Wizard of Oz review

For almost 70 years, the Wizard of Oz has captured the imagination of everyone who has seen it, from the songs, to the most memorable lines, such as "I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore."  It has been known to be the most popular movie ever made

The wizard of Oz may have not have been possible without the success of the animation film Snow white and the seven dwarfs.  Snow white showed that films adapted from popular children stories and fairytales, could be made succesfull amoung the public.  In January of 1938 MGM bought the rights to the popular novel written by Samuel Goldwyn and began production that same year.  It was MGM's most expensive movie made at that time.

One of the main reasons of the Wizard Of Oz's popularity, was the way it was filmed.  The opening and closing scenes were filmed using black and white and then colored in a sepia tone to make a kind of brown ash color.  In the novel, the author described Kansas as being "in shade of gray," the farm house and property were situated in the middle of the prairie where the grass was burnt gray by the sun.  The use of sepia tone was a stylistic choice that made the Kansas countryside seem dull, gray, and unattractive.  This was all made on purpose to set up for when Dorothy opens the door to see where she has landed after being picked up by the twister, thus exposing the colorful land of Oz and how important and attractive Oz was compared to Kanses.