum
UK
Robert Mitchell
UK
Stuart Murray
UK
Pia Reiser
Austria
David Rooney
USA
Will Sloan
Canada
Emma Smart
UK
Damon Smith
UK
Michael Sragow
USA
Tricia Tuttle
UK
Jake Wilson
Australia
Adrian Wootton
UK
Genevieve Yue
USA
Esther Zuckerman
USA

Directors

Lorcan Finnegan
Ireland
Karyn Kusama
USA
Lynne Ramsay
UK

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